Ministry of Environment

Local Government Resources

Introduction

The Riparian Areas Regulation (RAR) is enabled by section 12 of the Fish Protection Act. Subsection 4(b) provides that an applicable local government ensure that its bylaws and permits under Part 26 of the Local Government Act must in its opinion, provide a level of protection that is comparable to or exceeds that of the Riparian Areas Regulation.

Geographical Areas Implementing Riparian Protection

The Riparian Areas Regulation applies only to local governments on the east side of Vancouver Island, the Lower Mainland and the Southern Interior, as these are the parts of the province that are experiencing the most rapid urban growth. This includes the following regional districts and all the municipalities within them:

Capital (except the City of Victoria and Township of Esquimalt)
Central Okanagan
Columbia-Shuswap
Comox Valley
Strathcona
Cowichan Valley
Fraser Valley
Greater Vancouver (except the City of Vancouver)
Nanaimo
North Okanagan
Okanagan-Similkameen
Powell River
Squamish-Lillooet
Sunshine Coast
Thompson-Nicola
Trust area under the Islands Trust Act

The following maps and table will assist with understanding where the regulations are applicable:

Municipalities and regional districts
DFO areas (3.7MB PDF)
MOE regions
Overlay of all three borders

Table of RAR Areas

Legal Opinion

SMS Legal Opinion (PDF 700KB)

A legal opinion was jointly commissioned by the Ministry and the Union of British Columbia Municipalities to address Resolution B75 passed at the 2004 UBCM annual convention requesting a legal review of local government liability from the Riparian Areas Regulation.

The Ministry has, working with UBCM, generated the following strategy to address the conclusions and recommendations made in the legal opinion:

RAR Response to SMS Legal Opinion (PDF 72KB)

Pilot Studies