I’m sure by now that everyone is aware that regulations contained in the Lands Protection Act places limits on how much land that a large corporation or individual can acquire by way of “land holdings” on P.E.I.
Land holdings include land both “owned/purchased or leased by a single person or corporation,” and that limit is 3,000 acres. A search of the IRAC database for a company called “Island Holdings Ltd.,” a company that has Robert K. and James K. Irving listed as the co-president and co-chief executive officers, revealed some interesting numbers.
Between April 1997 and Feb. 2019, Island Holdings Ltd submitted 198 applications to acquire land to add to their holdings. Every one of those applications were approved by IRAC with the total acreage coming to just a little over 7,500 acres.
As of right now, the IRAC database does not differentiate as to what applications were to purchase or lease the land in question. I found it quite ironic that the last application submitted by Island Holdings for 100.25 acres was approved on March 26, 2019. Hmmm, wasn’t that the same date that Mary Jane Irving and her two daughters were refused in their application to acquire 2,200 acres of land because according to the Hon. Richard Brown, Liberal cabinet minister: “we applied the rules of the Land Protection Act, the beneficial owners are one family basically.” Here’s a little tidbit for Mr. Brown. My genealogy research shows that Mary Jane, Robert K. and James K. Irving might be siblings from the same family. Does that not count? Stay tuned folks because the good folks at VisionPEI are committed to peeling back the layers of corruption from this rotten onion we call “politics on P.E.I.”
It is relatively easy to get to this info, just go to IRAC website and click on Land Protection, then LPA Applications Data Bank, and type in Island Holdings Ltd.
Prior to April 1997 application, we believe Island Holdings had ownership of somewhere around 270 acres. Also note how the applications were grouped together and submitted on same date and generally approved on the same date, usually within 14 days.
John E. Clow,
Summerside
