The province decided it would remove the dock itself as the McGoverns fought to keep their lakefront access.

(BEN BULMER / iNFOnews.ca)

A North Okanagan couple trying to retain access to their Kalamalka Lake dock have lost in court.

The dock was there a decade before the Okanagan Rail Trail was built, but they lost access shortly before the project started. Then the government came to seize the dock, according to a recent BC Supreme Court decision.

Myles and Catherine McGovern own two properties between Kekuli Bay and the City of Vernon. Their dock was built in 2005, with the former Kelowna Pacific Railway running between their property and the lakeshore.

After years of trying to convince the regional district to let them keep the dock, their claim was dismissed this week entirely and the province, if it hasn't done so already, will seize it from the lakefront — boat lift, stairway and all.

The North Okanagan Regional District bought the old railway in 2015 and, at the end of the McGovern's ten-year license to use the shore, the regional district decided it wouldn't back the McGovern's dock use anymore. By 2021, the McGoverns took the regional district and the province to court, trying to get their shore use returned.

It's up to the province to give the ten-year licence the McGoverns sought, but they were looking for support from the regional district in the years after it expired. By the time the dispute reached Justice Allan Betton for a decision, the McGoverns focused their civil claim solely against the regional district.

The McGoverns argued the regional district should have supported another ten-year license. They claimed the regional district gave the OK in 2004 when the lakefront strip was a railway, but unfairly changed its mind after the local government bought it.

Betton found they brought the issue to court long after the two-year limitation period, which ended in 2017. He surmised they launched the 2021 claim in response to the province's trespass notice that came just a month earlier.

It warned them they should remove the dock by the end of July 2021, which was later extended to June 2023.

On Oct. 4, 2023, the province gave the McGoverns notice their dock would be seized, including any boat lift, staircase or framing it's attached to. Once removed, the province may sell, rent or destroy the dock. If the McGoverns removed any part of the dock, it "may be considered theft," the notice read.

They were also ordered to pay a $1,000 penalty. It's not clear whether any of the dock has been removed or whether they paid the penalty.

As for the civil claim, Betton said the McGoverns did not establish whether the regional district unfairly reneged its support for the dock once the first licence expired, adding that he would have ruled against the McGoverns even if their claim fell within the two-year limitation.

On Nov. 22, he dismissed the claim in a Vernon courtroom.

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