CPAWS Yukon Press Coverage

Two northern First Nations have agreed to work together to protect the waters that flow across both of their traditional lands, in light of increased mining activity in the Peel River area. Mining companies have been exploring for metals and minerals on the Peel River watershed in the Yukon. That has Gwich'in communities, downstream in the Northwest Territories, worried about pollution affecting their drinking water.

Before an oil and gas or tourism company can operate in the Yukon wilderness, they need government approval.

Miners don’t.

“The miner has the right of entry on lands that may contain minerals without getting a permit, without consulting the Crown, without telling the First Nations,” said Karen Baltgailis, the Yukon Conservation Society’s executive director.

Mining companies enjoy special treatment in their exploration activities because of the free-entry system or “free staking.” Click here to read the entire article.

The Yukon government has approved Cash Minerals’ application for a winter road along the Wind River, but has struck down the request for a new airstrip. Marg White, manager of land use for the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources, released her seven-page decision Tuesday afternoon. White explains in the document that it was felt there was not enough information provided to properly assess the environmental and socio-economic impacts of the proposed one-kilometre airstrip beside the Wind River.

Environmental groups fighting a mining company's proposal to build a winter road and airstrip along the Wind River are asking the Yukon government to block the company's bid, arguing that environmental assessors made serious errors in their review. The Yukon Conservation Society and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society are opposed to the proposal by Cash Minerals to build the 178-kilometre winter road and airstrip in the area, located near Mayo.

The proposal for a winter road to haul supplies up the territory’s Wind River has cascaded into a mammoth debate. It also prompted a second extension until midnight last night to the time allotted by the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board (YESAB) for public input.

During the past 20 years I have had the good fortune to travel throughout the Peel basin on water and by foot, along the Wind, Snake, Bonnet Plume, Hart, Ogilvie and Blackstone River watersheds, as well as the Peel River itself. These trips revealed to me what many Yukon people already know, and many others are beginning to recognize — the rivers, mountains and boreal ecology of the Peel watershed constitute one of the finest wild places left on the planet. Click here to read the entire commentary.

The proposed winter road along the Wind River by Cash Minerals has whipped up a passionate and heated debate. There have been no fewer than 90 public comments to the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board (YESAB). Submissions clearly show a gaping division between the environmental conservation community and the pro-mining camp, with no halfway compromise in sight. Conservation groups and supporters suggest that allowing the winter road would be the beginning of the end for one of the last spectacular wilderness areas in the world.

People from as far away as Germany are making a case for and against a proposed winter road in the Wind River area of central Yukon, flooding environmental reviewers with dozens of comments. The Yukon Environmental and Socio-Economic Assessment Board's office in Mayo has received 60 public submissions on the Wind River Trail proposal — more than what it received for all other projects it reviewed this year.

… The exhibition is organized and circulated by The Yukon Art Centre Public Art Gallery. Because Canada has about twenty percent of the world’s remaining intact landscapes, with a sizeable portion in the Yukon, a regional land use plan is urgent. Through the expedition and the exhibition, CPAWS highlights their critical mission.