Newsletter September 30, 2023: Local Government Autonomy a Thing of the Past.
The great North American experiment was based on “A development pattern that represents thousands of years of received wisdom on how to build human habitat”. So said author, engineer and Land Use Planner Charles L. Marohn. JR. However, the days of neighbourhoods with homes with the white picket fence are numbered. Today’s housing, that has been described as “A commodity from which to extract wealth”, is on the march, aided and abetted by the Federal and Provincial Governments.
With the advent of whole municipalities being upzoned to multi-family, this means residents may no longer have to get long with a few neighbours but with many neighbours. That is if a fourplex, sixplex and/ or infill is built next door or close by. Also, multi-dwelling transition zones to single family areas are also a thing of the past. Residents may now have many units overlooking their homes and gardens (See Appendix #1).
The BC Government has dictated that 640 units must be built in Oak Bay in the next five years. Replacement houses will not count – tearing down Oak Bay’s more affordable small homes to build much bigger ones will continue. Also, so will the infrastructure and the environmental impacts. It is doubtful heritage, street parking, quiet streets, and the District’s end-of-life infrastructure and the upgrade costs will be taken into consideration.
Oak Bay Watch Perspective
Oak Bay Watch was intending to provide the reasons that just providing more and more supply won’t solve the affordable housing crisis. However, to explain this, we could not improve on a Saanich resident’s September 14, 2023 Saanich News, editorial page letter. We both draw the same conclusions and outcomes (see letter Appendix #2).
It seemed to us that the September 14, Saanich article’s information is current and would have been of immediate interest to Oak Bay residents. Especially, given the Provincial Government’s pending (now confirmed) decree that Oak Bay has to build 640 new housing units in the next five years or else face the consequences.
However, this important information about housing supply and affordability, was not the subject of the Oak Bay News September 14, 2023 editorial page letters. Instead, it published a Langley Times September 2, 2023, editorial page article on first aid.
A decade or so ago, several Oak Bay Watch members met with Ida Chong the reigning BC Liberal Party’s Minister of Community, Sports and Culture. The meeting was about the Oak Bay Council’s approving over-building lots in our District.
Minister Chong informed Oak Bay Watch that the BC Local Government Act covers important authorities for both municipalities and regional districts, such as planning and land use powers. Also, we were informed that the BC Liberal Government had enacted the Community Charter to provide local governments with more autonomy over fundamental municipal powers. (https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/governments/local-governments/facts-framework/legislative-framework#:~:text=The%20Community)
Our understanding was that the purpose of local governments was to enable residents and their local council representatives to make land use decisions based on the conditions in their community. This is also the purpose that the BC Provincial Government clearly indicates on their website (Appendix #3). However, based on this government's new land use legislation that overrides local government's land use decisions, it turns out that the Province’s website information is just more of the usual senior government rhetoric.
“What a difference a decade makes”.
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“Nothing is inevitable if you are paying attention” Oak Bay Watch
Oak Bay Watch is a volunteer community association and its members have a variety of professional backgrounds in both the public and private sector.
*******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 the bottom of oakbaywatch.com Home Page)
Keep informed and sign up for our newsletter – at the bottom of the Newsletter top Menu Item
Appendix #1
The great North American experiment was based on “A development pattern that represents thousands of years of received wisdom on how to build human habitat”. So said author, engineer and Land Use Planner Charles L. Marohn. JR. However, the days of neighbourhoods with homes with the white picket fence are numbered. Today’s housing, that has been described as “A commodity from which to extract wealth”, is on the march, aided and abetted by the Federal and Provincial Governments.
With the advent of whole municipalities being upzoned to multi-family, this means residents may no longer have to get long with a few neighbours but with many neighbours. That is if a fourplex, sixplex and/ or infill is built next door or close by. Also, multi-dwelling transition zones to single family areas are also a thing of the past. Residents may now have many units overlooking their homes and gardens (See Appendix #1).
The BC Government has dictated that 640 units must be built in Oak Bay in the next five years. Replacement houses will not count – tearing down Oak Bay’s more affordable small homes to build much bigger ones will continue. Also, so will the infrastructure and the environmental impacts. It is doubtful heritage, street parking, quiet streets, and the District’s end-of-life infrastructure and the upgrade costs will be taken into consideration.
Oak Bay Watch Perspective
Oak Bay Watch was intending to provide the reasons that just providing more and more supply won’t solve the affordable housing crisis. However, to explain this, we could not improve on a Saanich resident’s September 14, 2023 Saanich News, editorial page letter. We both draw the same conclusions and outcomes (see letter Appendix #2).
It seemed to us that the September 14, Saanich article’s information is current and would have been of immediate interest to Oak Bay residents. Especially, given the Provincial Government’s pending (now confirmed) decree that Oak Bay has to build 640 new housing units in the next five years or else face the consequences.
However, this important information about housing supply and affordability, was not the subject of the Oak Bay News September 14, 2023 editorial page letters. Instead, it published a Langley Times September 2, 2023, editorial page article on first aid.
A decade or so ago, several Oak Bay Watch members met with Ida Chong the reigning BC Liberal Party’s Minister of Community, Sports and Culture. The meeting was about the Oak Bay Council’s approving over-building lots in our District.
Minister Chong informed Oak Bay Watch that the BC Local Government Act covers important authorities for both municipalities and regional districts, such as planning and land use powers. Also, we were informed that the BC Liberal Government had enacted the Community Charter to provide local governments with more autonomy over fundamental municipal powers. (https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/governments/local-governments/facts-framework/legislative-framework#:~:text=The%20Community)
Our understanding was that the purpose of local governments was to enable residents and their local council representatives to make land use decisions based on the conditions in their community. This is also the purpose that the BC Provincial Government clearly indicates on their website (Appendix #3). However, based on this government's new land use legislation that overrides local government's land use decisions, it turns out that the Province’s website information is just more of the usual senior government rhetoric.
“What a difference a decade makes”.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“Nothing is inevitable if you are paying attention” Oak Bay Watch
Oak Bay Watch is a volunteer community association and its members have a variety of professional backgrounds in both the public and private sector.
*******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 the bottom of oakbaywatch.com Home Page)
Keep informed and sign up for our newsletter – at the bottom of the Newsletter top Menu Item
Appendix #1
This is a new multi-use condominium sixplex and business development located at the north east corner of St, Patrick and Central Avenue. This building is on a single-family sized lot and, replaced Casey's Market that was a much smaller one-story building. The community had a number of serious concerns about parking and safety. Although they were recognized by staff nevertheless, the development was approved by Council with only 4 off-site parking spaces, and the safety concerns were not addressed.
On Monday September 11, 2023 Council approved a Covenant Amendment Application for this development, that will permit a restaurant with a liquor licence. Councillor Green, noting residents had previous concerns about parking, asked the applicant if residents had been informed about the restaurant use amendment application. The long answer was no.
Appendix #2
LETTER: Increasing supply isn’t enough to solve housing crisis – editorial page, Saanich News: Sept. 14, 2023
Recently, a development consultant wrote in reply to my letter titled: “Saanich shouldn’t be providing discounts to developers”; that profit margins on construction projects aren’t as high as the public might think. So, his rationalization follows, that discounts from the municipality on community amenity contributions, developer cost charges, etc. would lead to more affordable housing.
I consider this to be a non-sequitur in general. Never mind that the taxpaying public will be left with the added bills for decades to come, in order to pay for all the added infrastructure that will be required for all the new buildings and that the municipality will be left with considerably less revenue from those that benefit financially from the process. To mitigate that situation is the purpose of such charges; to retain some value being added from land-lift.
The big profits to be made are not in the actual constructions, but in speculation on increased density, potential up-zoning, resulting land-lift and resulting gentrification, particularly along transportation corridors; something myself and more recently professor Patrick Condon pointed out on a Zoom meeting through the Camoson Community Association.
It will be no surprise then that according to the Provincial Lobbyist Registrar: the UDI has lobbied the provincial government extensively on densifying so-called transportation corridors.
Turning windfall profits from speculation along transport corridors is nothing new. Historical examples of this include Tammany Hall in New York and the railroad barons of the 19th century.
If increasing supply will lead to affordable housing and thus solve a crisis, as the consultant has suggested; then show us your homework. How much added supply, what type of supply, and on what timeline will it take to do that? No math has so far been provided.
If that simple formula worked; then New York City, Toronto and Vancouver would have housing that is affordable. We all know that didn’t happen, so who benefited from all that construction? I think you can guess.
Saanich shouldn’t be made into the next expensive megalopolis, so that speculators can benefit from the repetition of history.
Saanich Resident
Appendix #3
BC Government Website: September 30,2023
https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/governments/local-governments
Local governments
Municipalities and regional districts provide British Columbians with essential local and regional services such as clean water, sewer systems, parks and recreation, and fire protection. These local governments plan and shape their communities, and exercise the vision through the adoption of bylaws.
Whether you live in a rural area, a small town, or a big city, locally elected officials represent citizens and taxpayers; they make decisions together to meet your community’s needs now and in the future.
BC Government: Local government planning
Local government planning establishes land use patterns that can last for hundreds of years. Regional growth strategies and official community plans are some of the tools used by municipalities and regional districts when planning their communities.
Local government planning uses tools such as regional growth strategies and official community plans to describe the long-term vision of communities. Local government land use regulations, such as zoning and other bylaws (for example, parking and loading, sign and screening and landscaping bylaws) enable local governments to implement the vision expressed in these plans.
Local Government Land Use Regulation: Planning for sustainability and resilience
Local government planning can help build community sustainability and resilience. Local governments can include planning policies in their regional growth strategies and official community plans that support positive economic, social and cultural, and environmental outcomes.
https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/governments/local-governments
Local governments - Province of British Columbia
These local governments plan and shape their communities, and exercise the vision through the adoption of bylaws. Whether you live in a rural area, a small town, or a big city, locally elected officials represent citizens and taxpayers; they make decisions together to meet your community's needs now and in the future.
Local government land use regulation
Local government land use is regulated by zoning and other bylaws (run-off control, flood plain bylaws, parking and loading, regulation of signs, and screening and landscaping) and agreements (phased development agreements and housing agreements).
Local government land use regulations, including zoning and other bylaws (e.g. parking and loading, sign and screening and landscaping bylaws) enable local governments to implement the long-term vision described in their regional growth strategies, official community plans or other planning tools.
Local Government Infrastructure
Infrastructure at the local government level facilitates the delivery of public services. The design and location of infrastructure can have a significant effect on a region's economic growth, community livability and overall health. B.C. government grants support local governments to plan, build and sustain these essential assets.
Community life cycle infrastructure costing
Community life cycle infrastructure costing is a process that can help local governments estimate the entire life cycle infrastructure costs for different land use patterns (for example, compact versus lower density development).
On Monday September 11, 2023 Council approved a Covenant Amendment Application for this development, that will permit a restaurant with a liquor licence. Councillor Green, noting residents had previous concerns about parking, asked the applicant if residents had been informed about the restaurant use amendment application. The long answer was no.
Appendix #2
LETTER: Increasing supply isn’t enough to solve housing crisis – editorial page, Saanich News: Sept. 14, 2023
Recently, a development consultant wrote in reply to my letter titled: “Saanich shouldn’t be providing discounts to developers”; that profit margins on construction projects aren’t as high as the public might think. So, his rationalization follows, that discounts from the municipality on community amenity contributions, developer cost charges, etc. would lead to more affordable housing.
I consider this to be a non-sequitur in general. Never mind that the taxpaying public will be left with the added bills for decades to come, in order to pay for all the added infrastructure that will be required for all the new buildings and that the municipality will be left with considerably less revenue from those that benefit financially from the process. To mitigate that situation is the purpose of such charges; to retain some value being added from land-lift.
The big profits to be made are not in the actual constructions, but in speculation on increased density, potential up-zoning, resulting land-lift and resulting gentrification, particularly along transportation corridors; something myself and more recently professor Patrick Condon pointed out on a Zoom meeting through the Camoson Community Association.
It will be no surprise then that according to the Provincial Lobbyist Registrar: the UDI has lobbied the provincial government extensively on densifying so-called transportation corridors.
Turning windfall profits from speculation along transport corridors is nothing new. Historical examples of this include Tammany Hall in New York and the railroad barons of the 19th century.
If increasing supply will lead to affordable housing and thus solve a crisis, as the consultant has suggested; then show us your homework. How much added supply, what type of supply, and on what timeline will it take to do that? No math has so far been provided.
If that simple formula worked; then New York City, Toronto and Vancouver would have housing that is affordable. We all know that didn’t happen, so who benefited from all that construction? I think you can guess.
Saanich shouldn’t be made into the next expensive megalopolis, so that speculators can benefit from the repetition of history.
Saanich Resident
Appendix #3
BC Government Website: September 30,2023
https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/governments/local-governments
Local governments
Municipalities and regional districts provide British Columbians with essential local and regional services such as clean water, sewer systems, parks and recreation, and fire protection. These local governments plan and shape their communities, and exercise the vision through the adoption of bylaws.
Whether you live in a rural area, a small town, or a big city, locally elected officials represent citizens and taxpayers; they make decisions together to meet your community’s needs now and in the future.
BC Government: Local government planning
Local government planning establishes land use patterns that can last for hundreds of years. Regional growth strategies and official community plans are some of the tools used by municipalities and regional districts when planning their communities.
Local government planning uses tools such as regional growth strategies and official community plans to describe the long-term vision of communities. Local government land use regulations, such as zoning and other bylaws (for example, parking and loading, sign and screening and landscaping bylaws) enable local governments to implement the vision expressed in these plans.
Local Government Land Use Regulation: Planning for sustainability and resilience
Local government planning can help build community sustainability and resilience. Local governments can include planning policies in their regional growth strategies and official community plans that support positive economic, social and cultural, and environmental outcomes.
https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/governments/local-governments
Local governments - Province of British Columbia
These local governments plan and shape their communities, and exercise the vision through the adoption of bylaws. Whether you live in a rural area, a small town, or a big city, locally elected officials represent citizens and taxpayers; they make decisions together to meet your community's needs now and in the future.
Local government land use regulation
Local government land use is regulated by zoning and other bylaws (run-off control, flood plain bylaws, parking and loading, regulation of signs, and screening and landscaping) and agreements (phased development agreements and housing agreements).
Local government land use regulations, including zoning and other bylaws (e.g. parking and loading, sign and screening and landscaping bylaws) enable local governments to implement the long-term vision described in their regional growth strategies, official community plans or other planning tools.
Local Government Infrastructure
Infrastructure at the local government level facilitates the delivery of public services. The design and location of infrastructure can have a significant effect on a region's economic growth, community livability and overall health. B.C. government grants support local governments to plan, build and sustain these essential assets.
Community life cycle infrastructure costing
Community life cycle infrastructure costing is a process that can help local governments estimate the entire life cycle infrastructure costs for different land use patterns (for example, compact versus lower density development).