To quote from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the questions and answers surrounding the two rail trails in the Southern Interior have become "curiouser and curiouser,” and to quote author Lewis Carroll once more, it's "going down the rabbit hole."

For those not familiar with the two phrases, the first means stranger and stranger. The second means entering a complex or confusing situation that can be difficult to escape from.

The investigative journalist Sheriff thought he'd give the current stalemate between North Okanagan farmers and Splatsin, the North Okanagan and the Columbia Shuswap regional districts one more shot. The result was posing some questions leads to the bigger picture and you may not like the answer.

The Sheriff decided to simplify the stalemate over the Shuswap North Okanagan Rail Trail (SNORT). Right from the 2017 rail trail purchase, nine farmers (or many more who didn't sign on) wanted the same thing the B.C. Agricultural Land Commission stipulated for the Okanagan Rail Trail—easements to access their ALR properties on both sides of the trail.

The three trail owners describe it as complicated. What became obvious is - like the ORT owners, they don't like easements and resisted the easement........

© Castanet