By David F. Rooney
After five years of searching for a new home, the Revelstoke Rod & Gun Club is set to receive a 30-year Licence of Occupation Tenure for a new rifle range adjacent to the Frisby Forest Service Road.
Club President Gary Krestinsky said the club expects to receive its certificate of tenure from the province on June 5. It will sign and block the entrance to the property, which includes a 900-metre rifle range. Entry to the new tenure will be limited to club members.
“Because we’ll be liable for anything that happens once we receive the Licence of Occupation Tenure we don’t want anyone shooting there,” he said in an interview Sunday afternoon.
Bullet Basin, the current club property and shooting range on Camozzi Road above Upper Arrow Heights, is for sale and development of the new 32-hectare tenure will be contingent on the sale of that property.
“We have several options we need to discuss at our next club meeting on June 5, but I can’t really discuss them until we have talked about them with the club,” Krestinsky said.
This is excellent news for the club which has for years been up on Camozzi. However, as development proceeded along Hay Road and elsewhere on Camozzi it came under increasing NIMBY pressure from new residents who didn’t like having a shooting range in the neighbourhood. It is highly unlikely that development along Westside Road and the Frisby FSR will place new pressure on the tenure anytime in the next several decades.
The new tenure and rifle range will open some new horizons for the club.
“This will be second-longest range in BC,” Krestinsky said, adding that this will enable the club to hold some challenging shooting competitions that could attract some of the West’s best marksmen and women.
Here’s a map of the new tenure:
