Frank Meyers lives on Meyers Creek Road. That’s what happens when your family farms the same plot of land for 2½ centuries. They name the street after you. “This is heritage property,” says the 81-year-old, pointing at his freshly plowed fields in Quinte West, Ont. “This is the property that was given to my forefathers when they fought for the British army against the Americans. This land was designated for us.”
Today, the Meyers land is designated for something else: a new headquarters for Joint Task Force 2, the Canadian military’s top-secret special operations squad.
The Department of National Defence issued the press release back in September, announcing that the country’s most elite commandos are moving to CFB Trenton, the same air base that has welcomed home the flag-draped caskets of every Canadian soldier killed in Afghanistan. The relocation of JTF 2, including the construction of a secluded, $240-million training facility, is the highlight of a half-billion-dollar base expansion that will funnel wads of federal cash into the local economy. But amid all the excited talk about infrastructure contracts and job creation—not to mention the arrival of hundreds of heavily trained counterterrorism troops—DND neglected to mention one minor detail. When the special forces move into the neighbourhood, the neighbours will be forced to move out. Whether they want to or not.
The military plans to build the unit’s new stomping grounds on 990 acres of private property located north of CFB Trenton. Federal bureaucrats have spent the past two years trying to convince the owners, 12 in all, to sell. Some have agreed. Some are holding out for a better offer. And some—Frank Meyers included—just want to be left alone. Unfortunately, when the state sets its sights on a plot of land, the owner is left with only two real choices: sell now, or be expropriated later. Staying is not an option. “If they don’t need you, they get rid of you,” Meyers says.
Officially, the Forces have not threatened to toss anyone off his land. Expropriation—a legal power that allows the government to purchase any property it pleases, for fair market value—is always a last resort, and the Department of Public Works says it remains committed to negotiating a “fair” and “mutually acceptable” deal with each owner. But that willingness to bargain won’t last forever. A briefing note sent to Defence Minister Peter MacKay, and obtained by Maclean’s under the Access to Information Act, confirms that “expropriation, as a tool available to the government, is being examined.”
“I lose sleep every night about it,” says Phil Jordan, whose 69 acres border the base. “Our world has been crushed. Somebody somewhere has decided they want to move JTF 2, but did they ever take into consideration what that was going to do to other people? They drew a red line around these pieces of property, and ever since then everybody in there has been screwed.”
For Jordan, speaking out is almost as frightening as the thought of losing his home. In this town—where the military is both a source of pride and a source of paycheques—he knows that many residents won’t exactly sympathize with his situation. “Every time a soldier comes home in a casket, the hearse drives right by my house,” says Jordan’s wife, Kristy Chard. “I see it, and I bawl.” But now, she says, “people might start looking at us and say: ‘You’re holding up progress.’ Well, guess what? The government is taking food off my table. That’s the way I’m looking at it.”
The government has been looking to expand CFB Trenton since 2006, when a campaigning Stephen Harper first promised to bring an airborne battalion to the region. By 2007, rumours began to circulate that Joint Task Force 2—the Canadian equivalent of America’s legendary Delta Force—would be moving to the region instead. (The unit’s current home at Dwyer Hill, on the outskirts of Ottawa, is barely 200 acres, and as one general famously told a Senate committee, the site is “bursting at the seams.”)
In the military’s eyes, Trenton is the obvious alternative. Located halfway between Ottawa and Toronto, the base provides immediate access to airlift capabilities—and a town anxious to roll out the welcome mat. Last fall, when DND finally verified the gossip, local officials lined up to shake each other’s hands and boast about the economic spinoffs. Rick Norlock, the local Conservative MP, called it “wonderful news for the people of Quinte West and surrounding area.”
