| Snowmobiles>
Snowmobiles News Center > For now, Winter motor sports not in jeopardy in the Chateauguay Valley
For now,
Winter motor sports not in jeopardy
in the Chateauguay Valley
Click
here to see our selection of Snowmobiles.
 http://www.zenwaiter.com/
By Susanne J. Brown
Dec 22 2005 -
Since the recent court decision up North making a MRC pay millions
of dollars for snowmobile pollution and some local farmers banning
snowmobiles and all terrain vehicles from their land, the future
of winter motor sports is in a state of flux despite a serious amount
of snow already on the ground.
However, "here, everything is fine," insists Benoit Leblanc,
president of the Lac St-Francois Snowmobile Club Inc., which has
close to 200 members, in addition to countless American and other
tourists, who use the club's 110 kms of trails around Dundee, Huntingdon,
and Sainte-Barbe.
The Supreme Court decision forcing a regional government to pay
$8,400 in compensation to each of the 600 residents living within
100 metres of a 38-kilometre section of the P'tit Train du Nord
snowmobile trail in the Laurentians because they had to endure the
noise and smell of winter recreational vehicles passing by their
homes, has had other regions considering if they can afford the
sport in their MRCs. But with the textile industries closing down
in Huntingdon, the Haut Saint-Laurent MRC has yet to make an official
decision about trails in this region.
In addition, last week the provincial government passed special
legislation to ban any other snowmobile trail lawsuits until 2006,
to reduce speed limits and close some trails overnight in residential
areas, which has taken the pressure off the snowmobile industry.
"So far, sales have been good this year," says Tony Nieuwenhof,
owner of Les Equipments TM Inc., a relatively new company that sells
Ski-doo and Bombardier ATV, as well as tires and farm equipment,
in Huntingdon.
Nieuwenhof has, however, noticed "a lot more indecision for
my customers" when it comes down to the final sale of a machine
because of the news farmers are boycotting access to some trails.
Also, so far Nieuwenhof has had one cancelled order because the
client's wife worked at Cleyn & Tinker.
Nevertheless, "the dossier is changing day-to-day," says
the president of the Lac St-Francois Snowmobile Club Inc., who is
also a farmer in St-Anicet.
"But for now, it is calm," says Benoit Leblanc.
Locally, representatives of the Saint-Jean-Valleyfield Union des
producteurs agricoles (UPA) met with all the snowmobile and four-wheeler
clubs presidents from the region before the snowmobile season opened
to highlight how unfair municipal taxes have been for farmers and
their need to draw attention to their financial plight by forbidding
snowmobile and ATV access to their land.
"For the past 10 years, municipal taxes have significantly
increased for farmers in some municipalities," says Jean Hogue,
regional director of the Saint Jean-Valleyfield UPA.
"Farmers are paying astronomical amounts compared to the services
received," he says.
In fact, because taxation is based on acreage, "it is not
rare to see farmers paying $5,000 to $8,000 per year, often more,
just for police services," says Pierre Caza, director of territory
management, environment and marketing with the Saint Jean-Valleyfield
UPA Federation.
In spite of this, "our demonstration is not against snowmobilers
or drivers of ATVs. It has always been free for them to cross our
land and we have never asked for anything. But we are paying high
taxes on that land and we need them now as another group to help
us put pressure on the MPS to settle this inequity," says Caza.
The provincial level of the UPA as well as the Board of Directors
for the Chateauguay Valley UPA English Syndicate do not agree with
the regional Saint-Jean-Valleyfield UPA's pressure tactic of closing
trails passing through farmland. They feel there are other ways
of expressing dissatisfaction with municipal taxation. The Chateauguay
Valley UPA, however, is respecting the regional Saint-Jean-Valleyfield
farmers' union's decision.
"The Chateauguay Valley Board is not in favour, but we are
standing behind the federation because it is a regional problem
that has to be resolved one way or the other," says Ken Brooks,
president of the Chateauguay Valley UPA English Syndicate.
"People see farmers getting up to 70% of their municipal and
school taxes back. But when land values increase three times, we
are being taxed three times as much. We're being unfairly taxed
for the same amount of services received as someone with just a
house," he says.
Overall, the UPA "doesn't want to make snowmobile enemies"
in rural regions, they simply want municipal taxes based "on
per household, not per value of land," says Brooks.
A regional UPA federation meeting is being held today, December
22, to decide if the boycott of the snowmobile and four-wheeler
trails will continue.
Have an opinion about this article? Want to discuss it? Check out
our Snowmobile
Forum!
|
