The June 24th Public Hearing had a lot of items on a diverse set of topics. I covered most of them in this post and this post. The last item was a new development project in Uptown:

Zoning Amendment (616 and 640 Sixth Street) Bylaw No. 7997, 2019
This proposal would see a 29-story mixed-use building built in Uptown. This is the first high rise development (indeed the first development of any scale), approved in the Uptown in a decade – since Bob Osterman and Betty MacIntosh were on the Council! The proposed building has 145 Market strata units and 95 secured market rental units. All would meet the City’s Family Friendly Housing requirements as far as 2- and 3-bedroom suites. There would also be more than 12,000 square feet of commercial space in the three-story podium.

The project has evolved quite a bit since it was first proposed a couple of years ago, including an increase in rental units, and a changed shape and form of the building to make the pedestal 3 stories instead of the originally-proposed 5 stories, which is a significant improvement to the street presence of the building and supports a more human-scaled street.

The Design Panel and Advisory Planning Commission reviewed and approved the project, and the two adjacent Residents Associations also expressed no opposition. The public open house had more mixed responses, with a significant number of direct neighbours opposed for the reasons you would expect: loss of views, adjacency to their building, construction impacts and traffic. Always traffic. We received 44 written submissions, the vast majority of them supporting the project.

Some were anticipating a large and fractious Public Hearing on this project due to a directed and active social media campaign against it. For the first time in my experience on Council, an anonymous person actually purchased Facebook ads (laden with dishonest and disingenuous rhetoric) in an attempt to rally people in opposition to the project. Surprisingly, the people leading that campaign decided not to show up at the Public Hearing. Instead, several neighbours did come to express concerns about the project while and a few people spoke in favour, so I want to go through a bit of what I took from their delegations.

The issue of pedestrian safety on Princess Street is an issue I take seriously. Although using the term “congestion” to describe Princess Street may be out of scale with other streets, I agree that there is a need to improve the pedestrian experience in this location, mostly because there are a lot more pedestrians using that space than was probably anticipated back when the Royal City Centre mall was designed. A strange design choice back then had the loading bay end of the mall across the street from the main entrance to several residential buildings, and the single mid-block pedestrian crossing is not well marked or located where many users would choose to cross. Making the Greenway on 7th Ave less safe (by creating another conflict-zone driveway crossing immediately adjacent to a significant intersection) is not the solution, improving to Princess is, and I look forward to seeing what those changes could look like.

There were some typically hyperbolic moments in the Public Hearing delegations. A person who is not a Professional Engineer represented himself as a Professional Engineer then raised frankly bizarre concerns about impacts on the Telus tower (200 feet away) and other fanciful geotechnical anxieties. A delegate suggested that 327 parking spaces are designed to accommodate 480 cars. We heard we live in the “the most congested City in Canada” and the suggestion that this one building will “destroy everything about the City”. I recently visited Hong Kong, and I can say with complete confidence that one residential tower at FSR under 7 approved per decade does not make New Westminster indistinguishable from Hong Kong. But the Public Hearing is ultimately about arguing rhetoric rather than about a solemn testing of evidence, which challenges the idea that this process is meant to be “semi-judicial”.  Some day I will rant at greater length about this.

The issue of separate entrances for the Market Rental and Strata components of the building did raise some concerns in the community and at Council. I challenge the contention that this represents “poor doors”, the pejorative applied to separate entrances when included in projects in New York or London where market units are combined with non-market (affordable or otherwise subsidized) units. This proposal does not even include subsidized or low-income housing, but is all market rate housing.

The City has some policy work to do here, as we are working on Inclusionary Zoning policy, and the subject of how to integrate market and non-market housing forms and address shared or separated amenities is an important one. Especially as BC Housing and other non-profit housing providers – organizations absolutely required to get on board if we hope to make non-market housing viable – have clearly stated that shared amenities and entrances with Stratas creates operational and management issues for the providers of affordable housing. These issues were, unfortunately, conflated by some delegates at this Public Hearing, resulting in some confusion in the public (and, indeed on Council) about the issue.

The issue of class segregation and fairness of zoning decisions was raised in a more compelling way by one delegate in opposition to this project because (and I am paraphrasing a 5-minute long delegation) he felt it didn’t do enough to address the housing crisis. Why not all rental? Why not affordable rental on this site? And why is this 240 units of housing OK if this council would not approve even the most modest infill density proposals one block to the east?

In the end, this is about building housing. Supply is (as we often hear) not the entire answer to the housing affordability crunch, but choking off supply will definitely not improve the situation. Still, no single project can be expected to provide every solution to housing;  much like the Ovation project downtown will provide one type of supportive housing, this will bring much-needed Purpose Built Rental to a part of town that has oodles of services, but has not seen any new housing in a decade. It is not lost on me that almost 100 market rental units are being committed to weeks after we had Landlord BC and UDI come to a New West Council meeting to tell us that our aggressive renoviction prevention measures were going to cause purpose built rental building to grind to a halt in the City. The housing crisis and recent market shift have caused hyperbole on all sides, but as a City Council we need to be driven not by reacting to hyperbole, but by solid, defensible housing policy. I am confident that this is an area where New Westminster is still leading the region.

The delegate who was an uptown business owner, and the Uptown BIA through their letter of support, showed that they feel more residential density in the neighbourhood is a good thing for the Uptown community. the developers of this property are long-time New Westminster property owners, locals interested in building housing for their community and for the long-term. More people living in places where they can support local businesses, more people within a walk of their daily needs and living on a Frequent Transit Network, these represent the goals of our Official Community Plan, and the vision for New Westminster in the decades ahead.

Council voted 6-1 in favour of supporting the project, and I was one of the 6.

More Public Hearing goodness from June 24th. We had 5 items that got somewhat less attention at the meeting, which I will go through now:

Zoning Amendment (Queensborough Eastern Neighbourhood Node) Bylaw No. 8092, 2019; and
Road Closure (Queensborough Eastern Neighbourhood Node) Bylaw No. 8093, 2019
The eloquently-named Eastern Node neighbourhood in Queensborough is part of a long-term plan to bring a node of “mixed use” development to the transition area between Port Royal and the rest of Q’Boro. This will (finally) bring a renewed neighbourhood-serving retail node to the Port Royal area, something the community is definitely in need of. There are two unopened roads within the plan area of the Eastern Node, that is pieces of land that belong to the City for the ostensible future use as roads that have never been actually used as roads. To re-purpose them, they need to be officially “closed” (which means make then into titled, taxable lands) and rezoned. These are the Bylaws necessary to make that happen.

We received no written submissions on these Bylaws, and we had one delegate speak in favour (though she did express concern that the city was not getting a fair price for the lands). Council voted to support the Bylaws.

Heritage Revitalization Agreement (1002 – 1004 and 1006 – 1008 Third Avenue) Bylaw No. 8117, 2019;
Heritage Designation (1002 – 1004 Third Avenue) Bylaw No. 8118, 2019; and
Heritage Designation (1006 – 1008 Third Avenue) Bylaw No. 8119, 2019
Those two unique brick duplexes at 10th and Third are getting a bit of a renovation, which is almost completely interior work, but they nonetheless are going through the HRA route and will be permanently protected through Heritage Designation. The Community Heritage Commission, Advisory Planning Commission, and Brow RA all approved of it. We had no written submissions and no-one came to speak to the application. Council moved to approve the Bylaws.

Heritage Revitalization Agreement (632 Second Street) Bylaw No. 8120, 2019; and
Heritage Designation (632 Second Street) Bylaw No. 8121, 2019
This property owner wants to fix up a heritage house in Glenbrook North, give it permanent protection and subdivide the relatively large lot it is on to build a second infill house on the lot. The Community Heritage commission, Advisory Planning commission, and Residents Association all expressed approval for the plan. We received 7 written submissions for neighbours, all in favour of the application. We also had about a half dozen people come and speak to council about the application – some in favour, some opposed.

To place those delegations in context, I note that this proposal would provide two modest sized houses, both with suites, on a site that would currently allow a large ~4,000 square foot house. To me, our Official Community Plan is better supported by the subdivision and providing increased flexibility of housing close to schools on a Greenway than it is by having a single house that would be much larger and more out of context with the neighbourhood.

One neighbor was concerned about the proximity of the new house to their existing home, but there is no variance of the setback being requested here – if we didn’t approve this, the owner could build their 4,00 square foot house on the same footprint and have the same impact on this neighbor. There were also some concerns expressed about parking (natch) and the safety of the 7th Ave Greenway for bikes. I think that second topic is going to be a great discussion over the next year or so (I have some ideas here, even led a Jane’s Walk on the topic), but this project will not shift the landscape on 7th in a meaningful way. Council moved to support these Bylaws.

Official Community Plan Amendment (Queensborough Residential Low Density) Bylaw No. 8122, 2019;
Heritage Revitalization Agreement (647 Ewen Avenue) Bylaw No. 8068, 2019; and
Heritage Designation (647 Ewen Avenue) Bylaw No. 8069, 2019
This property owner wants to build a small townhouse development in Queensborough, along with preserving and repurposing the historic Slovak Hall, to convert it into two townhouse-style units.

This proposal is supported by the Community Heritage Commission, the Advisory Planning Commission, and the Design Panel. We received no written submissions on this, we had two delegations: the proponent (in favour) and the direct neighbor (not completely opposed, but with concerns).

I think this was a creative approach to infill density in Queensborough, and the Slovak Hall is a unique structure that will continue to add it the interesting streetscape (avenuescape?) on Ewen Avenue. Council voted to approve the OCP Amendment and Bylaws.

We had a lengthy Public Hearing last Council meeting with 8 different items, so I’m going to talk about it in sections. and try to work through it over the long weekend. I’ll start with the last two items of the evening:

Zoning Amendment – Cannabis Retail Location: 532 Sixth Street Bylaw 8111, 2019 and
8. Zoning Amendment – Cannabis Retail Location: 710 Twelfth Street Bylaw No. 8109, 2019
These are the first two applications for cannabis retail locations that have reached this last stage of City approvals; one on 6th Street in Uptown and one on 12th Street.

We have spent more than a year and a half in the process that got us here. This link points you to the reams of public documents and conversations we have had about how best to synch our local land use and business regulations with the federal and provincial regulations, made no less easy as we were waiting for the details from senior governments to trickle in as we were going along. I wrote a few relevant blog posts along the way, and even answered some questions on my blog page. You can go there and search “cannabis” to follow along and see where my mind was as we went through things.

We had our first open Council Workshop back on October 30, 2017, a full year before federal legalization. Staff led us through a pretty detailed discussion about the issues, and you really need to watch the video from the workshop to get a sense of the discussion. It was clear that Council had varying concerns and levels of comfort with the legalization regime, but staff did a pretty good job of working us towards consensus on a framework for local regulations, which they brought back to us for another open Council Workshop on January 29, 2018 where Council once again found several points to disagree on, yet worked our way towards some early principles to build draft Bylaws on.

We then hired a consultant to put together some presentation materials based on the framework, and put it out to two Public Open Houses and a meeting with the local business community. The feedback was generally favourable. We had an on-line survey that was advertised in the local paper, at City Hall, and through social media, and received more than 300 responses. We held a Council Town Hall, inviting people to come in and tell Council what they think we need to do, not do, or adjust.

This feedback was drafted into a set of Zoning and Business Bylaw amendments, which were put to a Public Hearing, with all the notice that entails. We had two people come and speak to that Public Hearing – one telling us we were moving too slow, and one telling us we were moving too fast. Such is the nature of Public Consultation.

At this point, applications started coming into the City for retail locations. They were reviewed by staff based on the framework established, and 5 locations were approved (again, at a public meeting) to go to final approval. We received quite a few delegations at this point, mostly from proponents who had not been selected in their first round. The two applicants in front of us at this Public Hearing were the first to clear all of the required provincial regulatory hurdles to get to this final Public Hearing Stage.

So, after all of that, I do not take at face value a delegate at the Public Hearing who claims that this process was rushed, secretive, and failed to include public input. It is ridiculous on the face of it.

There were some concerns raised about traffic on the 12th Street site. However, the location is an existing retail space, and I don’t see how a cannabis retail location will present greater traffic concerns than a book store, a pub, or a coffee shop.

There are some requirements we agreed upon as a Council that I frankly don’t understand. The requirement for opaque windows is not congruent with vibrant retail street design. This and the “buffer from schools” are requirements based on an outmoded and Puritan idea that we can protect children from (alleged) evil by keeping that evil out of their sight. There is an extended meme in the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy about “Peril-sensitive sunglasses” that riffs off of this idea. If the idea of keeping dangerous things out of children’s sight aligned with the real risks to the life and health of children, we would quickly resolve that there are no automobiles within 500m of a school. But I digress.

In saying that, I don’t want to act dismissive of the concerns raised by parents at the meeting. It was clear they are genuinely concerned, even scared, about what the legalization of cannabis means to their children. I empathize with their fears, but I do not share their fears. The substance has always been available to youth who want it, and I think this legalization and regulation process is actually going to make it easier to have rational, fact-based conversations about the substance, its risks and responsible use. I agree it is not appropriate for children to be using cannabis at the age when I started smoking pot (full disclosure: I haven’t touched the stuff in years), but even in my I’d-still-like-to-think-it-wasn’t-that-long-ago youth, parents were less able to have rational conversations about cannabis than they were about alcohol. I suspect that is because alcohol was present in most houses in some for or other and was visible in advertising and on the street, where cannabis was counter-culture and represented (dangerous?) rebellion. I hope that these conversations will change through legalization, but recognize there will always be people unable to move past the prohibition-based status quo.

The nuisance issue with cannabis is a real one, and still one local governments across Canada are going to be challenged to address. I think the nuisance issues will never be as bad as those caused by alcohol (cannabis typically just doesn’t lead to the loud, violent rowdiness that is associated with closing time at many pubs) but they will be different. But in our land use decision-making, I think the nuisance will be more about consumption in inappropriate places (parks, bus stops) and less about where the purchase occurs.

The Uptown location received the most correspondence: 362 pieces, by far most were in favour, suggesting they already have a well established potential client base. We had about 10 people speak to this application, most opposed. It seemed to me that most were opposed to the entire idea of cannabis retail, and the opposition to this location was a sub-set of that. The 12th Street location received a single piece of correspondence (opposed), and about 10 people delegating, with the majority opposed based largely on traffic concerns and parking concerns. In the end, Council moved to approve the two locations.

We had a long day on Monday. I had a task force meeting at 9:00 am, and left City Hall just before midnight. 15 hours. And much of that was spent going through the Public Hearing topics. But I’m not going to talk about the Public Hearing here, because that is going to take a whole bunch of space and time and a little more thinking on my part about how to frame my responses to the events of the evening, so I’ll just deal with the info on the Regular Agenda, which began with three Opportunities to be Heard:

Business Regulations and Licensing (Rental Units) Amendment Bylaw No. 8130, 2019
The City has been pretty aggressive at addressing the renoviction situation, after the situation was rising to crisis levels last year. I have to give kudos to our staff for finding creative ways to leverage the City’s limited regulatory power here to fill gaps in the Provincial regulations, while we wait for those regulations to hopefully be updated and strengthened. I am pretty proud that other cities are following the lead of New Westminster, and that tenants around the region are seeing better protection because of our actions.

As we are on the leading edge here, Staff have brought forward some improvements on the Bylaws we passed back in February to use our Business Licensing powers to regulate how evictions occur in the City. Learning from practical experience, these changes will make the Bylaw easier to enforce and more effective. This includes making the timing of the offence at the delivery of eviction (if that eviction is found to be non-compliant), to clarify that every day the situation is not addressed constitutes a new offence (allowing the City to pile up fines to create real deterrence), and other administrative changes.

No-one came to speak to the Bylaw, and we received no written submissions. Council moved to adopt the Bylaw.

Closing of a Portion of Boyne Street at 34 South Dyke Road Bylaw No. 8074, 2019
There is an unused road portion in Queensborough the City wants to close. That means there is a piece of land that is not a regular taxable lot, but designated as highway that belongs to the city. This piece of highway has never had need for a road on it, so it is vacant land. There is a development on one side of it, and another development happening on the other side, but the roadway is still “surplus” to the city’s needs.

As is policy in these cases, the road can be sold to the adjacent landowner and integrated into the development, as long as conditions the City needs are met. We need a bylaw to do this, to “raise title” on the land so it can be valued and taxed appropriately. No-one came to speak to the Bylaw, and we received no written correspondence. Council moved to adopt the Bylaw.

Development Variance Permit DVP00664 for 118 Regina Street
The owners of this heritage house in Queens Park want to put a 12-foot addition on the back to create a more livable back space in the house, but because the side of the existing house is closer to the property line than would be currently permitted, an addition to the back will also be too close to the property line, meaning a variance is required.

We had no speakers and no written correspondence, and Council moved approve the variance.

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The following items were Moved on Consent:

NWACC Infrastructure Loan Authorization Bylaw No. 8073, 2019 – Results from Alternative Approval Process
The replacement for the Canada games Pool and Centennial Community Centre is going to require that we borrow money beyond a 5-year term, which requires special consent from the community. The City has two alternatives under the Community Charter – a City-wide referendum or this Alternate Approval Process (AAP) where we ask the City to tell us if they oppose the idea. If 10% of the public register opposition, we need to go to referendum.

I hate the structure of the AAP, always have, but that is the process available to us if we believe (as I do) that referendums are terrible way to choose what vital service the City – or any government – is able to deliver.

Anyway, the APP was completed as per the legislation, we had 41 people let us know they opposed the borrowing Bylaw (which is short of the 5,061 required to force referendum) so we can proceed with adopting the borrowing bylaw (below).

2018 Annual Water Quality Monitoring Report
The City samples your water to make sure it is safe to drink, because dysentery sucks. We have 13 sampling stations, and they measure things like coliforms and e-coli, chlorine levels, turbidity and metals. We collected more than 1,000 samples in 2018, and all passed quality criteria.

Sixth Avenue and Second Street Intersection – Open Delegation Response
We had a couple of delegates come to Council back in April to express concerns about a pedestrian improvement in Queens Park. Staff looked again at the changes, and have had discussions with the Neighbourhood Traffic Advisory Committee, the Queens Park Residents’ Association, and the NWPD, and have determined that the improvements planned are the best option for the site. With a City full of intersection improvements needed, the treatment here is the one that makes the most sense.

Glenbrook Ravine Park Invasive Plant Management Plan
Glenbrook Ravine is a green treasure in the City, but most people will not recognize that much of the green you see there represents invasive species that are actually terrible for the local ecosystem networks. Blackberry and English Ivy have completely proliferated in the ravine, where other invasives like Scotch Broom and Knotweed are still very limited in extent. Realistically, the limited extent invasive can be knocked out relatively easily, the proliferating ones cannot – but we can take efforts to reduce their impacts (i.e. stop ivy from destroying the alders),

Through ad-hoc efforts of community volunteers like Kyle Routledge and groups like the New West Environmental Partners, there have been some efforts to start addressing this problem, but the problem is bigger than these small efforts, and needs a long-term coordinated plan if it is going to make progress. This report outlines what that long-term strategy looks like!

228 Nelson’s Crescent: Housing Agreement Amendment Bylaw 8135, 2019 for Three Readings
We have a housing agreement with Wesgroup on the secured market rental building in the Brewery District, but the language of the agreement is making CMHC nervous, so we made a small modification so everyone is secure that the Feds will get paid if things go terribly wrong, I suppose.

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The following items were Removed from Consent for discussion

330 East Columbia Street (RCH Project): Gas Service Installation on Brunette Avenue – Request for Construction Noise Bylaw No. 6063, 1992 Exemption
The hospital upgrade requires a gas line upgrade, which means digging up Brunette Ave in front of the Hospital. Because traffic on Brunette must flow, they are going to do this work at night, which requires an exemption from the Construction Noise Bylaw for a week in late August.

I voted against this. I’m not against the work getting done, but do it during business hours and let people sleep. Fully charged and feeling punchy after the Active Transportation Summit, I am feeling strongly that we need to start pushing back a bit against the assumptions of motordom. I’m ready to start voting against these small erosions and start prioritizing livability before traffic flow. The exemption was granted in a split vote.

Child Care Situation in Queensborough
Affordable, accessible childcare is a desperate need across the City and region, but in New West the need is most acute in Queensborough. Where most neighbourhoods in New West have childcare spaces exceeding the provincial and regional average, Queensborough stands out with only 11 spaces per 1,000 children (compared to the regional average of 18.5). For a variety of reasons, both private and non-profit daycare providers are not setting up in Queensborough.

This is just a status report, but the City and School District are going to work together to address this, and specifically ask the province to help us out. Council discussed the need to find some creative solutions, as the current model (and current funding models) simply is not providing the need.

Amendment to Subdivision and Development Control Bylaw Schedule “B” Design Criteria Sections 1, 3, 4, 5 and Part of 8
Looking at the title, does anyone have any idea what this report is about?!

Let’s see if I can break it down. We have a Bylaw that tells anyone who wants to build some things in the City what they need to do to connect that thing to the rest of the City – what kind of water, sewer, electrical, road, sidewalk, etc. connections the developer or builder will be responsible for to assure that everything works together when the building is complete, and the developer pays for their share of the costs, not downloading it onto taxpayers. Attached to that Bylaw is “Schedule B”, which describes in detail all of the designs the City requires. Parts of the Schedule, in turn, describe General Requirements, Storm Drainage System, Sanitary Sewer System, Water Distribution System, and the designs of road pavement. Not surprisingly, technology and engineering demands change over time, and so we need to update the Bylaw to reflect these changes, which we have not done, apparently, since 2006.

It seems arcane, but there are some nuggets in here. The biggest changes are in how we account for projected climate change impacts on rainfall patterns (we need to store more rain water locally or build bigger pipes to address more intense storms). Consistent with Metro Vancouver work, we are incorporating a “moderate climate change forecast” for 2050 (for most infrastructure) or 2100 (for high-risk or critical infrastructure) based on this report.

I have had discussions with people trying to build laneway or carriage houses, and one common complaint is that the rules for connecting to water and sewer do not seem to reflect the situation where we have two residences on a single lot. Some of the existing bylaws create problematic situations like having to trench across an entire property when there may be a closer second connection, or having to run a new sewer line under or through an exsiting building. Staff assured us that they are learning from the experiences of these early adopters, and these Bylaws have the adaptability to support these changes.

Q to Q Ferry Service Plan for Permanent Service
In the last year (May 2018 – June 2019) we had 80,000 rides on the QtoQ ferry, and the City subsidized the service by a bit over $700,000. Staff are asking us to enter into a new procurement for a permanent service, and though I am supportive of the QtoQ, I am challenged with the projected cost, based on the existing ridership.

I had hoped that we could extend for another year, and have some better discussions with potential partners like TransLink and the Ministry of Transportation, both of whom were at the Active Transportation Summit, and both of whom have been expressing interest in supporting more innovative and multi-modal transportation options like the QtoQ, while we continue to see if we can cost share or bring more cost efficiency to the system. However, Council voted to commit to a 5-year contract, in light of how that may provide more security for users and may result in us getting a better contract with a provider.

I do think there is room to continue those conversations with senior agencies and potential partners. In the meantime, some small service adjustments are proposed to make the system run more efficiently

2019 Council Remuneration
We once again sent the touchy issue of Council Remuneration to an outside agency for review, as we agreed to do 4 years ago last time this came up. They recommended that Council pay be increased by 15% to make up for the change in federal taxation regime, which removed the tax exemption from half of our pay, essentially reducing our take-home by 15%. Then we should continue annual CPI increases. This would make our pay fit close to the median of our comparator communities, and essentially make out take-home pay match what we got in previous years. I am happy with this recommendation.

The report also recommended an increased vehicle allowance, but that recommendation did not make it through to our report, as staff will be looking at it as part of a more comprehensive update of our council expense policy.

639 – 655 East Columbia Street: Preliminary Application Review for Infill Townhouses
This is a preliminary report on a potential land assembly and townhouse development on East Columbia right across from the Lower Hume Park entrance. There is quite a bit going on here, including designing a new entrance and intersection at Hume Park, preservation of two possibly-heritage homes and potential to “strand” one property at the extreme north end of New West.

I don’t know why preserving these two single family homes would be congruent with what the bigger goal is here – more affordable and flexible townhouse-type development. If we are going to talk about the cost of preserving these homes as providing community asset, I would rather it be more affordable housing and expansion green space adjacent to Brunette River – even a connection to the Interurban train on the south side of Brunette, and preservation of significant trees. .

Anyway, a preliminary report for review, and there is lots of work to do yet here.

City of Victoria letter to UBCM dated May 29, 2019 regarding restoring Provincial support for libraries
We received a letter from the City of Victoria requesting we support their request to the Provincial government, and we did so and will send a note to the effect. I hope they don’t get it in their head that we are over that whole stealing-of-the-Capital thing….

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Finally, we had one Bylaw for Adoption:

New Westminster Aquatics and Community Centre Loan Authorization Bylaw No. 8073, 2019
This Bylaw, which gives Council the authority to borrow up to $93.6 Million for a term of 20 years to build the replacement for the Canada Games Pool and Centennial Community Centre was adopted by Council. Things are getting real now.

And like I said, I will follow up when I get a chance with a reporting out of my experiences at the Public Hearing. Lucky there is a long weekend coming!

We had a public-delegation-full Council Meeting on Monday, I never realized how much people in New West hate basketball (I’m going to look back at this blog post in a few years and have no idea what that joke is about). To see it all, you need to watch the video, because I only report here on what we get done, and we had an agenda to get through:

Uptown Belmont Street Parklet: Proposed Redesign
The Uptown Parklet has been successful, if you measure success by its intended purpose: making a public place where people can meet, rest, socialize, and share. As a public square owned by the public, it works, better than any other parklet in the City (and yes, there are others, in Sapperton, in the Brow). We are not quite Montreal, but animating public space is a goal this council supports.

Part of the problem with this success is that some people are bothered by other people using the space. There has also been a bit of a shift in the use of the space as the original astroturf got shabby and was removed, and there were some maintenance issues with the equipment in the space. This report outlines a plan to “refresh” the space to address the second problem, and a bit of a strategy to address the first problem.

Some residents of the adjacent residential buildings are bothered by nighttime use of the parklet, especially people leaving the local pub or drinking in the parklet at night, which has lead to a lot of noise complaints. Smoking is also (as in all of our parks) a problem. In short, some neighbours want the Parklet removed. These are both community behaviour problems that occur in all of our parks and public areas, and re-locating them is not a solution. Every time I go to the Parklet and talk to people using it, they tell me how much they appreciate it being there (though many say they want it fixed up). The drinking/smoking issues are best addressed through a combination of enforcement and education. We are working with the NWPD, the Uptown BIA and the neighbours to work on these issues, and Councillor Trentadue was right on the mark (IMHO) in saying we need to look at a little more “proactive” enforcement, and a little less relying on people to call the NWPD non-emergency line.

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The following items were moved on consent:

Recruitment 2019: Committee Appointments (NTAC & Arts)
We are officially appointing a new representative to the NTAC from the new Victoria Hill Ginger Drive Residents’ Association, and a new representative to the Arts Commission.

800 Block Boyd Street: Road Paving – Request for Construction Noise Bylaw No. 6063, 1992 Exemption
They need to re-pave Boyd Street after gas line replacement. It will happen at night to reduce the traffic impact, and a construction noise bylaw exemption is required. Council approved this.

118 Regina Street: Development Variance Permit – Consideration of Notice of Opportunity to be Heard
A heritage house in Queens Park is seeing an upgrade to improve the livable space, while protecting the heritage value of the house. They require a variance for side setback (how close the side of the addition can be to the property line), to reduce it from 5 feet to 3.1 feet. This will go to an Opportunity to be Heard on June 24th; C’mon out and tell us what you think.

230 Keary Street (Building 8), 268 Nelson’s Court (Building 7), and 228 Nelson’s Crescent (Building 5): Brewery District – Zoning Bylaw Text Amendment to Convert Permitted Use on Building 8 from Commercial to Omnibus Use (including Residential)
Wesgroup would like to revisit the zoning language for the next phases of the Brewery District development. The want to make the currently-designated commercial density in Building 8 into “omnibus” zoning which allows a shift towards more residential and less commercial use, along with increasing the height of the building (but not the density – a narrower, taller building), in exchange for making all of buildings 5 and 7 into market rental properties. In short, 320 units currently approved for sale as condos would become secured market rental units in exchange for no increased density, but a shift from commercial to residential.

This is a preliminary report, and has some review to go through, including a conversation with the neighbourhood and eventually a Public Hearing if it gets through all the hoops. I’m a bit challenged by this developer one again going back to the neighbourhood to ask for more height, but I am willing to see how the public and committee reviews go here, and whether the addition of more market rental is valued.

UBCM Resolution in Support of Greater Investments in Municipal and Not-for-Profit Seniors Services and Supports
The UBCM meeting in the Fall will already have a couple of New Westminster resolutions, this one was brought to us by the Healthy Aging Municipal Caucus, of which the City is a member. We are asking, along with a few other municipalities, for the UBCM to coordinate a more coordinated approach between the three orders of governments and local not-for-profits to better fund initiatives to support seniors in our communities.

2018 Statement of Financial Information
Every year we produce a SOFI for the Provincial Government, along with a report from our Auditors telling them everything is on the up-and-up. We ended this fiscal year with $51M more in financial assets than Liabilities ($4M less than last year), but have $23M more in accumulated surplus (which includes the value of all of our buildings, sewer pipes, asphalt, light poles, desktop computers, etc. etc.). We exceeded our revenue targets by $5 Million (though we collected $1M less than anticipated in taxes), and spent $9M more than we expected. We have $128M in investments, and $59M in debt.

Also on there is the remuneration info – I got paid $46,434 for Council work in fiscal year 2018, and spent $5,719 on various expenses (mostly conference attendance at FCM, UBCM, and Lower Mainland LGA). You can also see a list with the names (ugh) of every employee who got paid more than $75,000 in wages and expenses last year, and the name of every supplier from whom we purchased more than $25,000 in goods. Compelling stuff!

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The following items were Removed form Consent for discussion:

Funding for Tsilhqot’in Nation reconciliation
The City has a budget line for “international relations”, which has in the past supported several international-exchange initiatives with our City Cities in China, Japan, and the Philippines. Those types of junkets are becoming less common (I have never travelled overseas on behalf of the City in my 4+ years on Council, and there hasn’t been a full council exchange in many years). We are, however, entering a new kind of City-to-Nation relationship with First Nations communities across the province. The special relationship of New Westminster and the Tsilhqot’in Nation, based on a tragic history, has been a priority for Council, and has resulted in some great relationship building leading to a positive path towards reconciliation with this Nation.

The next step in this relationship is for our two communities to come together and have a commemoration ceremony with representatives of the Tsilhqot’in, and more visits by a Councillor or two to their Nation to talk about future activities. We are, in this report, approving taking some of the International Relations budget money to pay for this, and establishing that future expenses should come from a reconciliation budget.

2019 Council Remuneration
We once again sent the touchy issue of Council Remuneration to an outside consultant for review, as we agreed to do last time this came up 4 years ago. The consultant recommended that Council pay be increased by 15% to make up for the change in federal taxation regime, which removed the tax exemption from half of our pay, essentially reducing our take-home by 15% 9or “making us whole” so we have essentially the same take-home in 2019 as we did in 2018, then continue annual CPI increases. This would make our pay once again fit close to the median of our comparator communities.

They also recommended that we increase a vehicle allowance to match that of our neighbouring communities. This I disagree with. I simply don’t think we need a vehicle allowance in a City of 15 square kilometres with excellent transit service and walkability, and if we do have legitimate travel costs for our day-to-day work, it should be managed though our expense allowance, not as something we are given outright.

Regardless, Council moved to table the report, and we will have a fuller discussion of it next meeting, no doubt after careful consideration of Facebook comments.

Arts Commission: Request to Increase Arts & Culture Grant
We are going through a process of revamping our grant process, including some review of how grants are categorized. As we are also launching a new Arts Strategy, the Arts Commission is asking that the amount of money awarded to support arts in the community, and way it is awarded, be reviewed as part of this review. There is no specific ask for a specific amount here, but we will be getting a report back from staff.

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We moved the following Bylaw,:

Zoning Amendment Bylaw No. 8123, 2019 for Residential Rental Tenure
This Bylaw that updates the Rental Tenure zoning for 6 properties that have always operated a rental in the city was adopted by Council.

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We also had one piece of New business:

Motion: Gender, Diversity and Inclusion
Councillor Trentadue put forward the following motion:

That staff report back on the current breakdown of departments by gender, diversity, and people with disabilities, and
That staff report back on best practices that other governments, institutions and businesses have implemented to address gender parity, diversity and inclusion; and
That staff develop hiring practices that will meet the needs of a changing workforce and improve the balance of our employee make up; and
That staff develop metrics and a reporting structure that will confirm our success
or failure to address these issues; and
That staff develop City-wide policy to which all departments can adhere and that addresses not only the issues of gender parity, diversity, and inclusion but also the integration and support of all city employees with disabilities.

The City has always had the feeling that we are doing a good job at diversity in our workforce, but there are areas (such as in the trades) where we are definitely not keeping up with the diversity of the general workforce. This motion will ask staff to actually start tracking the diversity of our workforce, and report back with practices and metrics so we can assure that barriers to employment for underrepresented groups can be identified and addressed. This is going to make us a better operation, and Council unanimously supported it.

And that was the end of the meeting, but don’t forget to tune in or drop by on June 24th when we have (count ‘em) 12 Public Hearings and 3 Opportunities to be heard. Should be an action-packed event!