Dear editor,

I attended a presentation on Sunday that was well publicized in our local paper, 鈥減roudly sponsored鈥� by the Comox Valley Taxpayers Alliance.

In the presentation, the researcher, Vivian Krause, claimed that environmental groups such as Dogwood were being funded by U.S. money to land lock our Canadian Oil from getting to global markets. At no point in her presentation did she mention anything about climate change. The growing concern for climate change is global and does not stop at the border, so it is no surprise that like-minded organizations would help environmental groups across borders, but the idea that they were helping to benefit US oil and mess with our elections was a bit of a stretch. Turns out it really is a conspiracy theory, her presentation was scattered and full of holes but very clearly pro oil, as well as pro salmon farm.

I contacted Dogwood directly to hear what they had to say. They post their financials right on their web site. Dogwood has over 250,000 members in B.C. now and although they do receive donations annually from other environmental groups in the U.S. (which is no surprise as we share the same sea and earth) the majority of their donations are from individual donors all over B.C.

Exactly how this supposed U.S. money was influencing our elections was very unclear. What is clear is that the Comox Valley Taxpayers Alliance is paying big bucks for newspaper ads that promote pro oil conspiracy theories and false propaganda including the Dogwood logo sitting over the U.S. flag! So voter beware, if there is any group trying to sway votes with hidden agendas I would worry more about this Comox Valley Taxpayers Alliance.

Teresa Phillips

Comox