Everything from pipelines to secondary suites will be up for debate next week as hundreds of local government politicians take a break from campaigning to meet in Whistler for the Union of B.C. Municipalities convention.
Victoria hopes to have an emergency resolution debated calling on the province to conduct its own environmental assessment of Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.
The city believes the federal process is flawed and there’s not going to be a fair environmental assessment done under the federal process and the province should conduct its own, said Mayor Dean Fortin.
“Fundamentally, one oil spill will affect our fishing, it will affect our shores, it will affect our tourism, it will affect our quality of life which is one of the reasons why high tech comes to this town,” Fortin said.
Burnaby has also put forward an emergency resolution seeking to prevent Kinder Morgan from conducting land surveys as it looks to tunnel through Burnaby Mountain for the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.
The $5.4-billion project would twin an existing pipeline between Edmonton and Burnaby, increasing capacity from 300,000 barrels of oil per day to nearly 900,000. Tanker traffic around Vancouver and the South Island would increase from five tankers a month to about 34, increasing risk of oil spills.
Victoria is among 400 interveners who will be permitted to submit evidence and written questions, but is not allowed to raise follow-up questions.
Other resolutions to be debated at the convention include everything from what to do with derelict boats, put forward by Squamish, to a resolution from the Comox Valley Regional District to discourage accidental 911 calls from cellphones.
The annual convention, coming amid campaigning for the Nov. 15 municipal elections, will feature an address from Premier Christy Clark. It will also give local government officials a chance to corner provincial government ministers in meeting rooms and hallways on local issues and infrastructure funding
“Obviously [Transportation Minister] Todd Stone has caught my eye,” said Saanich Mayor Frank Leonard. “He’s got money to study a ferry to Gabriola [Island] and he’s got money to study a second bridge across Okanagan Lake for Kelowna but we’re still not getting any indication they’ll look at the McKenzie/Trans-Canada [interchange]. So if he passes me in the hallway, Minister Stone will get a nudge.”
Last year, both Sidney and Victoria took centre stage during the resolutions sessions. Sidney Mayor Larry Cross sponsored a resolution calling for regulation, training and testing of people using mobility scooters and Victoria councillors Ben Isitt and Shellie Gudgeon wanted delegates to endorse their call to the province for a 40 km/h default speed limit.
Neither resolution was successful, although Victoria councillors recently took the matter in their own hands — passing amendments to the city’s traffic bylaw that lowered the speed limit on several city streets.
This year, Victoria is also looking for delegates to support their call on the province to allocate a larger share of liquor sale revenues to fund more liquor licence inspectors, alcohol addiction treatment services, policing of pubs and bars, and late-night transit.
View Royal is proposing that secondary suites only be permitted at owner-occupied homes.
And the Comox Valley Regional District wants delegate support for calling on the Canadian Radio-Television Telecommunications Commission to discontinue the use of dedicated 911 buttons on cellphones and to require that all cellphones sold in Canada include a minimum two-button push that includes call confirmation to access 911. The resolution aims to reduce the number of abandoned 911 calls caused by pocket dialing.
With just two months to go before municipal elections, some local politicians are cancelling or shortening their participation at this year’s convention.
Victoria Coun. Chris Coleman is well aware that attending the convention means fewer days campaigning.
“It means the days as soon as I return will be very full and very long,” he said
