Manitoba Conservation has asked Red Rock Bible Camp to remove 32 beds.

Executive Director Kim Coursey says Red Rock Bible Camp falls under the jurisdiction of Manitoba Conservation because they are in the Whiteshell Provincial Park. He says over the years there have been studies done on the lakes within the park to determine which lakes have met their capacity in terms of human impact on the lake.

“If there is too much development on a particular lake, and it is deemed to be a negative thing for the lake then they set limits. Red Rock, and this was a number of years ago, was given the limit of a 150 people. That's the maximum that we are supposed to have on site at any one time.”

Coursey says they normally stay well within their limits but every now and then they go over. He notes last year they only went over capacity twice, but they also had 142 days when there were 16 or fewer people at the camp.

Coursey says the camp has over 150 beds so that they can accommodate different configurations of groups and family sizes. He notes Manitoba Conservation wants them to physically remove 32 beds so they can be sure Red Rock won't go over capacity. He says it won't affect summer camps as much as groups throughout the rest of the year.

“There are times when we have family camps there, and sometimes a family is only two people sometimes it is five or six or seven, but we have to have enough beds. Even if we are going to stay within that 150 limit, we still need to have enough beds to have some flexibility when we get these different sizes of groups.”

Coursey says these changes would very likely impact the camp financially because the number of people that they serve is directly connected to their income. He notes they may try to compensate by hosting more people on weekends and weekdays that previously remained open which would actually put more strain on the lake.

“The environmental impact is certainly far less then it could be if we were fully utilizing all of those weekends at camp. What we are probably going to have to look at doing is fill up those other weekends and those weekdays that now are not filled. If we have to do that it is actually going to impact the lake even more so than it is now.”

Coursey says Red Rock Bible Camps has a very good relationship with Manitoba Conservation that they certainly want to keep. He says they appreciate what they are doing, and hopes they can understand the camps situation so Red Rock Bible Camp can be more flexible to accommodate many different groups.