Late last month in the midst of Vancouver city council passing the West End Community Plan, Mayor Gregor Robertson was on CBC Radio being asked to comment on criticism of the plan by Randy Helten, the spokesperson for a group called West End Neighbours (WEN).
Rather than deal with the substance of what Helten had to say, Robertson was dismissive. He said that Helten was just planning to run against him for mayor again, as he did last time out. In other words Helten’s motives were purely, thoughtlessly political.
But the response by Robertson simply demonstrated once again his almost juvenile contempt for the public consultation process. Rather than accepting there is a diversity of considered views out there in the city he has been elected to govern, Robertson frames any opposition as “the enemy.”
His first run-in with Helten and WEN was at a council meeting more than three years ago when the group was there to protest the implementation of a program called STIR, which was designed to speed up building of market rental housing. The STIR accelerants included spot zoning, waiving parking requirements and development cost levies and providing willing developers with density bonuses for taking on the task.
It was during a subsequently much-publicized unguarded moment following the meeting that Robertson was caught referring to those West End delegates as “NPA hacks” while modifying his observations with the expletive “f**king.”
As it turned out, Helten and the rest were either Vision or COPE supporters, members of the coalition of political forces that gave Robertson his majority on council. But that outburst was key to a perception, which has since grown among community groups right across the city, that “Vision” means never having to listen — unless they are threatened with court action.
And that bring us to the report council considered this week: “Development Cost Levy By-Law Amendments to the definition for for-profit affordable housing.” The STIR program ran its course after 1,300 units of for-profit rental housing were built. It has been replaced by an ongoing program called Rental 100. But throughout, many beyond WEN criticized the process of approving developments because it of its discretionary nature, particularly when it came to defining what exactly “affordable rental housing” meant.
Of course, there was the definition offered by Coun. Kerry Jang that “affordable means whatever you can afford.” But that only served to irritate and further highlight the arbitrary nature of the exercise.
In fact, in spite of a crushing need for affordable rental housing in Vancouver, there was no transparent definition.
All we got in the report from the committee on affordable housing was an annual income range of $21,500 to $86,500, which defined the cohort being targeted. Aside from that there was just the “discretion” overseen by the office of city manager Penny Ballem. And at one point, I was reminded approval for “affordable rental” was withdrawn for the Beach Towers proposal when staff accepted that a waterfront location in the West End was highly unlikely to be “affordable.”
You have to wade most of the way through the report to council on the bylaw amendments before you hit the motive for staff’s proposed actions. It’s a not-so-subtle way of saying “this is not the headline.”
But here it is: “These amendments to the DCL By-laws would also address the legal Petition filed in the B.C. Supreme Court by the West End Neighbours, which challenges the City’s current process for determining eligibility for DCL waiver for affordable rental housing. The petition challenges the delegation of authority to the City Manager to determine eligibility for the waivers and argues that the DCL By-laws do not adequately define the meaning of ‘affordable.’”
The report adds that the definition will “provide certainty around eligibility for DCL wavers” and the decision will “no longer be at the discretion of the City Manager.”
You can decide if the “affordable” rent for a studio apartment of $1,443 a month is truly affordable. And you can also ponder the value of the city waving about $10 million in DCLs in order to entice developers to build 2,000 rental units instead of condos is worth it. But you can’t question that Helten and WEN got Vision to listen. We’ll have to see if this is a trend.
agarr@vancourier.com
twitter.com/allengarr
