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City of Victoria | 2018-2022 | Mayor and council general discussion


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#9241 Rob Randall

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Posted 10 July 2021 - 11:06 AM

^ I got a kick out it when he reached into his pocket, pulled out some cash and offered it to the tow truck operator to cease and desist.

Does that constitute a “bribe” Ben?

 

 

If the driver hooks up your car on Yates Street you give him fifty bucks and he unhooks it and drives away, the catch is you have to immediately remove your car. The problem was Ben's stunt costs him the high ground in the debate and a woman has to interrupt and get things back on track.



#9242 Mike K.

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Posted 10 July 2021 - 02:38 PM

Going back to the logging road discussion, Boneyard Main is a private road, owned by the Butler family, is it not? That’s why the province was in discussions with landowners for the emergency Malahat detour that was to have gone through private land and connect with Otter Point Road. Any road on Crown Land must be publicly available, unless there is a danger to the public, or there is a need to protect assets, or there is an environmental equation to the closure.

If you look at BC Assessment you’ll see what is private and what is public. More or less everything from JR south is private and can be gated at will.

As for maintenance, the logging companies must only maintain them if they have an active lease. There are hundreds of thousands of kilometres of logging roads on the Island but only mains are maintained as a priority if they provide access to a community or landmark or serve a dual purpose, etc. So I’m essence if it’s not needed by the logging company it won’t be maintained.

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#9243 spanky123

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Posted 10 July 2021 - 03:57 PM

According to Mayor Helps, the reason why she has had nothing to say about statues coming down or vandalism is because FN leaders didn't want her to.

 

https://www.timescol...ards-1.24340556

 

Helps said she hasn’t commented ­publicly on the statue because she was following the direction of the local nations.



#9244 Sparky

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Posted 10 July 2021 - 04:28 PM

^ What other groups have the power to stifle public officials?
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#9245 kitty surprise

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Posted 10 July 2021 - 06:02 PM

According to Mayor Helps, the reason why she has had nothing to say about statues coming down or vandalism is because FN leaders didn't want her to.

 

https://www.timescol...ards-1.24340556

 

Helps said she hasn’t commented ­publicly on the statue because she was following the direction of the local nations.

 

“Sometimes the best thing we can do as leaders who aren’t Indigenous, when there were Indigenous issues coming up, is stand back, stay out of the fray, and listen and watch and learn from the chiefs,” she said.

 

 

That's rich considering she cancelled Canada Day against FN wishes.

 

 

Thankfully tourism dollars saw what she did. These tourist dollars will go elsewhere 

https://www.timescol...else-1.24340710


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#9246 Nparker

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Posted 10 July 2021 - 08:17 PM

So the voices of thousands of non-indigenous people Her Worseship is supposed to represent are meaningless? If this is reconciliation, then it's a failed policy.


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#9247 Midnightly

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Posted 11 July 2021 - 01:48 AM

According to Mayor Helps, the reason why she has had nothing to say about statues coming down or vandalism is because FN leaders didn't want her to.

 

https://www.timescol...ards-1.24340556

 

Helps said she hasn’t commented ­publicly on the statue because she was following the direction of the local nations.

aka "i don't want to talk about it so i'm going to make an excuse not to talk about it"

 

this is not just a first nations issue.. this is an issue of division between people and cultures and beliefs.. this is also a huge act of vandalism right in the inner harbour... by not responding to it is pretty much her agreeing to what was done...

 

and really what did Captain Cook do to the local first nations? other then trade with them while he mapped the coastline.. he had nothing to do with residential schools, he had nothing to do with the murdered missing indigenous women (the red dress)... yes he did have some issues with other indigenous tribes in other countries (and in the end they did kill him..).. the mob just saw this statue of a colonial white male and said "tear it down"


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#9248 spanky123

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Posted 11 July 2021 - 10:32 AM

and really what did Captain Cook do to the local first nations? other then trade with them while he mapped the coastline.. he had nothing to do with residential schools, he had nothing to do with the murdered missing indigenous women (the red dress)... yes he did have some issues with other indigenous tribes in other countries (and in the end they did kill him..).. the mob just saw this statue of a colonial white male and said "tear it down"

 

Nothing to do with Captain Cook. This is about pushing for more and more. Heck the new assembly of FN chief wants every statue to come down and reparations to be paid to all FN. When you have a Government that has been wishing to give in on every demand then why not keep demanding more? Heck the NDP has already said they are open to writing a cheque to everyone.


Edited by spanky123, 11 July 2021 - 10:33 AM.

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#9249 spanky123

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Posted 11 July 2021 - 10:53 AM

Council will be discussing the first phase of their OCP changes at the next COTW meeting. Plan is to allow density increases in broad areas of the City. filestream.ashx (escribemeetings.com)

 

Anyone know if the highest and best use designation applies to residential properties? I am wondering if the zoning changes might force some SFH owners to sell if their assessments jump. 


Edited by spanky123, 11 July 2021 - 10:54 AM.

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#9250 mbjj

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Posted 11 July 2021 - 02:38 PM

According to Mayor Helps, the reason why she has had nothing to say about statues coming down or vandalism is because FN leaders didn't want her to.

 

https://www.timescol...ards-1.24340556

 

Helps said she hasn’t commented ­publicly on the statue because she was following the direction of the local nations.

Weak response. Not a leader. 



#9251 Awaiting Juno

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Posted 11 July 2021 - 08:18 PM

 

Anyone know if the highest and best use designation applies to residential properties? I am wondering if the zoning changes might force some SFH owners to sell if their assessments jump. 

 

Yes, and yes. That said, an alteration to the OCP is not a change to zoning, however, enabling development (ie. making the zoning change easy once desired) could be beneficial. Impacted properties should be directly notified. 



#9252 Sparky

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Posted 11 July 2021 - 09:00 PM

This sounds like rezoning to me.

“This amounts to waving a regulatory magic wand to make affordable housing possible on any site in the city, as long as the proposal fits with the OCP and the design guidelines for the neighbourhood. This means that there would be no public or political process for affordable housing developments.“

Lisa Helps

#9253 Mike K.

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Posted 11 July 2021 - 09:21 PM

A defacto rezoning, yes. You're going to see low-density zoning accommodate projects previously permitted only where high density zoning existed or was achieved.

 

The City must continue to diversify its tax base. It is crucial to keep adding more housing, for city hall, or existing taxpayers will see significant tax increases.

 

Consider that the CoV budget was $217 million in 2015. It rose to $265 million by 2020, a rise of over 22%.


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#9254 Spy Black

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Posted 11 July 2021 - 09:50 PM

Boneyard Main is a private road, owned by the Butler family, is it not? 

The Boneyard Main was constructed as an access road to the Leech River gold fields, built by the Crown, maintained by the Crown, and open to the general public right up until the early 80's.

It doesn't matter who owns the land currently, the road itself is a Crown road, and has been for over 130 years.

Crown roads are like railway land grants ... folks can own the land around them, but they can't own the road (or railway) itself.

 

There has always been a Crown access road up the west side of the Sooke River, and the Boneyard Main simply assumes that original access road constructed in the late 1800's.

 

Of course the obvious rub here is that Timberwest and CRD Water will bend over backwards to prevent you (and me, and everybody else) from accessing the Boneyard Main. Through these efforts they both manage to keep an awful lot of folks off the Boneyard Main ... but in the end they still admit hundreds of folks who have a legal right to use the Boneyard Main (and therein lies the proof that it's definitely not a "private" road).


Edited by Spy Black, 11 July 2021 - 09:50 PM.


#9255 Mike K.

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Posted 12 July 2021 - 06:07 AM

You can apply for access, and pay a fee to get a key, is my understanding.

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#9256 Victoria Watcher

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Posted 12 July 2021 - 06:57 AM

Nearly three decades later, Sharmarke Dubow still clearly remembers his mother waking him up in the middle of the night. He, then eight-years-old, was instructed to don three sweaters and two pairs of trousers, before heading to the shore with his mother and sister at the crack of dawn.

 

He remembers her negotiating with the people who had access to fishing boats—“Some people will call them smugglers, some will call them agents,” Dubow tells me—and on the second attempt, securing safe passage for him and his sister away from war-torn Somalia and towards safe haven.

 

Dubow is one of 22 siblings. That night, only he and his sister were able to get away from the civil war that had broken out in their homeland, Somalia—a country that remains in turmoil to this day.

 

“When you are a refugee, you don't decide or plan which day you leave, what time you leave,” Dubow said. “Things happen so suddenly and you have to make the hard choice. My mother made the hard choice that some of the family members would have to go and others [would] have to join [later].”

 

A few days later, their boat arrived in Kenya, but wasn’t allowed to dock at first because the country had been receiving an influx of Somali refugees and the government began pushing back against the new arrivals. Eventually, after negotiations between the Somali government and the UN Refugee Agency, the boat was accepted, and Dubow and his sister were taken to a camp in Mombasa, Kenya.

 

It was a little less than two years before Dubow’s mom was able to join him in the refugee camp. He recalls carefree childhood days spent playing soccer barefoot and getting into high jinks with other kids at camp.

 

The real burden of making sure there was enough clean water to drink, food to eat, and medicine for when someone was sick or injured fell on the adults. For Dubow’s family, the responsibility was entirely on his single mother.

 

https://www.capitald...sharmarke-dubow

 

 

 

22 siblings.  is that a record?  it looks like his family did not make this wikipedia list but could have:

 

https://en.wikipedia...e_most_children


Edited by Victoria Watcher, 12 July 2021 - 07:00 AM.


#9257 Nparker

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Posted 12 July 2021 - 07:23 AM

22 siblings.  is that a record? ...

Presumably, not all were full siblings and some had different mothers.



#9258 punk cannonballer

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Posted 12 July 2021 - 07:44 AM

Yes, and yes. That said, an alteration to the OCP is not a change to zoning, however, enabling development (ie. making the zoning change easy once desired) could be beneficial. Impacted properties should be directly notified. 

 

If the desired land use to be rezoned to meets the OCP use and density the City can waive a public hearing as the OCP adoption has already undergone a public process. The only notification requirement in this case is newspaper ads. As I mentioned in another thread they are usually loathe to do this because of the political hit. As I understand it the City is lobbying the province (I think through current UBCM discussion) regarding changing the legislation to actually remove public hearing processes in some cases such that Council doesn't have to be the bad guy. I'd be surprised if they get their way given that they already have the option and that the province enjoys stepping into municipal politics almost as much as cats like water, but we'll see.

I'm of two minds with it. I'm in agreement that we have a severe housing shortage in the Town, but I don't think volume is the only answer. If you want affordable housing, you need to designate and create affordability components for buildings, and build purpose built rental to remove speculation in those units. Affordable housing doesn't require a rezoning; residential is residential. If we want to grow the city in a big way, yeah remove public processes and build more and more. But, at least be honest about your intentions and your fears.


Edited by punk cannonballer, 12 July 2021 - 07:48 AM.

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#9259 Spy Black

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Posted 12 July 2021 - 08:20 AM

You can apply for access, and pay a fee to get a key, is my understanding.

Exactly, but not everybody can apply. 

The applications are primarily focused on First Nations, placer miners, hard rock miners, and members of the Victoria Fish and Game Club.

 

Timberwest and CRD Water know which groups have legally tested access, and grants them access with a $500.00 key deposit. If you need to get through a CRD gate as well as a Timberwest gate, that's another $500.00 (for a total of $1000.00). 

This money is sketchily referenced as a "key security deposit", but is, in fact, just another method of discouraging or preventing access to Crown roads. 

There are also realms of paperwork associated with the above access keys, permits, radio licenses, insurance papers, requirements for a full fuel spill and firefighting kit, etc.

 

And if you're not a placer miner, First Nations member, of VF&G club member ... you're not getting a key unless you go to court and fight for it. There's no gurantee you'll win said court case, as it really all depends on how you present your needs to use the roads in question, along with your evidence that the roads you wish to access are Crown roads under the law.

 

Roads that Timberwest (or any logging company for that matter) built from scratch are indeed private, and generally not accessible. Exceptions to that rule would be placer miners and hard rock miners, who benefit from additional legislation related exclusively to mining in B.C., and which allow for the use of any road that accesses their claim. 

You have to recall that in Canada, the vast majority of landowners just own their land. The Crown retains all mineral and oil rights, and can sell those rights to whomever they want ... and that buyer is most often not the actual landowner.

 

As well, some Timberwest roads further up Vancouver Island are indeed opened on weekends and holidays for the general public to use ... but that doesn't apply to the Boneyard Main, or any of the other roads in and around the CRD watershed, or Timberwests south Island lands.


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#9260 Mike K.

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Posted 12 July 2021 - 09:00 AM

And for good reason. There’s too much risk to the public to allow individuals to access those areas.

I spend a lot of time in the bush and I see the destruction. People are generally quite awful when they’re left to their own devices, and for every 1000 campers who do everything right one comes along and outdoes them all, tenfold.

A few years back some idiots trashed, absolutely trashed a forest campground. When we came upon it we found a drivers license one of them lost during their wild party and game of destruction. Another party that was assessing the damage took that license and delivered it to RCMP. They in turn were more than happy to deliver the lost license back its rightful owner. Under the condition that the camp site be restored to its former condition, meticulously. Under supervision by the police.

It’s scenarios like that which ruin it for the rest of us.
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