City council has voted to put off adopting a management plan for Chadburn Lake Park – just eight days after turning down Coun. Dan Boyd’s suggestion to do exactly that.

At Tuesday evening’s council meeting, Mayor Dan Curtis put forward the motion to postpone the vote by a month to Nov. 28. That will allow time for city staff to discuss the document with the Kwanlin Dün First Nation (KDFN).

As Curtis explained, the postponement comes from discussion at the Oct. 3 meeting where Coun. Samson Hartland noted that the KDFN was not listed in the acknowledgement section of the plan.

The KDFN has a parcel of settlement land inside the 7,555 hectares that make-up the park space in Riverdale as well as another two parcels that border the southern boundary of the park.

At last week’s meeting, city staff explained that while the KDFN had been involved with the work on the plan initially, it had a different vision on the approach with the First Nation interested in more scientific-based studies of the area. There were no resources for such studies to be done.

The city is also the traditional territory of the Ta’an Kwach’an Council, which was also involved in the park plan consultation. The Ta’an do not have formal settlement land in or bordering the park.

Both city staff and later a spokesperson for the KDFN said last week the two governments continue to have a good working relationship.

They noted an intergovernmental forum set for this week where a number of topics of mutual interest will be discussed.

While the park plan isn’t formally on the agenda for the meeting, Curtis said there will be a chance to informally discuss it in addition to the work city staff are now tasked with in approaching KDFN staff on it.

Boyd had suggested delaying the vote until after the intergovernmental forum to ensure there are no major issues with the plan for the First Nation. He couldn’t get council’s support at that point.

Last night, he wondered why Curtis was bringing a postponement forward now – after turning down the same suggestion just eight days earlier.

Curtis explained that last week, it seemed such a decision to postpone the vote would have been rushed.

Last week’s discussion “got me thinking a little bit,” the mayor added.

After having a week to consider the matter and Hartland’s concerns, Curtis said a delay would allow for some time to ensure the KDFN has no further information to add to the plan.

Delaying the vote will allow time for city staff to pursue that.

“We value their history and their knowledge a great deal,” Curtis said, stressing there have been no major issues brought forward by the First Nation.

Coun. Rob Fendrick also said he prefers such delays go through due process, with the postponement coming forward for a formal vote rather than by more informal consensus proposed last week.

While council did not go ahead with postponing the matter last week, Curtis pointed out, in the end, there will be a delay to ensure that discussion with the First Nation happens.

Council was unanimous in voting to postpone the matter to Nov. 28.

The Chadburn Lake Park is the largest of five regional parks identified in the city’s 2010 Official Community Plan.

As city planner Mike Ellis stated in his report to council last week: “The park offers a variety of recreational uses, such as paddling, hiking, mountain biking, skiing and wildlife viewing.

“It also contains environmentally sensitive areas, significant wildlife areas, and historically significant resources. City-wide amenities found in the park include Miles Canyon, Hidden Lakes, Long Lake, Canyon City and many others.”

The proposed final park plan features a number of changes over the initial draft plan.

Those include:

• more details on fire abatement strategies which came directly from input offered by the territory’s forest management branch;

• the direction to assess the state of Rotary Cabins in the area which are currently in disrepair, but used by the endangered little brown bats as a roosting site;

• removal of an initiative that would have seen a paved trail around the Riverdale neighbourhood because it is not strongly related to the park and would be expensive; and

• possibly renaming the park.

As Ellis explained on the renaming: “Lloyd Chadburn was a Canadian World War II war hero with no specific link to Whitehorse.

“Renaming parks to a traditional First Nations name is very common across Canada. The lake would retain the name.”

The overall plan outlines a total of 26 initiatives for the short term (in the next two years), medium term (two to five years) and long term (five to 10 years).

They range from a dog owner education program, to working with the Ta’an Kwach’an Council and KDFN to identify and inventory significant cultural sites, traditional site and stories within the park, to the development of an accessible trail to Hidden Lake #1.

The initiatives fall under five goals of promoting environmental health; promoting outdoor recreation; supporting community stewardship, education and partnerships; improving accountability, planning and management; and protecting and promoting cultural and heritage values.