The BC government is fast-tracking stakeholder and public engagement on a fast-tracking tool under the Infrastructure Projects Act (IPA). As you may recall, the IPA is a new provincial law that was rushed through the legislative process last year despite pushback from municipalities, First Nations, and environmental groups. Projects designated as “provincially significant” under the IPA will be eligible to access a number of fast-tracking tools to get the project developed faster. One of those tools is an expedited environmental assessment (EA). This means that a major project like a mine could bypass a thorough assessment of its environmental impacts.

The Environmental Assessment Office (EAO) is now engaging with the public and stakeholders on their proposed approach to an expedited EA. Unfortunately, BC has given us an extremely tight deadline for providing our feedback.

Public engagement is a critical checkpoint in the development of law and policy that keeps democracy in government processes and stops big industry lobbyists from having all the say. Limiting your ability to participate in that process is incredibly concerning. The purpose of our survey guide is to help cut through that barrier and make it as easy as possible for you to participate. 

The proposed expedited EA cuts some really dangerous corners, including reducing opportunities for communities and the public to express their concerns about a project undergoing an EA. Not only is government giving you little time for this engagement on a faster EA – they’re also looking to cut public engagement in the EA process itself by two-thirds. The proposed process will also result in the EAO pre-determining which "high-risk values and interests" should be assessed, rather than assessing all the impacts of the project, and will increase reliance on the project proponent to gather information on the project's effects with less direction and involvement from the EAO.

We have to push back on this process and tell the government we won’t stand for cuts to democracy and environmental standards.

How to participate in the survey

To participate in the survey, go to https://engage.eao.gov.bc.ca/xEA. We recommend keeping this guide open in one tab, and the survey open in another, so you can navigate through them together.

On the survey website, scroll to the bottom of the page, and click the “share your thoughts” button on the right-hand side. This will open a pop-up asking for your email address. 

To participate in the survey, enter your email address and click submit. Then go to your email and open the message from the Environmental Assessment Office for a link to the survey. NOTE: The survey link you will receive is only valid for 24 hours. It is recommended you do the survey in one sitting to avoid losing unsaved input.

While the survey asks several questions, there are two key questions that we feel are most important to give feedback on. We have highlighted the two most important questions in this survey guide so that you can see them easily. 

Why are these questions important?

The questions we have highlighted are an opportunity to provide written feedback. The majority of the survey is forced choice. While forced or multiple choice questions are not necessarily a bad thing, they limit the respondent’s ability to add nuanced or personal opinions to their response. The government has already limited the scope of this survey to focus only on the proposed changes to public engagement processes under an expedited EA, not the entire proposed expedited process. The two questions that ask for written feedback allow for two important opportunities: 1) to share thoughts about public engagement under the expedited EA that don’t fit within the multiple choice questions, and 2) to provide additional thoughts on other parts of the proposed expedited EA process.

We have provided some bullets to support written responses, but of course you're free to express your thoughts and opinions in a way that’s best for you. Same goes for the multiple choice questions: We have provided some suggestions for your response, but please feel free to select what you like. This guide is exactly that – just a guide to help you navigate this survey in such a short turnaround.