Council PH – Nov 26th 2020

We had Public Hearing last week on a single Heritage Restoration Agreement project in that funny part of the city that might be Glenbrook North or Massey Victory Heights, but is really Upper Sapperton. There was some sensitive timing around the project, so it was held on a Thursday Night. The project is a bit of a different one. A previous HRA project on the site went off the rails when the previous owner mistakenly thought that they could protect a heritage house by first knocking it down. That did not go over well with Council.

The current owner has a plan to rebuild that house on the same foot print, essentially building a replica of the heritage house. They will then move a second heritage house from Royal Avenue up to this spot and locate it a subdivision of the original lot. Both properties would then be improved with a Laneway House. In exchange for permanent protection of the moved heritage house and re-building the replica, the proponent is requesting subdivision to lots smaller than typical for RS-1 (to ~4,000 square feet) and density measured by FSR higher than permitted on both resultant lots. of the demolished heritage house on site. There would also be a reduced from setback, though this is to permit the use of the original floorplate of the demolished house and align the new house with it.

The Community Heritage Commission and Land use Planning Committee both approved the plan. Community consultation took place, and some feedback was received. The critical arguments were the density being requested, and loss of parking (though there are no parking relaxations being requested –one more off-street parking spot than required is being planned).

We had two parties connect through the Public Hearing, a team representing the proponent, and a neighbor expressing density concerns. We also received a couple of pieces of correspondence from neighbours, both in favour and opposed (with density again being the point of contention). I think that the type of infill we are seeing here is a good thing for the neighbourhood, and will provide a wider range of living options for people in close proximity to the Canada Games Pool and Centennial Recreation Centre replacements, the Justice Institute, and relatively nearby schools and shopping, and immediately adjacent to the Crosstown Greenway.

In the end, Council voted to approve the HRA proposal, and we all went on with our Thursday nights.

Budget 2021 – part 3

We had another budget workshop last week, and I’m sorry I’m so late getting to writing about it, but the usual level of chaos in my life was amped up a bit by too many meetings this week, including a chance to Fan-Boy on the two best “City beat” reporters in BC.

In the November 23rd workshop, Council took a first review of the Operating Budget. This is the money we spend day to day in the operations of the City. Not the buildings and equipment we use, but the staff in those buildings and the fuel for that equipment. And this is the budget that relates directly to the tax rate calculation for next year. One of the complicating factors in how we assess “the budget” is that we really have more than one. I have already talked about the Capital Budget and I already talked about Utilities, so I am going to ignore both of those as much as I can and talk just about Operations here.

The math form the 2020 budget looks like this:

So about 70% of our revenue in the general Operations Fund (aside from utility rates) comes from your property taxes. We also make money selling services (like concession stand hot dogs, swimming fees, and parking), a bit from senior government grants, more from “contributions” (casino money, etc.), and “Other” (which includes license fees, permitting fees, fines, interest on savings, an such). You can see the departmental breakdown of where the money is spent (in this case, shown without utility spending), and the breakdown of what we spend the money on (about 50% paying people, 35% buying stuff, 15% on financial stuff like amortization and interest).

2020 was (no surprise) a challenging year. Revenues fell short by almost $4 Million in sales of services (recreation fees, Anvil events, parking), an equal amount in lost Casino revenue, and about $1 million in other revenues. We also had significant operation savings, especially in staff costs related to not having to hire auxiliary staff to provide those suspended services like recreation classes, reduced training costs and suspensions of hiring at the peak of the Pandemic. We also had some unexpected costs related to the Pier Park fire and operating the Emergency Operations Centre for Pandemic response. The emergency Pandemic support money provided by the Province and Federal Government definitely helped and it looks like we are going to be in ok financial shape at the end of the year. We got through.

That said, we are not home and dry. To quote Ford Prefect, “We could not even be said to be home and vigorously toweling ourselves off.” The Pandemic is still here, and is still impacting our function and our finances. This makes modelling for 2021 difficult. We don’t know when revenues will come back, and certainly expenses are going to come back faster. We have to make some assumptions, and have to be conservative about those to keep ourselves from getting into financial trouble. We are assuming that $5 million of casino revenues are not coming back next year, that recreation programs and other sales of service will still be curtailed to the tune of $1.8M, and that we will be spending $550,000 on COVID response programs.

Once we set that as a baseline, we can project the “fixed” cost increases in the City related to already negotiated annual salary increases and inflation, which will be about $2.1 Million above 2020, and that our Capital Program as currently envisioned (mostly, that we break ground on the CGP replacement) will cause about $1.6 Million in debt financing costs. Staff have identified about $1 Million in operational efficiencies or savings, and have identified $3 Million in potential budget “enhancements” (new stuff we could do, or new staff we may need to meet the strategic goals set out be Council). Put that together, you end up with about a 6.3% tax increase in 2021. Yes, Council asked for  lot of stuff over the last year.

If we don’t want the tax increase to be that big, we need to cut some stuff from the budget, which is what most of the conversation from this point forward will be about. We spent some of the workshop discussion various “enhancements” and hearing reports from staff about their departmental operations and pressures that would either support or not those “enhancements”. When we get back together on December 7th, staff will have hopefully worked through those comments and come back with a draft budget that we can then start adjusting.

So all that to say, there is a *lot* of information in the public reports about the budget you can read here, and lots of it was related in the public meeting the video of which you can see here, and we have some work to do.

Budget 2021 – part 2

I wrote a bit about last week’s Council Workshop on the Capital Budget a few days ago, complete with some ugly pies. This post I am going to write about the second half of that presentation – the draft utility budgets for 2021.

As I have mentioned before, the City has more than one budget. The General Fund is all of the stuff we do to provide general City services, from parks and recreation to police and fire services to fixing potholes and supporting arts. The General Fund has a few funding sources including senior government contributions and fees related to permits or parking or fitness classes, but the bulk of it comes from property taxes. In that sense, it is the big fund that Council has close-to-unlimited authority to spend on providing a suite of services.

The Utility Funds are different, and are accounted differently. Outside of occasional senior government grant programs, all of what you pay for water, sewer, or solid waste, goes directly to paying to provide those services. No property tax is used to pay for providing those services, and paying for those services does not offset property taxes. (I am purposely putting our Electrical Utility aside, because it is unique in New West, as I’ve talked about before).

Utility rates are going up faster than property taxes. This is not because of Council largesse or pet projects, but because the cost of delivering these services is going up. To be more accurate, the cost for delivering these services *sustainably* is going up. More on that below.

I did some posts a couple of years ago that used a type of flow diagram to show what happens to the money you spend on your water, sewer, and solid waste bills. The numbers have gotten a little larger, but the proportions have stayed about the same, so the diagrams are still useful even if I don’t have the time or energy to update them right now.

Keep in mind that like all of our budgeting, the law tells us to create a 5-year budget plan. We update this plan every year, so even though we are currently looking to approve 2021-2025 budgets, we are really only approving the 2021 rate increases. The future rate increases are projected in order to inform our planning, but the rate increases in 2022 and beyond are really up to the discretion of future Councils. With that in mind, here is where we see the budgets going.

Water
We foresee collecting just under $15 Million in water fees this year, compared to $13.7M in last year’s budget. That is about a 10% increase. Part of that will come from selling more water (the City is growing), and the rest from a 7% increase in water rates. Here’s where the money is projected to go:

Water is the money we pay Metro Vancouver for the water in the pipes. Operations is the cost of running the utility day to day (staff, materials, power, water quality testing, etc.). Capital is the cost of replacing or building new pipes, valves, meters, hydrants, and all the hard parts that keep water flowing. Transfers are the exchange of money between the Water Utility and the General budget of the City. The “City” buys water from the Utility to run city hall, arenas, the pools, watering flowers, etc. At the same time, the Water Utility uses City equipment and personnel to do some of their work – from billing to road crews, and because the Utility by law must be separate from the General fund, these transfers must be accounted for. Every year, the Utility uses a little more City services than it collects from us in water charges. Finally, Reserves are the money the Utility puts aside in a reserve fund for a variety of purposes, which I will talk about below.

Sewers
We foresee collecting just over $24 Million in sewer fees this year, compared to about $22.5 Million in 2020. That is about a 7% increase. We are also projecting to collect another $3.6 Million in DCC money and capital grants (I talk about how that works here). That will predominantly come from a 7% increase in sewer rates. Here is where we expect that money to go:

With the same categories as water above (instead of paying for water, we are charged by volume by Metro Vancouver for the treatment of our waste water), you can see it is a little different. We are budgeting for a much bigger capital expenditure in 2021 for sewers, and we are actually going to dip a bit into our reserves to pay for that – which is why I put the blue box with the arrow above the line there to show the offset of costs from dipping into reserves.

Solid Waste
We foresee collecting $3.74M in users fees this year, compared to $3.35 Million last year (we also collect other revenue of a little under a million dollars in this utility) the utility rate increase works out to about 12%. Here’s where the money is projected to go:

You can see the solid waste utility works different that water and sewer. Though the per-tonne “tipping cost” of depositing waste at Metro Vancouver and private facilities is significant and going up, there is much more operational and transfer costs than other utilities. This is because of the nature of the work – we have collection trucks running 5 days a week that need crews and fuel. Also unique here is the fact we are running with a deficit in our reserves for solid waste, which will hopefully turn around by 2022, and this is not unrelated to why the rates are increasing so much.


I want to wrap this up by talking about our reserves. This is the money that each of these utilities have “in the bank” (well, Solid Waste has a deficit in the bank, but follow me here). We often talk about the main reason our utility rates are going up is because the cost of operating them is going up, but that is only partly true. We are also raising rates to build up our reserves.

The reason we have reserves is because they work like a buffer on the system. If we have an unexpected cost like extensive emergency repairs, a catastrophic loss, or have an opportunity to get a big matching fund grant from senior government that requires we are able to pay our half, a healthy reserve gives us that flexibility. Healthy reserves make our utilities *sustainable*. Currently, our reserves are in the order of 2-3% of the value of our assets. With increased awareness of the infrastructure gap so many communities are suffering, the current best practice is to keep reserves between 5% and 10% of the asset value. For this reason, we are continuing to build reserves in each of our Utility funds with an aim to get to that level.

This was a conversation we had in the workshop, and part of our finance staff’s work plan is to do a thorough analysis of our reserves situation as the City’s Asset Management plan is updated.

Overall, a typical household in New West can expect to see their annual utility rates for water, sewer, and solid waste go up by $132 next year, or about $11 more dollars a month.

Budget 2021 – part 1

This week Council had a Workshop instead of a Council meeting. We have these intermittently to dig deeper into subjects than we have time to in a regular meeting. It also allows us to have more of a free-form conversation with staff than the strict structures of a Council meeting. This gives staff a chance to educate Council a bit on the inner workings of their departments, and gives Council a chance to provide more direct feedback. In the end, we usually give staff some “direction” for future work – somewhere between vague ideas and strict orders. This direction should, as best as possible, be reflected in the reports staff eventually bring back to Council for approval, which is sometimes a challenge as Council workshops are 7 people speaking and often providing contradictory direction. Such is the life of a senior management for a city.

The workshop this week (you can watch the video here) was our first discussion of the 2021 Budget, with both some preliminary Capital Budget work and some discussion of Utility Rates. I have written previously about the difference between the City’s Capital Budget and Operational Budget, and have also written about how Utilities are different the General Operations. Damn, I’ve written a lot of stuff about budgets over the years. Here we go again.

Like the rest of our budgeting, we do our Capital budgeting as a 5-year plan. That makes this conversation about framing a 2021-2025 Capital Plan, but 5-year plans are updated every year, so our emphasis is on the planned 2021 capital expenditure. Still, we project into 2022-2025.

I would continue to describe our capital plan as “ambitious”, because we are planning to invest significantly in capital in the next few years. This is in part due to a few of big-ticket items (e.g. the Canada Games Pool replacement and Massey Theatre refit) and partly because some of our strategic goals and climate action plans will require capital outlay in the next couple of years. The budget I talk about here is very much a draft, and will certainly change, but the first pass includes $202 Million in capital spending in 2021. Yikes.

For comparison, our previous 2020-2024 capital plan approved last year was for $475M over 5 years, front-loaded to include $135M in 2020. This brings up the first thing we need to talk about with Capital budgets: we rarely spend all of our capital plan in any given year. Most years I have been on Council, we have had an annual capital plans in the order of about $90M in the current budget year, and $60M in each of the subsequent 4 years. However, usually about $30M of that $90 million doesn’t get done in that year. This is because projects are delayed, because other priorities come up, partnership money doesn’t materialize in time, or any of numerous factors. For whatever reason, about a third of “this year” in the Capital Budget commonly sgets pushed forward into “next year”. Meaning next years capital budget will go from the forecast of $60M to $90M, and the cycle repeats.

2020 was obviously a unique year. It started off that way because our Capital Budget had expanded due to Council priorities and we anticipated about $135M in budgeted capital delivery in 2020. The Pandemic response caused that to go off the rails early in the year, and although we did/will deliver something like $50M in capital works, that means $85M in approved capital works have been pushed forward into 2021 Add to this the $117M in 2021 capital plan works (most of which was already in the 2020-2024 5-year plan) and you get $202M. Realistically, we will deliver about $142M of this and push $60M into 2022.

**It is probably worth pointing out again, I am using rough estimate numbers here. The bills for 2020 have not all come in yet, as the year isn’t over, and we have not settled on what the Capital Budget will look like as a Council yet. I am just relating the very-draft numbers we used to guide our deliberations in the workshop. None of this is fixed in certainty yet.**

In the report provided to Council there was a big spreadsheet that set out all of the planned capital expenditures as 500+ line items, from $2,000 for scheduled replacement of Emergency Radio batteries to $84,000,000 for the Canada Games Pool replacement. And yes, we went through them line-by line and have asked staff questions about many of them. We will be asking more questions line-by line, and many of those lines are going to change.

In the workshop, we went though various ways to “clump” this capital spending to make the big number relatable and better set priorities. The first big division is by “fund”. We have a General Fund that is all the stuff you pay for ostensibly through property taxes (parks, police, fire, roads, planning, bylaws, council, etc.) and we have Utility funds that are paid for through users fees (Electrical, Water, Sewer, and Solid Waste). That breaks down like this:

Putting aside the Utility Funds for a bit (until next post), we can break down the General Fund in various ways, be it through the function or departments where the capital will be spent:

Or through the types of things we are paying for with the capital funds (and here is where the clumping gets a  little more subjective – you may clump a little differently than me):

As we went through in the workshop, these can be further clumped by how much is spent on each Council Priority (this one clumps the utility capital in with the general fund capital, because Council Priorities end up in both):

Any way you slice it, $200M is a lot of pie. As you can see in all of these, the $84M for the replacement for the Canada Games Pool is the biggest item, by far. It is currently shown as a 2021 expense, and we will likely be making a decision on whether to commit that funding in 2021, but the actual bill is not likely to be paid all in one chunk in 2021. $84M in one year looks big, but in reality it will stretch out over a couple of years as we take money out of reserves and issue debt to pay the construction bills.

As we went through the spreadsheets at the workshop, different Councilors emphasized different priorities, and asked for more details on several lines. I suspect (and I am speaking only as one of 7 members of Council here, not on behalf of anyone else) I think this list will be whittled down a bit, and that there is no way we will have the operational capacity to get all of this capital work done in one year. The real numbers will become more apparent in December after some significant back-and-forth between Capital and Operational budgets.

Next time, I’ll talk a bit about the preliminary Utility Budgets and what we can (or can’t) do about ever-increasing utility rates.

Council – Nov 9 2020

We had a lot of business for the November 9th meeting. A bunch of items will go to Public Hearing, so more exciting meetings in the near future. We also had a couple of presentations and public delegations, which you can listen to/watch online if you are into that kind of thing, and a pretty large and slightly messy agenda due to late additions and timing around presentations, so everything here may not be in exact order. Maybe pour some tea, this is a long one:


We started with moving the following items On Consent:

100 Braid Street: Zoning Bylaw Text Amendment and Development Permit to Facilitate Provision of Secured Market Rental Housing with Art Gallery/Studio Space – Bylaw for First and Second Readings
Wesgroup owns the property at 100 Braid, and already has an approved plan to build a high rise mixed-use condo building. They are now proposing to instead build a purpose-built rental building in exchange for a significant (50%) increase in density. This would make for a taller tower (118 metres instead of 65), and would provide 423 rental units, 96 of which would be less-than-market as secured through the CMHC affordable housing program.

These less-than-market units would be just that – priced at a level below the market, but will not meet the City’s definition of “affordable housing”, which is stricter than the federal CMHC standard. One of the presentations you can enjoy if you watch the video is an outline with quite a bit of detail on how the CMHC program works.

This report, however, outlines the project that will be going to Public Hearing, and asks that Council approve the terms of a Housing Agreement that will secure the dedicated rental use of the units in the event that Council approves the final proposal. Council moved to approve those recommendations.

COVID-19 Recovery Public Engagement Input – Summary Report
Further to engaging the public on the City’s Pandemic strategy, we had a recent City-wide engagement and survey effort, and had something close to 1,300 responses, which is a pretty impressive for any non-dog-park-related survey. The report and resultant graphics are really worth checking out in some detail.

Themes coming out of the survey were general support for efforts to create more accessible public spaces (and desire for more covered outdoor spaces, public WiFi, and public washrooms), and significant concerns about homelessness and housing security. In general, people support efforts to improve pedestrian spaces in the City, value public spaces, and are encouraging us to push forward on environmental initiatives and reconciliation. There is much more in here, but this is a really valuable touchpoint I think for Council as we are half way through this somewhat-disrupted term. Our Public Engagement team is doing great work these days.

Extension of Sidewalk/Street Patios and Parklets to Support Business Recovery
We made some temporary changes in how we manage patios in the City, following up on the change in Provincial regulations on how restaurants and pubs can serve on patios, and to give food service providers more flexibility in how they adapt to the COVID world. With these temporary changes extended to next fall, the City is looking at how we can support winterizing these spaces if businesses want to go that step.

Budget 2021 – Upcoming Budget Workshops
Our budget 2021 engagement process is ongoing, and we are doing everything we can to make this the most transparent and public budget deliberation process the City has ever had. This has included more effort to “demystify” municipal finance, so that people are better empowered to have a meaningful engagement. There are going to be pressures on our 2021 budget related to COVID, but Council has still been clear (supported by some of that public engagement I talked about above) that we do not want to slow down on Climate Action or cut services that support the community at this difficult time.

Preliminary numbers are very preliminary, but inflation and collective agreements give us a 2.3% tax increase baseline, with various COVID and strategic plan pressures pushing us up over 7%. That said, it was just announced that the City is in line for about $6 Million in COVID relief grant money from senior government, which should help address some of the significant operational revenue gaps in our current budget.

There are workshops coming up in November and December to go through the Capital Budget, Utility rates, and Operating budget, with the goal of having a draft budget together by the end of December.

2021 Schedule of Regular Council Meetings
This is the preliminary schedule of council meetings, workshops, and Public Hearings for 2021. As always, subject to change as needs emerge. Mark your calendars!

TransLink/SkyTrain Guideway (22nd Street Station to New Westminster Station): Request to Extend the Construction Noise Bylaw Exemption
SkyTrain rail replacement is an ongoing process to keep the now more than 30 year old system running. For obvious reasons, this work must occur when the SkyTrain is not running, so we are providing a night time construction noise exemption.

273 and 275 Sherbrooke Street: Development Permit – Consideration of Waiver
Back in 2012, E.Fry proposed to expend their services in Sapperton and went through an OCP Amendment and Rezoning to support that. It was a high-profile application at the time, with a couple of very lengthy Public Hearings, before Council almost unanimously supported the rezoning.

The proponent is now ready to go forward with the approved project, but in the meantime the City has adopted a new OCP, this property did not fall within a Development Permit Area, meaning that the proponent now ostensibly requires a Development Permit for something already approved for the site. Council is proposing to waive that DP process, in light of the significant public process and design review the project already completed. Notably, the proposed use (supportive housing for women and children) is a more urgent need now than even in 2012 when the project was approved.

835 Royal Avenue: Heritage Revitalization Agreement and Heritage Designation – Bylaws for First and Second Readings and Heritage Register Addition
There is an old house you may not have noticed on the hill on Royal Ave. I used to live right across the street, and I hardly knew it was there, but it is one of the oldest intact houses in New West. The owner wants to preserve it through an HRA, stratify it into three units, and build a three-unit townhouse project on a subdivided back of the property.

This would go to a Public Hearing, so I’ll hold my comments until after then.

631 Second Street: Heritage Revitalization Agreement and Heritage Designation – Bylaws for Two Readings and Addition to Heritage Register
The owner of this small heritage house in Glenbrooke North wants to subdivide their lot and build a small infill house on the second lot while preserving the existing heritage house. The HRA request is related to the lots being compact, and the FSR for the two houses to be above what is currently permitted in the zone.

This would go to a Public Hearing, so I’ll hold my comments until after then.

709 Cumberland Street: Heritage Revitalization Agreement – Bylaw for First and Second Readings
The owner of this property in upper Sapperton wants to subdivide it, move a heritage house from downtown to one lot, and re-build a storied-and-destroyed heritage house on the other lot, add laneway houses, and preserve the heritage house by an HRA. This would exceed the allowable FSR for both compact lots, and require various other allowances.

This would go to a Public Hearing, so I’ll hold my comments until after then.

EV User Fee Implementation at City Owned Public Charging Stations: Bylaw for Three Readings
On the recommendation of the Electrical Utility Commission, the City is following the lead of other municipalities across North America and starting to charge user fees for vehicle charging stations. This is not much of a revenue driver, when you amortize the infrastructure costs of the chargers, but it does create a more fair allocation of a limited resource, and improves access to the charging stations overall. Our pricing will be similar to that being introduced across the region – generally $1 or $2/hr for Level 2 chargers and $16/hr for the Fast Chargers at Queens Park, which is again consistent across the region.

Q to Q – Resumption of Service Plan
The Q to Q Ferry was one of the services the City cut back at the beginning of the Pandemic. Initially, there was little in the way of public health guidance on how to run it safely, and superficially similar to TransLink services and other passenger ferries like in False Creek and the Victoria Harbour, there were some challenges in understanding if people would use the service and what the cost issues related to adapting to COVID-safe operations were. Both of the False Creek ferry operators are now up and running (with reduced capacity), and the Victoria Habour ferries had some financial issues, but got a very limited operation going at the end of the summer before suspending for the winter. I need to note that those three services are very different than the QtoQ in that they run on calm water with much lighter boats, and in that they are self-supporting, run completely on fare revenue, while the QtoQ is significantly subsidized by local taxpayers on both sides of the river.

The resumed service will be limited to morning and evening during the week and shorter hours on the weekend. There are new details about payment and queueing and operations to keep everyone safe. We have to see if people show up, and will be closely monitoring usage. This has created quite the discussion in the community and in Council about the role of the QtoQ, and perhaps I’ll expand on that in a follow up blog post once the ferry is back up and running.

Westminster Pier Park Management Oversight Committee: Westminster Pier Park – Fire Recovery Update
This report provides a bunch of detail about the current situation with Pier Park. I had a professional interest in the challenges related to managing the demolition and environmental remediation of the debris (they are significant), but the bigger community interest is more about when can we open Pier Park again, what is all of this going to cost us, an when do we start the re-build?

Short answers are: probably early in 2021, as we have work to do to assure the park is safe and has emergency access; It is insured, but how that insurance plays out is going to be a long conversation negotiated with stakeholders as the clean-up alone with be counted in the $Millions; It is way too early to start talking re-build, as the pier is a complicated piece of jurisdiction involving the federal government, First Nations, the Port of Vancouver, and the rail companies. The parallels with the White Rock pier damage are superficial; this is a much larger and more complex situation in a part of the waterfront considered “Working River” by the Port. I really hope the community can be involved in visioning a replacement, but that is work for 2021 and beyond. Sorry, I just don’t see those 2 acres of deck being replaced any time soon.


We then had an on-table report and Presentation from staff:

COVID update from the Province
There were new orders from the provincial health authority, and we are in the Fraser Health region where the current COVID situation is… not good.

In short, we are cutting back on some recreation programs, and are making facemasks mandatory in all indoor City facilities. This is consistent with Public Health orders, and makes or a safer workplace for our staff, and safer public spaces for our residents.


The following items were Removed from Consent for discussion:

COVID-19 Pandemic Response – Update and Progress from the Five Task Forces
This is our regular update from the internal task forces coordinating the City’s response to the ongoing pandemic. Attached to this is an update report on Child Care stresses during the Pandemic, including the results of a survey of childcare operators across the city to determine how their Pandemic response and recovery is impacting their operations. Council also raised some concern about the slow pace of rolling our emergency housing space with wintery weather arriving right now.

404 Second Street: Heritage Revitalization Agreement and Heritage Designation – Bylaws for Two Readings and Addition to Heritage Register
The owner of the butcher shop in Queens Park wants to expand the building, formalize the now non-conforming land use, and enter into an agreement to restore and preserve the building, in one of the more unusual HRAs in this week’s Agenda full of HRAs.

This would go to a Public Hearing, so I’ll hold my comments until after then.

515 Fourth Street – Heritage Revitalization Agreement and Heritage Designation – Bylaws for First and Second Readings and Addition to Heritage Register
The owner of this modest heritage house in Queens Park wants to convert it to a duplex and build an infill house on the lot, then convert the property to strata ownership. This would require some relaxations for set back and parking, though the FSR (0.79) and number of residential units (3) would comply with existing entitlements in the OCP and the Development Permit area. This was an unusual application, in that it bounced around committees for a while, and the Land Use Planning Committee did not recommend it to Council, but the owner does have the right to be heard before Council to determine if there is any support for the proposal.

We had a bit of e-mail feedback from a few members of the Queens Park heritage community, and two delegations opposed to the application. It appears that the opposition was partly to the idea of stratification of HRAs (though the City has approved many stratified HRAs, at least 4 in the last three years), and partly just a feeling the plan was “too dense”, though again I have to note the density (measured by FSR), lot coverage, and massing were all within existing entitlements and guidelines.

The option before Council was to approve first and second reading, which would send the application to a Public Hearing. Council voted in a split vote to not give the application these readings, essentially ending the project as it is (I voted with the minority to support the application going to Public Hearing). The owner will need to bring something else to Council if they want to make changes on the lot that are not within the existing zoning.

Miscellaneous Zoning Bylaw Amendments: Zoning Bylaw Amendment Bylaw for First and Second Readings
Our Zoning Bylaw is a big, complicated document that is constantly being amended. As people read it or try to interpret it, sometimes they discover things that are inconsistent internally, places where it doesn’t match other City policies, grammatical errors, math errors, and such. When discovered, staff put these in a pile, and occasionally that pile comes to us as an omnibus Amendment Bylaw like this. There are a number of changes here, and they will all go to Public Hearing. If you have opinions about Massage Services permitting or metric conversion, or anything else in here, please let us know.

616 and 640 Sixth (Orr Development): Development Variance Permit, Housing Agreement Modification and Project Update
Back in 2019, Council approved the first new multi-family development in the Uptown commercial core in more than a decade. It was a notable Public Hearing because it was a combination of secured market rental and condo ownership, and led some people to critique those two tenure types having different entrances. Some characterized it as a “poor doors” situation, though there was no non-market housing component involved in the project.

The proponent has, apparently, been doing some number crunching since that approval, and has determined that making the entire building purpose-built-rental is a better plan for them. They also want to reduce (!) overall height by two stories, offset by a 6% increase in the floorplate of the tower, and reduce some of the parking required to better suit the needs related to rental tenure. This requires an update Housing Agreement and amendment to the Development Permit.

Shine Bright New West Holiday Initiative
The traditional Christmas Tree lighting at Hyack Square can’t really happen this year, as we don’t want to be having large group gatherings. So in working with the BIAs, staff from Special Events division and Economic Development have another plan to “light up” the town during the Christmas season. Light displays around town by businesses, supported by the City, and planned self-guided walking tours so you and your bubble can enjoy without the issues around crowds.

The majority of Council supported this new model, but some concerns were raised on whether while expanding the program beyond just Downtown, we were spreading it a little thin, and perhaps we wanted to add more funding to assure that each commercial district has sufficient funding to make for a successful program, so we approved in principle, and asked staff to come back with expansion plans if appropriate.

It’s going to be a different Christmas this year, folks, I hope you can find a new way to make it fun with your family and friends, and can support local businesses who are going through as challenging as time as ever.

Tobacco Free Water Pipe Smoking Premises (Hookah Lounges)
The City received requests to consider a Hookah Lounge, though no formal location or application was received. This is not compliant with the City’s regulations or with provincial regulations around indoor smoking in businesses, and we simply didn’t have a zoning or business permitting to allow this use

Council approved the staff recommendation to not change our Bylaws to permit this use, mostly based on the recommendations from Public Health. The only municipality that does allow Hookah Lounges (Burnaby) has signaled their intent to change that allowance in the near future. Not permitting indoor Hookah use in commercial businesses is consistent with the City’s approach to tobacco, cannabis, and vaping regulations.


We then had two items that were discussed in a closed meeting, but we are now Releasing from Closed:

British Columbia Youth Parliament (BCYP) Nomination – 92nd Parliamentary Session (Originally closed because of privacy of potential candidates)
The City has the ability to nominate a local youth to take part in the BCYP, and we are doing so!

Port of Vancouver Lands at 430 Canfor and Traffic Management (Originally closed because it may involve details of negotiations with senior governments)
It was moved that staff report back to Council on the traffic impacts of the change of land use at 430 Canfor, measures by the Port to assure traffic related to the current use is not creating an unsafe condition for other road users, and on opportunities for the City to address any safety concerns related to traffic with the Port of Vancouver.
In short, the property is Port of Vancouver land, so we don’t have any jurisdictional control over its use, but there have been some concerns raised that the type of use (essentially, a park-and-ride for workers at various TMX work sites) is having negative traffic impacts, so we are asking staff to work with the Port and the operator on site to look into this.


We then Adopted the following Bylaws:

Development Services Fees and Rates Amendment Bylaw (Amusement Arcade) No. 8228, 2020
This is one of the smaller bylaw changes that would need to occur to permit the formalization of the arcade use for a site in Sapperton, and it is now the law of the land.

Engineering Fees and Rates Bylaw Amendment No. 8230, 2020
Development Services Fees and Rates Amendment Bylaw No., 8232, 2020 and
Cultural Services Fees and Charges Amendment Bylaw No. 8241, 2020
These are the Bylaws that set our fees for service for the next year as part of our annual budgeting process. Now adopted by Council!


Finally, a bit of New Business:

Litter Receptacle Optimization Initiative
I resolved that:

THAT Staff provide an update report on the litter receptacle optimization initiative introduced to Council on October 2019, outlining any operational savings and metrics on the impact to street litter and illegal dumping.

A little more than year ago, staff provided a report for information about plans to change how they deal with litter receptacles in parts of the City. This included the removal of some problematic receptacles where people were dumping domestic garbage, and a new plan for addressing and tracking litter in the commercial districts. At the time, Council had some questions about the plan, but staff indicated they would be tracking the program and report back to us.

In short, it was expected that reducing trash cans in some public places may actually reduce litter and illegal dumping. Some people (including me) were incredulous of this idea, but staff did reinforce this was based on experience in other jurisdictions, and becoming a well-accepted practice. As counter intuitive as it is, I had to draw parallels between this idea and our modern understanding of how increasing road space actually makes traffic worse, which is an established, if counterintuitive, idea that I have learned to understand. So I was willing to suspect my incredulity and see where this plan from staff went.

In the year since, I have heard members of the public express concern about the lack of trash cans and increased litter. My admittedly anecdotal impression is that litter is increasing in our commercial areas, maybe related to these actions, maybe related to change in behaviours around the Pandemic, or maybe it is just confirmation bias on my part. So I would like, a year later, for staff to report back to us what metrics they have been collecting, share any data they have about litter in the City, and any recommendations they may have to address litter and waste management in our public spaces. Council moved to support this.


And then, whew, we were done.