Parksville council defers motion for multi-unit development bylaw amendment for Englishman River
Riordan says the group is asking for the city to designate the coastal and Englishman River floodplains as environmentally sensitive areas. Photo: Jasperdo / Flickr
Parksville city council voted to defer a motion that could have seen an Official Community Plan, (OCP) bylaw amendment to limit multi-unit developments along the Englishman River.
At the council meeting on Monday, March 4, council heard a presentation from Mid Island Habitat Enhancement Society president, Barb Riordan, about how changes to the Local Government Act, may impact environmentally sensitive areas along the Englishman River.
Riordan spoke to council about the importance of applying conservation objectives to the area and included it in the city’s updated OCP.
“Lots adjacent to the Englishmen River and creeks that are currently zoned single-family housing will be allowed to have multi-unit housing unless those lots have rigorous environmental protections built into the development permit areas,” she said.
She said the policy manual for multi-housing discourages green spaces for units to allow construction to maximize housing space. She believes this could lead to fewer opportunities for rain gardens and swales.
“And this could result in a decrease in rainwater infiltration that reduces the erosion of flows and creeks and rivers in the winter and contributes to streamflow in the summer,” she said.
Riordan said the group is asking for the city to designate the coastal and Englishman River floodplains as environmentally sensitive areas. The role of the flood plains is to accommodate floodwater and take pressure off rivers and shorelines.
“Imagine the water shooting out of a fire hose and suddenly the hose gets a leak, and the water pressure drops off,” she said. “A floodplain is the leak in the hose.”
Riordan mentioned this would prevent serious erosion and destruction of fish habitat.
In terms of floodplain protection measures, Riordan said no development would be ideal but there are other ideas she has.
“Exempting single family unit lots currently in the flood zone from the zoning bylaw and that way they can't become multiple unit lots without a public hearing,” Riordan said. “Requiring that they be large lots and limit development to 25 per cent of the lot in the area furthest away from the river or shoreline with a development covenant on the remaining 75 per cent.
Another idea mentioned was requiring all development to have rainwater capture and filtration systems. She mentioned having developers be responsible for invasive species management after clearing land as she said after a lot is cleared and sites are untouched for three or four years, invasive species take over the area.
Mayor Doug O’Brien said the city has extensive mapping for ecologically sensitive areas and has created eight development permit areas for managing hazards and environmental values in the city.
“The city uses a professional reliance model,” O’Brien said, “This allows for a site-specific and tailored approach to managing the values whatever they may be, and balancing a need for new homes, services and businesses with protecting environment important features that make people want to have a home or business here.”
He said this method is better than applying a one-size-fits-all approach
Councilor Amit Gaur said he agreed with Riordan's concerns about how the bill could affect the ecosystem at Englishman River.
“I do agree with you that it has put elemental protection on the back burner and the sole focus is on housing,” Gaur said. “This act now dilutes the powers of the municipality in terms of protecting the environment when it comes to the housing density that can be built.”
Later in the meeting, Gaur proposed to amend the OCP to enact a low-density development land use designation with a four-hectare minimum parcel size property that contains a riparian and coastal floodplain area.
“So I think this motion is trying to be very proactive in telling the province ‘This is where we [want to] see the density of housing to go and this is where we do not want higher density of housing to go’,” Gaur said.
Gaur did admit that the motion goes against provincial law.
“This is contradictory to the housing bill that the province is proposing and that's exactly the intent,” he said. “I am trying to tell the province we don't want to build high density close to the river.”
He said the province also has contradictions about developing on floodplains.
“I spoke with the deputy minister for land water resource stewardship, and she was very clear in saying that the best practice is not to build on or near the floodplains,” he said. “But then we went to the UBCM and there was a presentation talking about how to build safely on floodplains. So that was very, very interesting to see.”
After hearing reservations from council members and the staff time required for amendments to be made, Gaur asked if the motion should be deferred so it could be considered fit into next year’s work plan.
Council voted unanimously to defer the motion.
Funding Note: This story was produced with funding support from the Local Journalism Initiative, administered by the Community Radio Fund of Canada.