To refresh memories:
Johnston said he talked with Agricultural Land Commission staff and was told the Glen Meadows plan is unique in B.C. “They said to me I’m the first person since the commission was established to walk through the door with a proposal to turn a golf course back into a farm.”
A letter from the Criddles to members of Glen Meadows, which added curling and tennis during its first decade, said membership numbers have been going down. “The time has come that we need to look at some possible alternatives,” the letter said. “These processes do not happen overnight, so in the meantime we plan to continue the day-to-day operations as normal.”
The Criddles said Glen Meadows has created “49 years of wonderful memories” and they would love to create more wonderful memories as regular business continues.
Johnston said an application for rezoning and an official community plan amendment for the property has been made to the municipality of North Saanich. “The general proposal is to return it to produce food locally.”
The plan calls for some subdivision, Johnston said, but all of the houses would have a footprint on farmable lots.
“At the end of the day, 85 or 90 per cent of the land, even with the housing, is still returned to food production,” he said.
“You would be returning a 130-acre golf course that no one gets any food off of now back to food production to feed probably a couple [of] thousand people.”
North Saanich Mayor Alice Finall said she has heard general details of the plan, and expects it to come before council within a few weeks. She said a return to agricultural activity at Glen Meadows is “a lovely idea.”
“It sounds tremendously exciting to me.”
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