After two years of Tsawwassen Area Plan Committee meetings, Delta Council has decided to turn down the proposed Tsawwassen Area Plan. The plan, which involved untold hours of Delta planning and staff time, contentious public meetings, consultations, and costly surveys met with fierce opposition from the citizens of Tsawwassen and sparked an intense public hearing process that had no end in sight.The public hearing for the proposed area plan took place on Oct 26 and 27 between 7 and 10 PM at the South Delta Rec Center. Each speaker was allowed 5 minutes to speak to the Area Plan and an additional 2-minutes of rebuttal time after everyone had been heard.
An overwhelming majority of the speakers spoke against the adoption of the plan. The Southlands retaining its agriculture designation was the only part of the plan that received endorsement, although many people requested that the council lobby the provincial government to return the land to the Agricultural Land Reserve.
With development of the Southlands off the chopping block, it became pretty obvious that Mayor Jackson and her council had grossly miscalculated the effect this plan would have on the community. It was the appearance of a vastly extended area of apartments, condos and town homes that proved to be the catalyst of an all-out citizens revolt. This rezoning of established single family neighbourhoods would have affected 600 single family homes. To those in attendance, Mayor Jackson's error became apparent as speaker after speaker took the podium to vocalize their outrage of the plan and their contempt for the council that tried to impose it without public consultation. The new plan would have also allowed for multi-family homes to built along the BC Hydro right of way and there was outrage that this was even considered, let alone be included in the new Tsawwassen Area Plan.
Residents affected by the arbitrary increase of multi-family zoning were united in their disapproval. Their emotional testimonies included tears, pleas, outrage and shock by many that the first they had been informed of the designation changes were when they received the brochure from Delta showing the proposed area plan.
Other issues raised were the exclusion of the Tsawwassen Golf and Country Club from the area plan as well as the lack of inclusion of plans for rapid and large development on the Tsawwassen First Nation lands and how those plans would effect Tsawwassen.
Additionally, there were questions raised about why there had been no discussion or information regarding Tsawwassen's role in the Metro Vancouver Watershed program and a number of speakers called for the resignations of city planning staff for creating this plan. Another day of hearings had to be scheduled as many people had yet to be heard by the end of day two. With Mayor Jackson not in attendance due to failing health, Councilor Robert Campbell put forth a motion to extend the hearings for another day.
It was at this newly scheduled meeting that the bomb was dropped, as Mayor Lois Jackson showed up and brought an end to the meeting. After thanking Delta staff and Councilor Bruce McDonald for all their time and effort, she announced that Delta had decided to withdraw the plan after hearing the overwhelming opposition from residents at the public hearing. She also announced that there will be a review of the process that took place.
The entire public hearing, including Thursday's stunning announcement, can be viewed on Delta Cable, a community access channel.
What a bunch of incompentant people Delta mayor and council are. If I had been on that committee of citizens who had given so much of their time I'd be banging on Delta's door with a bill in my hand demanding that they pay me for wasted time and effort. I think the whole thing was just a big show to get the Southlands developed and get rid of single family homes in Tsawwassen. Too bad for them the people here pay attention to what they were trying to sneak in. I'm sure the price tag to the taxpayer is going to be huge as well. I filled out that survey that was mailed out and I sure never saw anything about putting in all those multi family homes. And putting them along the power lines - are they crazy? As for that survey, I'm pretty sure that the results came back that we didn't want to have all that increase. The town center, yes, but unless the town center magically grew overnight i don't think it was that big.
ReplyDeleteI think for sure that some people should be fired, starting with the mayor, whose supposed to be the head of Delta. Remember that saying, the buck stop here. Of course they'll just probably sweep it under the rug and try to pretend they didn't waste taxpayer time and money. Gordon Campbell and his government should look out because they've got competition from Mayor Jackson and her bunch for being the biggest bunch of incompetent politicians around. They should have to take a cut in pay to help pay for this mess. I can tell you this for sure, I was never much of a community activist before but I sure am one now. There is no way that Mayor Jackson can say she didn't know what this town wanted. The survey said to leave us alone and she just didin't want to listen. What a bunch of malarky
The Delta Council seems determined to see large-scale growth in Tsawwassen. If Southlands is strongly rejected by the local citizens, we'll switch to the next development plan (rezoning along the hydrolines and massive growth on the IR lands).
ReplyDeleteHasn't South Delta suffered enough recent development (Port expansion, Hydrolines, Gateway highway, etc)?
Just when this arrogant Delta Council was ready to impose the Tsawwassen Area Plan to the community , the people stood out to defend their life style and their neighbourhoods and stopped the charade (or should I say the charrette?), at least for the time being.
ReplyDeleteNow we can go out and enjoy this beautiful place,thank you all.
Note that a new by-law is in the offing, probably in the New Year. Enjoy what we have now and be resolute when we face this Mayor and Council again.
ReplyDeleteAnyone for a clean sweep next election?
I have it on good authority that at least one councilor complained about and made derogatory remarks about the people that showed up to the public hearing.
ReplyDeleteHow dare they? We elected them, they serve us, not the other way around. I agree with 2:23 - clean house next election and get rid of this lot.
Lila and the rest of you:
ReplyDeleteFirst off...the plan was the result of COMMITTEE work! NOT council work. The public hearing was so the mayor and council could here the public opinion regarding the COMMITTEE plan. Guess what? Mayor and council listened and the plan was scrapped. The people won. Are you never happy???
Also, Southlands was left as an agricultural designation which means NO DEVELOPMENT!
Yes, two years down the drain. I sure hope some of you that seem to only complain constantly will now put yourself on the committee or at the very least show up to the committee meetings which are open for anyone to attend!!!
Dirty, rotten scoundrel is what this mayor and council are. I watched the Delta cable broadcast of the Monday council meeting and what a bunch of scrambling is going on. Bruce McDonald even went so far as saying he had never seen a development plan proposed for the powerline homes and yet I heard him say he had at the last Tsawwassen Area Plan meeting. Luckily Delta cable was there that night and would have recorded his comments to Anne Pedersen. He said the "plan" would move the townhomes forward onto the street and an access road would be built in the back. Sounds like a development plan to me. Anyway I'm going to get a copy from Delta cable to send him. Maybe he'll remember then.
ReplyDeleteTo the person that thinks the TAP was committee work - your nuts. I was at most meetings, that were carefully orchestrated to be presentations and Theme nights. The committee had very little time for discussion, given very little time for comment, and were fed the plan by the planning department. MCdonald acted like he was a "King", and the committee was only there to listen to his endless babbles. KICK THE BUNCH OUT!
ReplyDeleteThe attempt by Mayor Jackson to take credit for stopping the public hearing is quite pathetic. The whole mess was created initially by appointing the wrong people to the Tswassen Area Plan Committee. Having observed all but two of their meetings I can testify that the committee members were very tardy in raising any discussion points, and merely reacted occasionally to the planners, who ran the "show" with support from the chairperson. It was a dysfunctional setup, bound to suppress public input. The delegations were chosen carefully to recommend large scale development. The forums were ridiculous in the way they attempted to secure public input, and to make it orginally impossible for people to speak up.
ReplyDeleteAs an example of how not to organize public input this will stand as a model. To take credit for something which she could have stopped long ago is a typical politician's trick.