NewslettersThe Problem: Tree Asset Preservation, Infrastructure & Climate Impacts & Council’s Disconnect.
Part #2
It is apparent Council and the ever-growing Administration are not grasping the correlation and significance of:
There are many, many examples of how Council has failed to adequately address these important Community issues (e.g. see Pictures Appendix #1).
There seems to be little understanding of what the cumulative impacts of these issues are and will continue to be on the character and environment of Oak Bay. Often Council is spending hours discussing minor issues while these urgent remedial actions are delayed. Or there are only token attempts, masquerading as what are purported to be District priorities: e.g. “Providing Service Excellence” and “Achieving Sustainable Service Delivery”.
Natural Asset Preservation
It is apparent there is little or no communication between the Engineering, Parks and Planning Departments (see Appendix #2. Page #4). No red flags are raised about most developments that involve a reduction in natural assets. There is no evidence anyone or any department is keeping track of the many cumulative impacts. The District is mainly evaluating each department's accomplishments through a developer’s or development lens.
The District’s 2-for-1 tree replacement policy offers no help. It in no way can be taken seriously. Often there is little room left on the lot for replacement trees to grow to maturity. The tree replacement policy also only applies to a limited number of trees and not the loss of the vegetation – a significant part of our Urban forest. It will be many years before any newly planted, substitute saplings can even begin to provide the same benefits the removed mature trees provided.
Put another way in the “Aladdin’s “Magic Lamp” Analogy: there is not much chance the evil magician would have acquired Aladdin’s lamp if the new lamps he was trading for old did not work for twenty years or so. It is a safe bet people including Aladdin’s wife would not have wanted to spend many years in darkness and would surely have held onto their old functional lamps.
This “keeping what natural assets we have" approach (in our case mature trees etc.) should certainly be Oak Bay’s Council’s policy if they are serious about climate change and tree conservation.
However, there seems little hope of a tree conservation approach. Council formed a Climate Change Task Force and appointed the entire Advisory Planning Commission (APC) membership. Many of the APC commissioners, one way or another, have been connected to housing development. Urban Forest (tree and vegetation preservation) has not been one of the Commission’s agenda items.
Infrastructure Capacity, Development Taxation Shortfall and Climate Change
These issues were addressed in Part #1. The recent infrastructure failure, the many leaks and pipe failures, the CRD/ Oak Bay wastewater effluent danger alert and ignoring the real climate change issues are all by-products of over-develop first, deal with infrastructure second. New development revenue also has proven to be a false economy as it isn’t keeping up with the additional costs it creates.
Oak Bay Watch Perspective (Read on for more related Information)
Compounding all of the above concerns is a recent disclosure by the District’s Secondary Suite Consultant. He stated a suite zoning change that would allow multi-tenant suites in Oak Bay’s single-family neighbourhoods, would result in an increase of 1,500 new suites. This would be in addition to the existing estimated 750 suites. This would mean at least a 2,000 car increase. Notwithstanding that secondary suites bring in insufficient revenue to support the new District services required, the increased commuting and parking implications alone are not a desirable climate change outcome.
It seems to us if so many trees on new-build approved applications are reported to be in poor condition or diseased, therefore justifying their removal, then it follows. these cannot be isolated cases. This serious tree health issue must apply to the condition of the rest of Oak Bay’s private property urban forest trees.
We know many mature trees have life-spans far in excess of those being cut down so the questions are what is the reason Oak Bay has so many unhealthy trees and what is the number of poor condition tree removal permits issued in the rest of the District?
The facts are Council members are forging ahead with excessive over-densification objectives and condoning, not only tree and urban forest destruction, they are sanctioning the depletion of affordable housing stock and replacing it with many more expensive, infrastructure impacting overbuilds (see Appendix #1).
Council’s role of defending the public interest has given way to real estate and development interests - at present a very unbalanced situation.
A good start would be:
Oak Bay Watch does not crate the facts - it just reports them
*******Please help us continue to provide you with information about Community concerns and Council decisions and actions. Oak Bay Watch members also help community groups with their specific development concerns. Donate to Oak Bay Watch - even $5 or $10 dollars provides expenses for door- to- door handouts and helps us maintain our website. Oak Bay Watch is committed to ensuring the Community gets the full range of information on budget, governance and all key development issues – a well-informed opinion cannot be made without this.
(Please use Donate Button at bottom of oakbaywatch.com Home Page)
Keep informed and sign up for our newsletter – bottom of Newsletter Menu Item.
Appendix #1 (All Pictures are of the same lot)
Part #2
It is apparent Council and the ever-growing Administration are not grasping the correlation and significance of:
- Preserving our natural assets (trees & vegetation),
- The infrastructure’s capacity to handle ongoing and planned development,
- The dysfunctional (over- building) Zoning Bylaw impacts and,
- Providing effective Climate Change strategies.
There are many, many examples of how Council has failed to adequately address these important Community issues (e.g. see Pictures Appendix #1).
There seems to be little understanding of what the cumulative impacts of these issues are and will continue to be on the character and environment of Oak Bay. Often Council is spending hours discussing minor issues while these urgent remedial actions are delayed. Or there are only token attempts, masquerading as what are purported to be District priorities: e.g. “Providing Service Excellence” and “Achieving Sustainable Service Delivery”.
Natural Asset Preservation
It is apparent there is little or no communication between the Engineering, Parks and Planning Departments (see Appendix #2. Page #4). No red flags are raised about most developments that involve a reduction in natural assets. There is no evidence anyone or any department is keeping track of the many cumulative impacts. The District is mainly evaluating each department's accomplishments through a developer’s or development lens.
The District’s 2-for-1 tree replacement policy offers no help. It in no way can be taken seriously. Often there is little room left on the lot for replacement trees to grow to maturity. The tree replacement policy also only applies to a limited number of trees and not the loss of the vegetation – a significant part of our Urban forest. It will be many years before any newly planted, substitute saplings can even begin to provide the same benefits the removed mature trees provided.
Put another way in the “Aladdin’s “Magic Lamp” Analogy: there is not much chance the evil magician would have acquired Aladdin’s lamp if the new lamps he was trading for old did not work for twenty years or so. It is a safe bet people including Aladdin’s wife would not have wanted to spend many years in darkness and would surely have held onto their old functional lamps.
This “keeping what natural assets we have" approach (in our case mature trees etc.) should certainly be Oak Bay’s Council’s policy if they are serious about climate change and tree conservation.
However, there seems little hope of a tree conservation approach. Council formed a Climate Change Task Force and appointed the entire Advisory Planning Commission (APC) membership. Many of the APC commissioners, one way or another, have been connected to housing development. Urban Forest (tree and vegetation preservation) has not been one of the Commission’s agenda items.
Infrastructure Capacity, Development Taxation Shortfall and Climate Change
These issues were addressed in Part #1. The recent infrastructure failure, the many leaks and pipe failures, the CRD/ Oak Bay wastewater effluent danger alert and ignoring the real climate change issues are all by-products of over-develop first, deal with infrastructure second. New development revenue also has proven to be a false economy as it isn’t keeping up with the additional costs it creates.
Oak Bay Watch Perspective (Read on for more related Information)
Compounding all of the above concerns is a recent disclosure by the District’s Secondary Suite Consultant. He stated a suite zoning change that would allow multi-tenant suites in Oak Bay’s single-family neighbourhoods, would result in an increase of 1,500 new suites. This would be in addition to the existing estimated 750 suites. This would mean at least a 2,000 car increase. Notwithstanding that secondary suites bring in insufficient revenue to support the new District services required, the increased commuting and parking implications alone are not a desirable climate change outcome.
It seems to us if so many trees on new-build approved applications are reported to be in poor condition or diseased, therefore justifying their removal, then it follows. these cannot be isolated cases. This serious tree health issue must apply to the condition of the rest of Oak Bay’s private property urban forest trees.
We know many mature trees have life-spans far in excess of those being cut down so the questions are what is the reason Oak Bay has so many unhealthy trees and what is the number of poor condition tree removal permits issued in the rest of the District?
The facts are Council members are forging ahead with excessive over-densification objectives and condoning, not only tree and urban forest destruction, they are sanctioning the depletion of affordable housing stock and replacing it with many more expensive, infrastructure impacting overbuilds (see Appendix #1).
Council’s role of defending the public interest has given way to real estate and development interests - at present a very unbalanced situation.
A good start would be:
- A Zoning Bylaw remediation review prioritized for 2021. The Zoning Review must correct the zoning lot coverage mistakes made in 2007 and 2014. The over-building loopholes must be eliminated and a 30% lot coverage compliance re-established. This must be in conjunction with the Planning Department getting busy planning and identifying a balanced development approach that will ensure the preservation of Oak Bay’s neighbourhhood characteristics.
- The Planning Department must stop claiming that a 2-for-1 replacement sapling count is maintaining and protecting the urban forest.This practice in not only ineffective but a deception.
- Re-establish the Environmental Committee with local members who have environmental expertise.
- Adopt an Eco-Asset Management Strategy: see https://gibsons.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Eco-Asset-Strategy.pdf with a view to protecting natural assets ahead of development interests.
Oak Bay Watch does not crate the facts - it just reports them
*******Please help us continue to provide you with information about Community concerns and Council decisions and actions. Oak Bay Watch members also help community groups with their specific development concerns. Donate to Oak Bay Watch - even $5 or $10 dollars provides expenses for door- to- door handouts and helps us maintain our website. Oak Bay Watch is committed to ensuring the Community gets the full range of information on budget, governance and all key development issues – a well-informed opinion cannot be made without this.
(Please use Donate Button at bottom of oakbaywatch.com Home Page)
Keep informed and sign up for our newsletter – bottom of Newsletter Menu Item.
Appendix #1 (All Pictures are of the same lot)
This House most likely rivals the Bowker massing. The public or Council no longer have any say about the resulting tree loss or environmental and infrastructure impacts of these new mega-builds. It's difficult to understand how the Parks, and Engineering Departments and Council don't see this is a serious Problem?
The Development of this very large lot required a clear-cut of the trees indicated within the white lot-line perimeters.
Appendix #2
https://gibsons.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Eco-Asset-Strategy.pdf
"Asset management requires that all assets be considered, then assets must include not only built or engineered infrastructure but also natural assets, or “eco-assets” wherever these provide equivalent civil services on which the Town relies". Home
Page #4: In Canada and elsewhere, responsibility for municipal asset management plans traditionally existed within individual departments, for example, Parks, Public Works, Engineering and Finance, independent of core financial systems. Departments used data that was specialized, incomplete, and not comparable across the municipal systems making it challenging to develop a holistic picture of the quality of assets or their relative costs and maintenance priorities. Municipal asset management also often had the narrow objective of avoiding or addressing breakdowns, rather than maintaining an overall healthy asset portfolio over the lifecycle of each asset.
https://gibsons.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/2019-Asset-Management-Program-Overview_finalcombined.pdf
Appendix #2
https://gibsons.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Eco-Asset-Strategy.pdf
"Asset management requires that all assets be considered, then assets must include not only built or engineered infrastructure but also natural assets, or “eco-assets” wherever these provide equivalent civil services on which the Town relies". Home
Page #4: In Canada and elsewhere, responsibility for municipal asset management plans traditionally existed within individual departments, for example, Parks, Public Works, Engineering and Finance, independent of core financial systems. Departments used data that was specialized, incomplete, and not comparable across the municipal systems making it challenging to develop a holistic picture of the quality of assets or their relative costs and maintenance priorities. Municipal asset management also often had the narrow objective of avoiding or addressing breakdowns, rather than maintaining an overall healthy asset portfolio over the lifecycle of each asset.
https://gibsons.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/2019-Asset-Management-Program-Overview_finalcombined.pdf