There is a decided air of resignation from the three Vancouver communities that had the deadlines on completion of their community plans extended by city council last Friday. And you have to wonder how — in what has so far been a failure to engage citizens — this will affect the political fortunes of the city’s ruling Vision Vancouver party.
Principle players in the Downtown Eastside, Marpole and Grandview-Woodland all admit it is at least a “step forward.”
But these are people who are feeling bruised by a bureaucracy driven by city manager Penny Ballem and seemingly more intent on meeting deadlines than resolving difficult planning issues.
There is a palpable amount of skepticism that much will change with what Grandview-Woodland’s Jak King calls “a second chance.”
As Marpole Resident Association spokesman Mike Burdick observed: “Unfortunately, there is not a lot of enthusiasm right now because of past deeds.”
In his presentation to council last week, the city’s senior planner Brian Jackson boasted about the thousands of “participant contacts” in each neighbourhood and the massive number of “events” — 148 in the Downtown Eastside and 100 in Grandview-Woodland. It would seem there was nothing as comprehensive to compare it with anywhere on the planet.
And yet you have to wonder if “community engagement” was so thorough, why were there so many angry citizens?
How did it come to pass that in Grandview-Woodland, 30-storey towers appeared in plans at the corner of Commercial and Broadway when none had even been discussed. Or how did Marpole end up with a proposal for “thin streets” in which the city removes land from wide public roadways and builds houses so that corner lots with once relatively unobstructed side views have them blocked? Why did no one canvass the people who would be affected?
Why, asks Ray Spaxman the former Vancouver city planner now volunteering his services for citizens of the Downtown Eastside, is there a “cookie cutter approach” being taken by Jackson, including the expectation that each community was expected to have the same deadline to have their plans finished when each community has very different issues and populations? Whose interests are being served by the rush?
And how did we end up with a planner who lays the blame for screw-ups on his staff (the planning department did it) rather than cover their backs and take the heat himself for decisions he is ultimately responsible for?
Then there is this: now, as we have a second chance with the extension of deadlines, what can we expect?
Burdick, who is meeting with planning staff next week, says: “We have stopped using the word consultation. We want meaningful input.”
The folks in Grandview-Woodland got a one-year “minimum” extension along with something called a “Citizens Assembly” as a model for dialogue about their community plan.
Staff will report back to council by December on some aspects of the Assembly. And citizens will likely be fiddling around with issues of process well into the new year. King is clearly cautious, saying the composition and powers of the Assembly will determine the outcome: “However, if it is stuffed with ‘yes men’ and given only an observational role, then we will have gained nothing.”
And what will this delay and disappointment have on the fortunes of Mayor Gregor Robertson and Vision. Well, at this point, it seems they are not terribly concerned. The fact is Vision occupies a great whack of the middle of the political spectrum while the opposition continues to fragment to the left and right.
At the moment I count six parties on the periphery. There is the Non Partisan Association now gearing up and which will have the biggest war chest. But there is also the new TEAM with Jonathan Baker. There’s The Cedar Party, with enough dough to put out a slick brochure. Then there’s Adriane Carr’s Green Party, Randy Helten’s Neighbourhoods for a Sustainable Vancouver and, finally, COPE which, after a couple of unhappy alliances with Vision, plans to run its own mayoral candidate.
And if Vision’s opposition continues to splinter, Robertson and the rest will have an easy walk to their next victory a year from now regardless of how communities may be ignored in the planning process.
