SEPARATE OUR HOME FROM PARK AND FOREVER
PROTECT MT
JOINT VENTURE TO PURCHASE THE PRIVATELY OWNED PRIMARY KNOLL NOT IN MT DOUGLAS PARK
Help Ray Harwood raise the $1M needed to protect this 4 acres of Garry Oak ecosystem for generations to come.
w/only 1% of the original Garry Oak ecosystem left this 4 acres would expand Mt Douglas Park by 1%
After more than 50 years in Saanich community I am faced with losing my home of
over 40 years.
The death of Anita Harwood forces the Harwood family into a position that
requires the land be re-owned.
First born son Ray Harwood has first right of refusal and has offered four of
five acres to Saanich Parks.
The land I am talking about is the primary knoll of Mt Douglas as seen driving
South on Blenkinsop but also from most places in Victoria and CRD.
Often thought of as Park our land backs deep into Mt Douglas Park from
Blenkinsop Valley.
Ray Harwood is looking to partner with either Saanich or a private investor or
family to retain and protect the primary knoll of Mt Douglas.
Friends of Mt Douglas Park Society call out this land in their constitution for
acquisition and Saanich Parks calls out 1.5 acres for acquisition.
GOERT confirms that less than 1% of the original Garry Oak ecosystem found only
here in the world, remains.
Expand Mt Douglas by 1% with the addition of these 4 acres.
As four of our five acres is used by Parks users we have asked that the four be
moved into Parks protection. Saanich has so far declined my offer and therefore
I am looking for a family or investor with $700,000+ to invest in the obvious
potential the primary knoll has. Ocean views from Port Angeles to Vancouver and
everything west are achieved from the primary knoll.
In 1956 this land was worth $1500.
The property is a million dollar property today.
Imagine the value in 2020.
I have raised ~$300K. Looking for $700K more from right family or private
investor to partner with.
Potential opportunity is for private park, equestrian stables, agri-tourism,zip
lines, mountain bikes, quad trails.
Or maybe a family would like to live in the house, make the mortgage payments
and revisit ownership in 2020.
I have many ideas and am open to other ideas.
Interested?
r
Mt Douglas is
threatened with change as the primary SW knoll which has been
PRIVATE PROPERTY since 1906 is FOR
Ray Harwood holds first right of refusal and leads the charge to move this unprotected habitat/Primary knoll into Parks protection or find suitable investors and keep it private.
Shania, you listening?
With the passing of Anita Harwood the primary knoll (Harwood Heights Estate) Anita owned for decades is offered up for incorporation into Saanich Parks system, Mount Douglas Park achieving the goal/s set out by Friends of Mt Douglas Society decades ago; to protect and incorporate the primary knoll (Harwood Heights) into Mt Douglas Park.
By working together with Ray Harwood, Saanich can acquire the rear four acres, the primary knoll of Mt Doug as seen above and below at fair market value of ~$175,000 per acre x 4 protecting this rare and desirable habitat in perpetuity for generations to come.
This sale and incorporation of four acres of Mt Douglas into Parks will forever protect the Garry Oak ecosystem and habitat preventing anyone from building on or off the face of the primary knoll.
According to GOERT there is less than 1% of the Garry Oak habitat left in the CRD.
GOERT, BVCA, FOMDPS have all written letters of support for the acquisition and incorporation of this four acres of Parkland into Mt Douglas Park officially.
Two paths presents themselves.
One of Parks protection and another of continued private ownership with an investment opportunity for those wishing to invest in future building or sale of land into Parks opportunity circa 2020.
In 1956 this land was valued at ~ $1500.
Today $1500 1956 dollars equals $1M 2010 dollars.
What will the value be in 2020?
If interested in joining the team to privately own this land write Ray Harwood
or
Your opinion matters.
Our Situation at length
the 4439 property
the trespassing
call on Saanich to separate the four acres of Parkland from the Harwood family home at 4439 Blenkinsop Rd.
After decades of Mt Douglas Park users unlawfully accessing our private land Saanich was offered four acres of our five acre parcel in Blenkinsop Valley in order to remedy the long overdue problem of trespass at the fair market value of ~$175,000 per acre.
Park users trespass on up to four of five acres so Saanich was offered to purchase that land into Parks prior to being listed for sale publicly so that the Park remains the same incorporating the smaller sister knoll Harwood's currently own the majority of into Parks protection.
At the same time the Harwood family home at 4439 would be saved from demolition.
The home has no real value to anyone purchasing the entire five acres as to build on the primary knoll the family home at foot of Mt Douglas would have to be demolished impacting the ecosystem as well as creating unnecessary green house gases from the new building and the demolition of the Harwood family home . Being zoned A1 only one home per five acres is allowed.
Built in 1968 best suited as a movie set for "That 70's Show" Anita Harwood's home of 40 years sits at the very foot of Mt Douglas .
Saanich offered to buy 1.5 acres and maintained this position since the BVLAP was formed in 1978/9.
Incorporating the
rear eastern 1.5
acres does not remedy the problem of
trespass fully nor completely for us.
Saanich marked out 1.5 acres of our property at 4439 for acquisition in 1978 and the Friends of Mt Douglas Park a few years later call out this specific geographical feature, the primary knoll, for acquisition in their constitution.
The Saanich BVLAP 1.5 acre solution address' only half the problem as trespass occurs on 3+ acres of our land and on several acres of neighbouring lands N and S of us.
We are not looking for a fence we are looking for habitat protection of this last bit of unadulterated ecosystem for generations ahead
Many trails lead across private land out to the primary knoll where both the Olympic and North Shore Mountains are visible on clear days.
The 200*+panoramic view from Port Angeles to Vancouver is achieved on 3rd Rock though there was too much particulate in air the day this photo was taken in 2007 to see either Mountain Range clearly.
pan > right
Selling the 1.5 does not deter users
from accessing the primary knoll, the private property in our family’s possession
that has been unknowingly used as parks for decades that should be incorporated into
parklands post haste in order to remedy this situation.
The FOMDPS Constitution section 3 Acquisition, calls out
that FOMDPS wish to add the primary SW knoll into Mt Douglas Park protection.
The Harwood family and other property owners along the SW side support this acquisition
The BVCA and FMDPS each wrote a letter in support of the acquisition.
More recently GOERT submitted a letter indicating this land is part of the 1% of remaining Garry Oak ecosystems left in the CRD.
The green and ecological solution
in regards to the Primary Knoll (
With less than 1% of pristine Garry Oak
ecosystem left in the CRD opportunity is now.
This four acres is untouched and how it’s been
for thousands of years.
Much of the broom bush has been
removed exposing the Garry Oak ecosystem to the full benefit of our weather
pattern.
The family have been good stewards of
the 4 acres of Mt Doug owned for over 50 years.
Don and Anita Harwood never saw the Eastern side of the property they owned and paid taxes on for decades.
Harwood's worked hard to pay their taxes while users of Park encroached further and further until now the Police come and take personal possessions off our private land citing it as messing up the "Park".
An easy mistake as there is no proper signage or boundary markers.
I never knew where the SE corner was till this year.
We'd only ever walked on half our property and were surprised to learn how deep into Parks we actually penetrate.
We’d always left the back three acres for the animals forced farther and farther off their homeland by the users of Mt Douglas Park to use.
Or so we thought.
Now we realize that all this time Park users have been accessing our land.
Saanich Parks who as a courtesy to both land owners and users of Parks could erect proper signage indicating the Park boundary.
Great Horned Owls live in the tree line.
It is now that with the Feb/2008 passing of my Mother that the estate must be settled.
Eldest son Ray Harwood has first right of refusal on the property and has asked Saanich to pair up with the Harwood family to forever protect Mt Douglas by separating the family home from the four acres of Parkland.
In order to maintain the Valley and Mt Douglas the way it is now and always has been the sensible ecological green solution is to move the SW knoll into Parks protection protecting this geographically significant ecological habitat.
This 3rd rock is visible from Pt Angeles to Vancouver to Cowichan to Sooke, almost wherever you are in the CRD and even further you can see Harwood Heights Estate.
Failing to achieve Park protection Harwood's are forced to sell to someone who would build and change the face of Mt Douglas irrevocably forever.
Let's expand park 1- 2% work out a 4 acre solution with Harwood's (and a potential further six acre solution with properties North) allowing the
Harwood family home to stand and the face of Mt Douglas unchanged.
Selling all five 4439 acres means Harwood's most likely sell all five acres to someone who will build blast and forever change the face of Mt Doug to the highest bidder forever impacting the Garry Oak ecosystem we are all trying to maintain.
This selling to a builder who will demolish the family home at 4439 and build a mansion/castle atop the primary knoll is not the green solution nor what we families want or what Saanich wants nor what I think BVCA, GOERT or FOMDPS want but it will give Harwood's the most $$ they can get as they are being forced from the Blenkinsop Valley where they have been contributing members of community since 1956.
Allowing the Harwood family home to remain in Harwood ownership at foot of Mt Douglas where it was built in 1968 is paramount to the protection of the four eastern Garry Oak habitat acres offered.
An interesting sidereal is that Don Harwood purchased the 19 acres with the farm house a dairy and several chicken houses for $8000 1956 dollars. Today 22 acres just up the road same side is priced at 2.9 million today, no outbuildings no chicken houses.
Don's Chicken Ranch started with just four chickens.
There is nothing "green" about demolishing the existing family home to build another Mansion back on the hill where blasting tree cutting fauna and foliage removal will impact the ecosystem and Mt Douglas view we all see in a major way.
This meets Saanich green position , incorporates more Park and
green space forever
protecting this area from builders and development meeting the OCP and BVLAP
criteria as well as The Friends of Mt Douglas Society goal of bringing the third
rock into Mt Douglas Park Protection.
Voice your support for the acquisition to
Saanich.
The consequence of not working
together and not moving 4-11 acres zoned A1 into Parks means selling to a
builder who will undoubtedly and un'ecologically destroy the family home at
4439 to build on the plateau of the primary knoll.
Simply put no one will spend a
million dollars to live in the existing 40 year old 1400 sq ft modest home best
suited as a movie set for "That 70's Show".
In essence it’s the property as the house has no real value. The primary knoll provides the million dollar view.
Many will want to build up on there.
With hopes that Saanich will incorporate this 4-11 acres
into Parks
before its
too late we ask you to help support this
acquisition by calling on Saanich and voicing your opinion.
TLC FoMDPS member
SAANICH NEWS
Mount Doug landowner tired of trespassers
Ray Harwood sits at the rear of his private property on a knoll that’s often used by visitors to Mount Doug Park looking for a view of the Blenkinsop Valley. Fed up with trespassers, Harwood has strung up barbed wire to mark his property.
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Updated: August 11, 2009 9:39 AM
That’s message that one mountainside land owner wants to get through to the public.
Ray Harwood’s family owns property at 4439 Blenkinsop Rd., including a house Harwood’s mother lived in for 40 years, before her death in 2008. Most of the five-acre lot stretches up the mountain’s southwestern primary knoll.
Harwood has now strung up barbed wire in a bid to keep trespassing park users off his land.
Park users “come right out past the treeline, on the east side, and then they work their way to the primary knoll, which is that flat plateau right in the middle of our land, where they drink and smoke and who knows what they do,” he said. “There’s been grow-ops there, there’s been people living up there. I have no idea what goes on up there because we can’t control the land.”
Before the barbed wire, Harwood says he tried more gentle means of persuasion, erecting a tent and no trespassing signs, only to find them taken down. In one case, it was Saanich police who removed a tent, apparently unaware it was standing on private land, not public park, Harwood said.
In February, Harwood made Saanich an offer -- buy the property and fold it into the park. What’s followed has been a complicated to-and-fro.
After he made his initial offer to sell the entire property, Saanich staff asked for an independent appraisal of the land’s market value. That came in at $150,000 per acre and $150,000 for the 40-year-old house at the road, Saanich wrote back saying the municipality would be willing to negotiate for the rear 1.5 acre chunk that borders the park.
“I said, look, it’s not the top acre and a half that we’re selling,” said Harwood. “The top acre and a half doesn’t solve the trespass issue and furthermore selling (it) to Saanich devalues the potential for the (rest of the) property.”
Though Saanich has now come back to him and expressed interest in purchasing the entire property, Harwood’s changed his mind and says he’s only willing to sell four of the five acres and wants to keep the house. His asking price for the rear four acres of land is now $700,000.
“I’m not satisfied with selling five acres to Saanich with the way that they’ve treated this process,” he said “My concern is that they’re just going to buy the five acres and separate my family home from the five acres and then go out and re-sell my home. If we’re going to redraw the line, let’s redraw the line while we own that property.”
Saanich parks manager Rae Roer confirmed that the municipality is interested in some or all of Harwood’s land, but declined to comment on specifics while negotiations are ongoing.
He did, however, suggest it’s unlikely the front of the property would be sold off if the rest of the property was incorporated into the park.
“Part of our interest is in providing for vehicle parking off of Blenkinsop Road to access the park from the west side, up the potential Mercer trail, so if there’s an opportunity to create that on that parcel and tie into the trail and take advantage of some of the views that are available on the back of the property, there’s some value there that’s worth exploring,” said Roer.
The Friends of Mount Douglas Park Society has met with Harwood, but hasn’t taken a position on whether, or how much of his land should be acquired for the park, said spokesman Kenneth Rankin.
kvass@vicnews.com
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