‘Why did you not warn us’: Frustration for B.C. land owners at Cowichan case meeting

A recent court decision granting Aboriginal title to a portion of land to the Cowichan Tribes is sparking concerns about private land ownership.

Residents of Richmond, B.C., asked why they weren’t told sooner about potential risks to their property rights at a tense meeting with officials over the impact of the landmark Cowichan Tribes Aboriginal title ruling.

Tensions and frustrations ran high at the public information meeting at the Sheraton Vancouver Airport Hotel on Tuesday night, with affected homeowners peppering Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie with questions. 

“Why did you not warn us earlier?” homeowner Kal Mattu asked Brodie at the meeting, overflowing with hundreds of residents. “Why don’t you tell us sooner?”

The meeting came after the British Columbia government tried to impress on the public that the case could be crucial to the fate of private land ownership in the province, with officials staging a technical briefing for journalists, writing an opinion piece and telling reporters in the legislature why they believed the ruling cannot be allowed to stand.

In August, a B.C. Supreme Court judge ruled the Cowichan Tribes have Aboriginal title over about 750 acres on the Fraser River, that Crown and city titles on the land are defective and invalid, and the granting of private titles on it by the government unjustifiably infringed on the Cowichan title.

The Cowichan have accused officials at the provincial and municipal level of spreading misinformation, because their case did not seek to overturn private property titles.

At the meeting, Mattu’s questions were greeted with a round of applause.

He then asked Brodie: “If I don’t own my land anymore, why am I gonna pay the city of Richmond taxes?”

City solicitor Tony Capuccinello Iraci, who is also the general manager of law and legislative services for the city, told Mattu he was “still the registered fee simple owner of your property and as a result, your obligation to taxes continues.”

He told the City of Richmond would defend against the Aboriginal title claim “as vigorously as possible to protect your interests” and that he should “ask the attorney general to protect your interests -- you purchased fee-simple property.”

Mattu later said in an interview that he attended the meeting to learn more, but it turned out to be a “waste of time.”

“He’s not telling anybody anything. He’s just making a political thing out of this. That’s all it was. Tonight’s a waste of time,” said Mattu of Brodie. 

Mattu said grew up in Richmond and had lived in the city since 1975. When the mayor’s letter inviting him to the meeting and informing him of the potential risks to his land title arrived in his mailbox weeks ago, it left him with mixed emotions.

“I paid tax. I bought the place. Now, lo and behold, I don’t own my place,” said Mattu, “Not fair.”

Protesters gathered in a parking lot across the street before the meeting.

Rally organizer Steven Lai, a Richmond resident, said the court ruling left him confused and scared.

He owns a home and has a million-dollar mortgage, although it isn’t in the Cowichan title area. 

“Could you imagine if I have spent half of my life working hard to pay my mortgage off, not to mention paying for the property taxes, and then only to find out that the property doesn’t belong to me anymore?” Lai in an interview in Mandarin.

“Then why should I have spent so much time and money paying off the loans? This would be incredibly unfair to me.”

Sharma told reporters at the legislature earlier in the day that the government would continue to fight the case, “probably up to the Supreme Court of Canada,” to give British Columbians clarity about their fee-simple rights, the most common form of land ownership in Canada. 

“We are going to continue to fight the court case at every level to understand how we bring that clarity,” she said.

“We have a team of lawyers at work right here, and I want to assure British Columbians of that, to help ensure that we can clarify the law and the issues with the law that we see in this court decision.”

She said the provincial government’s argument in the case had been that Aboriginal and fee-simple title “cannot co-exist” simultaneously on the same land in their full form.

Sharma said there was “perhaps nothing more important” to land owners than the security of their title, quoting directly from B.C.’s arguments in the case, which it lost.

She also co-wrote an opinion piece in The Vancouver Sun with Indigenous Relations Minister Spencer Chandra-Herbert, saying they “strongly disagree with the court’s treatment of private property in this case.”

While Tuesday’s article argued that “you can respect Aboriginal title and protect private property,” it also said “the ruling raises new and complicated legal questions that must be clarified by a higher court.”

In a lengthy technical briefing, reporters were told of the province’s arguments in the original case. 

The briefing quoted directly from B.C.’s case, saying both Aboriginal title and fee-simple title “confer rights of exclusive use and occupation” of land.

“As a result, those interests cannot co-exist in the same land, in their full form, at the same time,” it said. 

The government argued that Aboriginal title “must be understood as being suspended” where lands are “subject to an incompatible legal interest” such as fee-simple ownership. 

“This does not mean that Aboriginal title is extinguished, but rather that it is suspended for the time that the incompatible legal interest persists,” it says.

The City of Richmond, meanwhile, had argued for extinguishment, reporters were told in the briefing, with both arguments failing to convince the court.

In her August ruling, Justice Barbara Young ruled that “Aboriginal title lies beyond the land title system” in B.C.

The court found that the terms under which B.C. joined Canada in 1871 had limited the province’s “ability to sell the land without first dealing with the Cowichan’s interest.” 

Richmond, which is joining B.C. and others appealing the decision, had scheduled Tuesday’s meeting for owners to discuss the implications of the ruling, saying in a letter that the ruling “may compromise the status and validity” of their ownership.

David Rosenberg, the lawyer for the Cowichan Tribes, has warned against applying the case to all fee-simple lands across British Columbia or Canada, but the technical briefing described B.C.’s argument as focused on protecting the integrity of private property across the province. 

The Quw’utsun Nation said Monday that public comments about the case by Premier David Eby, Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie and other politicians have been “at best, misleading, and at worst, deliberately inflammatory,” saying the ruling does not “erase” public property.

The nation, whose members include the Cowichan Tribes, said the B.C. government and City of Richmond were stirring up “unnecessary fears” among private landowners.

Lai said no matter how the appeals turn out, “the damage was already done.”

“I won’t buy a home in that area anymore,” he said. “I think this ruling is just the beginning, and I am worried it will set a precedent for other related lawsuits in the future.”

Colin Cai, who bought a farm on No. 6 Road in Richmond in 2016, said the case may make many people lose confidence in the B.C. housing market.

Cai, who attended Tuesday night’s public meeting, said he spent about $40,000 to $50,000 annually to hire labour and purchase fertilizer to grow blueberries on the farm, and he initially planned to rebuild some homes on the land.

However, he said in an interview in Mandarin he doesn’t want to pour any more money into the land after Mayor Brodie’s letter sparked “shock waves and worries” in him.

“I wish it could be resolved as soon as possible,” said Cai. 

-- With files by Wolfgang Depner in Victoria

This report by Nono Shen, The Canadian Press, was first published Oct. 28, 2025.