The Editor:
I am a resident of Burnaby and, although now retired, I worked on both the design side of the construction industry (providing plans and submissions to municipal building departments) for 15 years as well as working as a project manager (managing major construction projects) for 25 years.
The projects I was involved with were largely in Burnaby, but also in downtown Vancouver and Surrey.
I support all the points outlined in Mayor Mike Hurley’s position and recommend he does as much immediate planning and budget forecasting as possible, to Ensure Burnaby identifies and receives a commitment from Eby for the infrastructure funds Burnaby will no doubt need, before tearing apart Burnaby’s current municipal plan in any significant way.
While I understand some of Premier David Eby’s struggle with the B.C. housing crises, I think his current housing mandate is too generic, naive and unsupportable in any "facts based" reality.
Additionally, if adopted as mandated, I believe it may devastate Burnaby’s valued, quiet, residential neighbourhoods, currently centred around raising children, caring for our elderly and building safe communities. And it will most certainly exacerbate the current traffic overload situation.
Without careful study of Eby’s mandate over-laid on our existing neighbourhoods, municipal infrastructure, traffic and increased power demands, Eby’s mandate will undoubtedly cause varied unforeseen impacts. We need as much certainty as possible to accurately forecast costs before proceeding.
Additionally, as Mayor Mike Hurley also indicates, confusion may reign about the effect to individuals on their residential property taxes and property values (best and highest use) that rapid development may forecast, potentially driving the immediate cost of land acquisition even higher.
It appears the B.C. government has only simplistic knowledge about how municipalities plan and grow their communities.
I suspect Eby’s information is one-sided; he’s likely been talking to too many developers, frustrated by the glacial speed municipalities typically change.
Nevertheless, development with no planning, is planning to fail.
Our tax funds, currently allocated by Eby to help municipalities with the myriad of new, currently undersized and aging infrastructure, will very likely be shown as grossly underestimated.
When this becomes apparent, who is left to bail the municipalities out of an erroneously created, poorly planned, mandate from the province?
Just a concerned taxpayer.
- Kathryn Jones, Burnaby
