Re: “Coming up with a plan,” Ramona Faust column, April 25
Ms. Faust: “An OCP (official community plan) has no tax implications.”
Actually the regional district has already spent considerable tax dollars on preparing the draft OCP. If adopted, regional district staff will have to evaluate every proposed development, subdivision, addition or renovation for compliance with the OCP, I do not believe RDCK staff will welcome the increased work load without compensation.
Ms. Faust: “The majority of Area E residents felt that growth and development should be managed.”
This is the result of a survey conducted in 2010. A total of 43 per cent supported a community plan, while 37 per cent wanted more information and 17 per cent said no to planning. That means 54 per cent either wanted more information or were opposed, yet on that basis a draft plan was prepared.
We all know that a survey can produce whatever result the party doing the survey wants. For instance if you ask “are you in favour of preventing child abuse” you will get a resounding YES, but if you suggest installing monitoring devices in every residence for the purpose of preventing child abuse, you might well get a different response.
The regional district would not be justified in adopting a bylaw based on responses to a survey that simply asked “do you think growth and development should be managed?” since that survey did not include details of what was involved, and especially since more than one-third of respondents specifically asked for more information.
Now that the information is available as to what this OCP entails, the decision on whether to adopt the bylaw should be left to the voters to decide in a referendum, and not to a possibly flawed survey or the opinion of directors.
Jack Zeeman
Balfour