“An OCP is not meant to be a static document but rather is fluid and develops over time.”

That means no plan actually exists, so proponents can do what ever they like. Within bylaws of course, but then bylaws are often changed for convenience.

What a waste of time, money, and staff.

I actually agree with what the court said there.

The problem as I see it is that the city doesn’t recognize the spirit of the OCP and they don’t act in a manner that supports the intent of the OCP. To them, the OCP is just an expensive document that gets in the way of what they want to do. Other cities are the opposite. They actually use it as a guiding document and make rational changes to it when appropriate, not just whenever a developer asks.

In short, the city doesn’t understand what an OCP is. Unfortunately, you can’t legislate common sense or intelligence.

Agree with you Loki. The OCP was just adopted by council in June 2012 and then changed to meet the needs of the developer.Not only is the OCP a waste of time money and staff but you can add to that MY PG, and the City Strategic Plan as these too are documents that are suppose to engage community neighbourhoods. The city shows no consistency when using these documents.

Next step for Haldi Road is to proceed with removing themselves from the City for lack of services promised.

Fantastic. We are so in… just make sure that everyone within 5 km is included.

NoWay: “Next step for Haldi Road is to proceed with removing themselves from the City for lack of services promised. “

Sure. And after they leave, they can’t use any City infrastructure or services. Why should City taxpayers subsidize rural non-City residents? Right?

Green may have won the battle but no doubt her actions will result in losing the war come November.
One sad excuse for those on city council who support those who add to their campaign coffers but ignore the rest of the electorate.

“after they leave, they can’t use any City infrastructure or services”

You’re kidding, right? They never did get the promised city water and sewer, roads are plowed to a level even below the city’s dismal standard. With no hydrants in the area water would have to be hauled for any fire so no big loss if they depended on Beverly FD. The only city service they would lose is garbage collection and the Vanway transfer station is a hop, skip and a jump away, plus as part of the RDFFG they would get a access card.

If Green takes another run it will be interesting to look closely at the list of contributors to her campaign. Fingers crossed that the voters tell her it is time for her to find greener grass elsewhere. By any measure the worst mayor that I have seen in town.

One more example of dismissing the concerns of the residents of an area and jam something down their throat.

Jonnybelt makes an interesting point, why is that city residents pay the same rate as non-residents for taxpayer funded things? City residents should have lower rates for the pool, skating rinks, cougars tickets etc.

Instead of taxing me on rain water, start charging a higher user fee for non-residents.

porter

Ya think that a kid coming to town for a hockey tournament might drag their parents along. Those parents will likely spend money on food, accommodation, gas and even some shopping. This helps those businesses stay profitable and paying taxes. Same goes for the pool and also the Cougars in the not too distant future.

Without this injection of cash to the local economy the tax load on residents would be higher.

porter gets it, lonesome missed it.

JB

So I take it you have to counter to the valid points I raised. “missed it” is one step removed from “am too/am not” that one would hear on a elementary school playground.

JohnnyBelt missed it, Porter missed it, and Lonesome got it.

The rural areas like Haldi Road, Hart Highway, Blackburn, get about the same type of service that the Regional District provides (maybe less) but have the honor of paying taxes at a higher level because they are in the City.

Unless the plans for the centre have changed once again it will do little to help local women. They will only find place for locals if they can’t find enough well heeled suburban pill poppers from the lower mainland.

Mayor and council shown to be the chumps and rubes they really are.

Lonesome Sparrow – The plans for the building as it exists are also flawed and the council ignored this.

If the centre goes ahead the centre will be requesting an expansion permit as the existing floor layout of the building does not legally allow room for 30 people.

Amazing how Wells at planning and city missed that item.

I am sure there are other things as well, but like Councillor Wilbur stated he will only listen to the “professionals” lol

The city has no respect for home owners. One would think residents would have more of a system of checks and balances in place so they don’t have to resort to these kinds of court challenges.

Why not the old RCMP building? They can even add a few floors if need be.

Lonesome,

I “get it”. However, do you think that a few dollar user fee would stop someone from coming to a hockey tournament, a sport that cost hundreds of dollars to participate in? How about the regular users of the pool (which residents pay for the upkeep of)? As for the loss to businesses from the out lying areas, where are they going to go?

I don’t think you “get it”, Residents of the Regional District get the majority of the benefits that we enjoy in the City and don’t pay for it, then they rub our noses in the fact.

I don’t see how the RD gets the majority of benefits. OK, they drive on the roads. Big deal. They get to use some of the sites in the city – but they also pay a user fee just like everyone else.
Water and sewer are the major difference, and until a person lives in a house that does not have these services, you really don’t realize how much people take it for granted. When the well pump goes on a late Friday night going into a long weekend, in the winter months, these people would love to be able to call up the city and get them to fix it. At the cost of the city. But they can’t and foot the bill themselves. And don’t think I’m making up the worse case – it happened to friends of mine just this past winter.

The only thing this court case proves is that the city went about changing everything the right way legally. The law doesn’t look at how many residents oppose something, that is what city council is supposed to look at and make their decisions accordingly. But when you have a corrupt mayor along with several councillors in her pocket, what might be the right thing to do by the taxpayers isn’t what happens.

I hope Haldi leaves the city and rejoins the RD, Queen Green brought this upon herself. And if you take approx. 200 residents who pay $3000/year in taxes, that’s $600,000 out of the city’s pockets. That’s a low guess – I would think that Beaverly will probably also join Haldi in leaving the city.

It’s a shelter for drug addicted and abused women. Let’s not forget that.

No, its proposed to be a shelter for women but the business model can change anytime. They can change their minds and put in any sort of institution now. The rezoning language does not restrict it to a women only shelter. Which can now happen in any neighbourhood.