Council Accepts Agricultural Designation of Southlands

At Monday’s Council Meeting, there was unanimous endorsement of the final report of the Tsawwassen Area Plan Committee (TAPC) and staff recommendation to draft a bylaw for the new TAP. This will be brought forward to the September 13th Council Meeting, with a date of October 26 & 27 set for a public hearing. The recommendation from Staff & the TAPC is to maintain the agricultural designation of the Southlands.

This follows an 8-1 vote in favour of agricultural designation from the final TAPC meeting, an Ipsos Reid survey showing clear majority support (62%) for maintaining the designation of the land as agricultural, and an earlier staff recommendation from Delta’s Chief Administrative Officer in June to maintain the agricultural designation.

“I’m glad that Council is respecting the will of the public,” stated Dana Maslovat, one of the organizers of Southlands the Facts, “We will stay vigilant to ensure the agricultural designation of the Southlands is maintained when they ratify Tsawwassen’s new Official Community Plan this fall.”

The potential re-designation of the Southlands agricultural land to accommodate a housing development is by far the most contentious component of the process undertaken to revise the existing Tsawwassen Area Plan. Any re-designation will change the Official Community Plan and open up the Southlands for a 1900 unit housing development by Century Holdings. This piece of farmland was the cause of the longest public hearing in Commonwealth history and a resident run plebiscite in 1989, which prevented a 2000 unit development that was proposed for the same property.