June, 12, 2012:  
Letter to Ms. Mico, Manitoba Coordinator, IBA 

Dear Ms. Mico:

 I am writing on behalf of Citizens for Charleswood Habitat Preservation (CCHP), a community group formed in response to the announcement by the City and Landmark Planning and Design Inc (representing Qualico) in June 2011 to develop Ridgewood South. This area is approximately 1,000 acres of largely undeveloped, private land located in South Charleswood bordered by Wilkes Ave to the south, perimeter to the west, Assiniboine Forest to the east, and Harte Trail to the north, although there is a fair amount of land north and contiguous to the Harte that is part of the plan. We are not anti-development as we believe our concerns would be ignored if we took this position.

I understand you are the Manitoba Coordinator for IBA (important bird areas) and a member of Nature Manitoba. As such I am hopeful you can assist us in securing 25% natural area our group has requested, to preserve the biodiversity in birds (in particular), amphibians, invertebrates, mammals, and natural areas that support these populations in Ridgewood South. The City requires the developers to allocate 10% natural areas - which they have met - and they are interested in preserving a bit more as they understand this is the last greenland in Winnipeg slated for development, understand Charleswood resident's concern about this issue, and have educated themselves (with our insistent prodding) on national and global initiatives to preserve urban natural areas. It is the city's responsibility (and ours) to make up the remaining 15%.

As part of the planning process, the city's naturalist dept conducted an natural area assessment (NAA) in the fall of 2011 as the first step of the city's Ecologically Significant Natural Land (ESNL) Strategy. Our group, which has a volunteer biologist and botonist, found significant flaws in the assessment and indicated much of the surveys were dated, and that they did not conduct bird, mammal, amphibian, invertebrates surveys. They responded these populations could be assessed based on the plant/land grading alone as per their habitat surveys. We expressed these concerns to the City planners, our councillor, and Landmark Planning and Design.  Consequently Qualico, to their credit, hired Native Plant Solutions to conduct additional surveys to address information gaps on their own land, which represents 60% of the area. CCHP is working with NPS to conduct similar surveys on private lands not owned by Qualico.

The first CCHP bird surveys were conducted last weekend. Dr. Christian Artuso has already documented yellow rails in the area and there are two areas within the precinct where bobolink populations were identified in natural areas previously identified as 'low grade' for preservation in the NAA. Dr. Sue Cosens is coordinating the bird surveys on behalf of CCHP and has indicated the areas are very biodiverse in terms of birds and plants. Jo-Anne Joyce is leading the plant surveys to address NAA information gaps on private lands not owned by Qualico. These surveys are forthcoming.

My question to you is, can we partner to help preserve urban natural areas that supports bird biodiversity? I think we need a united effort to make this happen - and your input and position will help us achieve that. I'd like to forward you the results of CCHP and NPS surveys. We're finding the resources and 'will' to preserve urban natural areas limited at City Council, and this must change. I'd like to meet with you to discuss this further. Please visit our website at cchpcharleswood@org.ca

I look forward to meeting you.  

Sincerely, 

Victoria Macdonald
Chair CCHP