Lantzville Foothills Comprehensive Development Plan Public Hearing Written Submission

Following are my comments to the Second Public Hearing on the Lantzville Foothills Comprehensive Development Plan (CDP). I am posting them here since Twyla Graff, our CAO, has decided that written submissions will only appear in the minutes of a Public Hearing if they are actually spoken at the meeting. While I attended the first Public Hearing, I chose to pass on the second one (apparently necessitated by a 'late' comment from the Ministry of Forests regarding the unburned slash piles spread out throughout the property). Exactly why this necessitated a second Public Hearing and the 'intrigue' that went with it (our CAO having to ask the Council to 'trust her' that the issue was important enough that they agree, sight unseen, to reopen the application). A person more cynical than I might suggest that it was done simply to wear down the public and reduce the attendance at the 'final' Public Hearing - it seems to have worked since there were about 85 people at the first and apparently only 20 or so at the second. Council might well now try to claim that there is now broad public support for the Foothills development.

Mayor and Council,
RE: District of Lantzville Amendment Bylaw 60.10, 2006 Public Hearing Written Submission

I am very concerned about the liability which the District would be assuming by approving this proposal. Many of the roads will be quite steep and require specialized and expensive equipment to keep clear of snow in the winter time. I am even more concerned about the liability the community would be assuming for the trails and rock bluffs of the Foothills ‘park’ area – what is the cost of mitigating these liabilities vs. what is the potential exposure to the District? Will we have to construct fences like Parksville has had to do at Little Mountain and will we have increased policing to prevent individuals from ‘partying’ (and possibly vandalizing) at various locations in this large park area? Although there is mention of a ‘risk assessment’ in the Foothills CDP Executive Summary, I have, to date, seen no information relative to addressing either of these potentially major liabilities.

‘(T)he objective of the Foothills sanitary sewer strategy is to provide suitable, environmentally responsible, sustainable treatment and dispersal options for all three main land uses”(The Foothills – Its Your Nature – March 2006). They tell us how environmentally sensitive/aware they are and use a range of planning ‘emotives’ to try and convince us, yet they are satisfied with the ‘status quo’ of sending the sewage generated from the bulk of their development to the primary treatment plant at Hammond Bay and then flushing it out into the ocean (“green” this isn’t - their original plan of on-site secondary treatment and beneficial reuse matched their words much more closely). While we have been told for the last ten years that a treatment upgrade at the GNWPCC is ‘imminent’ (usually whenever a developer was contemplating hooking up to this antiquated facility), I’ll believe it when I see it.

The applicants have been given a ‘free ride’ as far as sewer Development Cost Charges go (and they are now seeking to be exempt from water, drainage and park DCC’s, as well). I have calculated that this is an approx. 2.3 M$ benefit to them (LPL is also expected to similarly benefit to the tune of 1.9 M$). What is a ‘small’ developer or even a home-owner with a greater than $50,000 renovation on their property to think when they are ‘dinged’ approx. $6,000 by the District for sewer DCC’s? If this decision stands (or even worse, is expanded), Council needs to clearly explain to the residents and other subdividable property owners the rationale behind it.

On the water side, I am concerned about the potential impact of the Foothills drilling program on any down-slope wells (they write that their ‘chemical fingerprinting’ tests indicate no sub-surface link and therefore, “no impact on the quantity and quality of existing systems” but I have been told that they only tested two wells for interference, which would make their ‘guarantee’ very tenuous).

The ‘Foothills Centre’, which was initially of unknown size and then 1,000 sq. m, has now grown to a maximum ‘footprint’ of 5,000 sq. m (53,792 sq. ft), which is about half the size again as the floor area of all of the commercial development presently within downtown Lantzville. In the community survey leading up to the OCP, the overwhelming majority of residents of Lantzville said that they wanted any new, commercial development to be limited and to extend eastward along Lantzville Road and up Ware Road/behind the existing commercial area. The OCP also contains an objective (sec. 6.1) to "discourage development outside of the Village Residential and Village Commercial Core Areas". Council needs to be very careful, in trying to reduce the length of automobile trips by Foothills residents, that the development, while located within the District of Lantzville, doesn’t become more of a ‘satellite’ neighbourhood of Nanaimo.

While there has been talk of a new firehall (paid for by the developer) to better service the Foothills and Upper Lantzville, I don’t see any such proposed use under any of the Foothills development zones.

While the proponents have made many commitments concerning numerous aspects of their development, some of which may look good on paper, it will be up to District Council and staff to monitor these commitments and enforce the rules, if they are not being followed. With the number of regulations involved in this CDP, this will not be an easy task.