Yes, it's that exciting time of the year again when we get to find out how much money city hall fleeced developers for in 2011.
Did I write fleeced?
Maybe that's a little harsh, although I've had a few developers bend my ear about the whack of cash they are required to dump in city hall coffers when they want to build in this town.
That's right ladies and gents, I'm talking about that dinner party conversation starter-that topic that brings even your most somnambulant guests to a state of egghead euphoria unmatched by, say, an afternoon with an insurance salesman-yes, people, I'm talking about_ development cost levies!
Or, as the kids say, DCLs, yo!
Note about this psychobabble: It's allergy season, my eyes are on fire and I've got an old dog that gets me up three times a night. Plus, I've been re-reading some Tom Wolfe and Hunter S. Thompson.
So I'll get right to it: The city has released its 2011 annual report on the amount of money it received from developers and what the city spent that money on.
Total DCL revenue in 2011 was a whopping $55.3 million, which is substantially more than the measly $31.1 million the city took in way back in the good old Olympic year of 2010.
Why?
I think you know why: Vancouver had a busy year development-wise in 2011, with development permits approved by city hall reaching 7.4 million square feet of real estate.
So what does the city do with all that DCL cash?
Does it:
a) Pay for new bikes and spandex culottes for Mayor Gregor Robertson and his staff?
b) Go to artist Ken Lum to create the long-awaited sculpture of George Puil to replace the pigeon-bombed Capt. George Vancouver outside city hall?
c) Get used to build new sidewalks, parks, housing and childcare centres?
The correct answer is, of course, the third choice, with the city spending $22 million on parks, $7 million on housing, $2.5 million on engineering infrastructure and $1.1 million on childcare projects. The remainder of the cash will be spent in 2012. From 2002 to 2011, the city's DCL revenue totalled $288 million. Some of the money was used for housing at Woodwards's and the Olympic Village, childcare spaces at Creekside and Mount Pleasant community centres, park renewals such as Oppenheimer and Tecumseh, bike routes on Hornby and Dunsmuir and playing fields at Jericho.
See, I told you, exciting, right?
Cop talk
In policing news_
Const. Jana McGuinness, a longtime media relations officer with the Vancouver Police Department, no longer has to respond to my lengthy emails or answer my calls-although she always did, no matter what her workload.
McGuinness has left the VPD's media section and is back on patrol downtown. At the Cambie Street police station last week, Police Chief Jim Chu thanked McGuinness for her dedication to the job in front of a bunch of reporters. "Just amazing work over the last four-and-a-half years," the chief said. "We'll miss you, but onward and upward in your new assignment."
Const. Brian Montague, a longtime patrol officer, a former detective in the department's identity theft task force and recent investigator with the Stanley Cup riot team, replaces McGuinness.
He joins Const. Lindsey Houghton, who will remain a media relations officer until the fall when he moves to another position.
Twitter: @Howellings
