Council Meeting

Good evening, View Royal.

I'll call the council meeting for Tuesday, April 1st, 2025, to order and begin with a territorial acknowledgement that we recognize Lakongwin speaking people known today as the Esquimalt Nation and the Songheese Nation, and that their historic connections to these lands continue to this day.

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Uh moving down, can I get a motion to approve the agenda if there's no other um ads to it, including the blue sheets I had a uh notice of motion just to be added at the end uh okay when we come down to notice of motion just remind me and we can add that in and you've supplied staff a copy yes or not and members of council okay thank you for that so so amended uh any other changes to the agenda if there are no other changes can I get a move her in a second here for the agenda.

Moved by councillor brown, seconded by councillor Mattson, all those in favor.

Any opposed?

Seeing none opposed, motion carries.

And can I get a motion to adopt uh the minutes of our council meeting for the 18th of March, please moved by Councillor Brown, seconded by Councilor Rogers, all those in favor?

Any opposed, seeing none opposed, motion carries.

Mayor's report.

Uh I've just got three items, and uh pleased to see the handy dart official opening in View Royal on uh Friday.

Uh was uh an honor to be the uh MC of the event, and I think it was a project that um really stirred up the town to begin with, including council.

Um, and I think because of the public's engagement uh for the Ministry of Transit, they changed.

They really changed their project management, went all in on community engagement, First Nations engagement, had kids planting actively.

I know that staff enjoyed working on a gold lead construction building, it's we don't get those often.

Um, so again, it was a good opportunity to do that.

On the other hand, on a rather related project, I think I've received uh numerous emails over the past day uh of folks really concerned about the bus on the shoulder project and particularly mowing trees down around the beaver pond.

And although um uh although council was briefed on this, just our last meeting, uh, and that uh Ivan and I sat down with uh Modi and said, look, uh engagement in View Royal is a big thing, bigger than most communities you're going to uh find.

Um uh obviously the message had not gotten out effectively to folks.

Um and although the town can divert um local concern to the ministry, if you Google the uh bus on the shoulder project for Victoria, you will find the latest uh iteration of what's going on.

There is also a contact on the bottom, and I just encourage you to do that because we're not your only elected officials.

You've also afflect uh elected uh MLAs for your area, and that's the appropriate place for it.

We can advocate for you, but most effectively if they can hear directly from you, then that would uh I think that would get the point across um the best way.

Uh and lastly, I just want to bring up uh council had also passed a bylaw sign for uh by law for preventing uh signs being put on upon View Royal land during election period.

That election period covers uh municipal, provincial, and federal elections.

Um and uh uh I I know that norm our staff have gone out uh from the uh list of candidates of which when this current election started there was but one uh since that time there have been several others so you may see some signage up uh in the town uh and staff is working with the candidates to ensure that they're aware and get the signs down.

Um uh and I think it's quite refreshing to be able to uh drive around uh and not see as many signs as you do in other municipalities.

And so yeah, just a reminder for both candidates and the public that uh staff are working the issue and uh and seeing if there's voluntary compliance to get those signs removed that are in the area.

Uh and that's all I have for a mayor's report.

I think we do not have any petitions and delegations, Sarah.

And that'll bring us down to our first public participation period.

And I'll start with folks in the room.

If you've got something like you uh that you would like to address council on the agenda, we'd be more than happy to hear from you.

So anybody want to address council?

There we go.

I've been in this business for so long and I don't even know how to push a button.

My name is uh Brian Richmond, and I am uh a proud resident and homeowner here in the beautiful township of View Royal since 2015.

Um I am uh someone who's had the great privilege of uh working in the arts uh for my entire career, uh other than working in my family's construction business and my family's uh farm prior to that.

Uh I've had a six nearly 60-year career working in the arts.

Um so uh and I came to Victoria in 2001 so I'm uh my my profession is is I'm currently a professor at the University of Victoria and former chair of the theater department there and I've also I'm also the founder of a company called Bluebridge Repertory Theater which is a recipient of CRD arts service money here in the uh in the region.

I thought what might be useful to you uh first of all I just want to thank uh view royal for being such a strong supporter of the arts through being being a participant in the uh in the arts service uh uh service uh uh uh uh agency since uh you know since I think since its founding in uh in uh 2001.

So thank you for that, and thank you for that uh that support.

Um and I just I thought that maybe what I'd be able to offer to you tonight is just the perspective of someone who has had the opportunity of working in the arts for this long a period of time.

And and what I I'm now at that age where I spend a lot of time reflecting on things and what you know what things have meant to me and to others in the life.

And one of the things that I have come to understand about the arts is that the arts are are not a product.

Of course, they are a product, right?

We go to see plays, we go to see paintings and galleries, we go to, we we we participate, we go to symphonies, we see we see the arts in many, many forms, but that isn't, in my view, the most important function of the arts in our lives.

The most important function of the arts in our lives is that they generate a conversation.

And in that way, the arts are always local.

They generate a conversation.

Even if we're seeing, oh, I don't know, a work by Shakespeare from the 17th century in England.

The reason why it matters so much to the area is the conversation that it generates, right?

And I've lived through, you know, I uh, you know, I'm uh I I think I'm probably older than uh than than many of you here.

So I've lived through a number of eras here in in our country.

And um, even though I think Councillor Rogers' uh uh uh idea of supporting the performance arts on the West Shore is a is a really good idea.

I think it's a great idea, actually.

I think we know we need to diversify how we view the arts and how we experience the arts in the region.

I would really encourage you to not uh think of that as something that is instead of uh the support of the arts as the arts and the artists, and more importantly, the artists who create the art, which is what the CRD Art Service has done.

I remember living through the 60s when we were um full of enthusiasm about what culture could mean in our in our country as a whole.

And I remember a number of theaters being built, right?

And there were no artists to fill them.

That's what we discovered quite quickly after that.

And this is my fear is that if uh it's it's the it's the artists who do the work that is really uh really the the the blood and the life and the soul of it and and uh and that is what the CRD Arts Service has been uh supporting in in such a strong fashion of course you know uh you know my passion is is the arts right uh and uh and that's not shared by everybody but I uh I was just doing a little calculation on my uh on my uh taxes right and I went well you know how much do we actually give out of our tax dollars and I'm speaking of our property tax dollars here.

And it's like 0.33% of of my tax dollars go to supporting the arts.

And that's good I'm I'm I'm happy that that much goes.

I, of course, would be an advocate that much more should be going to the arts, but I understand that there are many things that need to be supported.

And I'm I happily support uh the money going to that.

I just I I just think that um we've been living through a period now that where there's been uh uh a lot of uh upset, a lot of upheaval uh through COVID.

The arts suffered a great deal through COVID.

We're now going through another period of upheaval, and I would encourage you to um uh continue to offer your support during what I think is going to be a difficult time.

Thank you very much for listening.

Thank you.

It's still on, right?

It is, yeah.

Uh my name is Ian Case.

I live on Wilford Road.

And thank you for the opportunity to address Council.

I've been a resident, a resident, homeowner, and taxpayer in View Royal for 20 years.

I've also had an over 35 year career as a practicing artist, arts administrator, and advocate in our region.

And first and foremost, I want to express my gratitude to View Royal and its ongoing support of the arts.

I spoke to View Royal Council in favor of the original motion to move to Group One funding for the Arts Service.

And that decision has had a significant and a positive impact on arts community, on the arts community, providing essential resources for countless organizations and artists throughout the region, including those right here in View Royal.

My experience over the years has shown me just how vital regional arts services are to both artists and organizations.

View Royal's support has directly benefited me through operating and program grants that have enabled me to sustain my career as an artist and to enrich the cultural and social fabric of our municipality.

My journey in the arts and culture sector of Vancouver Island began in 1991.

I was the director of the Farcour Auditorium for Ed UVic for 13 years recently.

I was the general manager of Theatre Inconnu, general manager of Intrepid Theater.

They produced the Fringe Festival and UNA Festival, and so much more.

I was the co-founder of the Victoria Shakespeare Festival, which performed in View Royal recently.

I founded Giggling Iguana Productions, producing shows across the CRD, including in View Royal.

I've collaborated with numerous arts organizations in various roles, such as producer, writer, director, actor, grant writer, and more.

I have performed, produced, directed, and rehearsed in nearly every venue in the region, including NV Royal.

In that time, I have contributed to the development of significant regional creative spaces, such as the Planet Theater, the Metro Studio, the Intrepid Theater Club.

I've also supported the first use of the Inner Harbor as a festival venue.

And currently I'm working on a capital project to enhance the theater space at William Head on stage.

I believe that the West Shore Arts Center would greatly enhance the arts infrastructure of our region, benefiting artists and organizations by providing opportunities to showcase their work.

However, it is vital that we do not let the creation of new art space come at the expense of funding that directly supports artists.

View Royal's group one contribution to the CRD Art Service is critical to allowing artists to thrive in their craft.

I encourage View Royal to adopt the model that has been successfully implemented by many other municipalities, such as Vancouver, Victoria, Kelowna, Duncan, and Naimo, and many others.

Those communities maintain their funding for artists and arts organizations while allocating new resources for infrastructure development.

And I know these are difficult times and budgets are tight.

The BC Arts Council has followed a similar strategy through its Arts Infrastructure Fund while preserving support for artists and arts organization organizations.

Investing in a new venue without supporting the artists who will use it will ult ultimately lead to that venue sitting empty.

And no one wants that.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Does there anybody else in chambers want to address counsel on anything related to the internet?

Seeing nobody, Carl, do we get any uh submissions coming in online?

Sorry, I just said that with my mic muted.

Um, mayor Tobias, we have no uh comments on the forum.

Thanks, Carl.

Uh appreciate it.

I think we can move down to business arriving, arising from previous minutes.

And um item A, that variants permit policies be amended to address gaps in service specifically with respect to gathering information on impact to neighbors.

Council Rogers.

Yes, thank you very much.

Um one of the things I I think we all recall when um uh the variants uh for a debt variance for 406 Creed Road came upon us.

Um we were concerned and wondering uh what the impact would be or is uh would be on on the adjacent neighbor.

Um but we had no information.

We saw the building, we saw no contours, we saw no photographs, and um uh this is um this was of concern and and um going to the neighbor, I I heard uh their concerns um, but um you know fortunately it wasn't uh a situation where it was going to be facing uh a bedroom or whatever, but these so these are uh this is just one of many, many examples uh in this town where we get development variances and there is very little information uh provided to us so that we could fully understand and appreciate and recognize the neighbors that would be impacted by this.

So you know my um my motion would be that uh uh staff amend relevant bylaws and policies for new developments in various applications developments and variance applications uh to assess and include information about impacts on adjacent properties uh in the staff reports to council and border variants that's my motion what if I could have a if there's a seconder for discussion counselor Brown uh thank you um staff did you want to reply to this now I I'm just a little unclear counselor rogers uh that's kind of vague are you what what specifically are we looking for to change if we're providing a motion to staff to amend things?

As I understand it, and staff correct me if I'm wrong, there is a mail out for a certain area around the variance.

But I think we need to perhaps provide a little bit more specific direction for staff.

Do you want them to come back with uh with options?

Can I allow me to elaborate then?

Um I know there's the notice um um information going out to the neighbors, letting them know what's uh what's going on, but if they look at the staff report, as we look at the staff report, they really don't understand, as I don't understand, what the implications are to them.

I don't see contour lines as to what might be in terms of water flows.

It doesn't show any photographs of the adjacent neighbors that could be provided.

It doesn't give us any ideas about the distance of structures from proposed structures to the neighbors.

And it doesn't do any assessment of what it all talks about, the favorable reasons to support.

The staff report does not include any uh unfavorable, as in the adverse impacts or possible adverse uh impacts like noise, shadow, external, uh exterior lighting.

So these are these are things that um in in um uh and and and maybe the applicants or the neighbors, they don't know because they'll look at the report and they don't see the distance, they don't see the contour lines, they don't see what uh you know what might be a problem to them until it's too late.

Then they can't do anything about it.

So the more information that staff can kindly provide counsel, the more we can be informed uh to make sure that we're not making the wrong decisions and saying, whoops, we made an error.

So um I think it's it's reasonable, and obviously I appreciate staff don't do this because we acquire them.

It's not in the bottles of policy.

So uh, and how many times have I asked for for contour lines?

Never happens.

So I I think it's time that we we raise the bar and ensure that uh all residents are listened to.

Thanks, Councillor Rogers.

Councillor Brown, I think that I understand the intent.

Um and I think occasionally, and there's the probably the deck example is a good example where people build and ask for forgiveness after the fact.

'Cause I know staff does their due diligence and sending letters out there, which is great, and which is what they should be doing.

That's what they do.

Uh but I think there may be the odd time where someone's built something and then after the fact um it comes to council.

And I know in that one case uh that happened recently, um I think they talked to one neighbor perhaps b behind, but not the surroundings so um maybe if um may not even have to be a motion it may just be kind of a uh asking staff to to maybe expand that so when people do apply for the building permit after the fact which happens sometimes uh you know they're building stuff and then begging forgiveness after so I think that's perhaps where things might occasionally fall through the cracks that's just my perception.

Okay thanks staff did you want to comment uh thank you mayor to bias yeah I think um it's just it is appropriate for council like for just for staff to make a couple uh or provide counsel with some information so our development applications have um a very comprehensive list of submission details and documentation that applications um um may have to provide it really depends on the type of application the scope the proposal and many and there are often times where there are things listed in the application forms where it's not relevant to an application and so staff don't feel it is reasonable that an applicant spend the time and money to include to to include that information when it's not relevant to the application.

So staff use their their professional um knowledge and expertise in terms of what is required in order to evaluate an application against town bylaws and council policies.

If staff brings forward an applic uh an uh report to council and there's additional information that council would like to see, well, it's council's you know responsibility or to ask for that if if that's what they want at that time.

Um there's really no need to amend any of our applications or development procedures bylaw to to um to address these changes because we already have it in there, and um we we can bring more information.

Well, I I want to be careful about that too, because we do have our the analysis section in our our reports, where that is where staff speak to the supportability of an application and its um consistency with policies and where it deviates from bylaws and things like that, and if it's supportable or not supportable.

So that's all in the analysis section of the report.

Furthermore, we have recently received guidance from council to make our reports more short and sweet and include more information in the um in the attachments.

And so we have done we have we've we have done that as well.

So it's so I just wanted to to to um share that with council.

And then also in terms of notif public notification, for development variance permits, our public notification distance is 100 meters.

And council may recall that we have the greatest mail out distance in all municipalities within the region for variance permits.

So we do go above and beyond in terms of notification already of an application.

We can certainly add more photos in reports.

We do often provide photos in the PowerPoint presentations.

Um then the other important part of this is that for complex applications, we do require a lot more information than let's say a variance for a deck.

Um it's you just sort of have to look at scope of application and what is required in order to evaluate that evaluate that proposal.

And you know, when we send out notices to neighbors, we can't force people to come out and speak and write letters, right?

So we have done our job, council's done their job in the notices to the public.

The notices are are um specifically state that council is considering this application, and we invite you to provide comments in writing or speak during the opting for public comment.

That's all I have to add.

Thank you.

Anyone else with comments?

Uh let's start with you, Councillor Matzlin, Councillor McKinsey.

Yeah, um what I thought I hear Counselor Rogers say is what's missing in our reports are the negative consequences of approving the variants to the adjacent neighbors.

And so it'd be good if there was a section, you know, negative consequences, and if there aren't any, they could just put none.

And it's as simple as that, or outlining those things, you know, potential noise, shadow, those things that Councilor Rogers has asked for.

And that's staff could just from their understanding of what the variance is and what the impacts are, could write that down in the document because it keeps staff or keeps council from having to try to go through a ver through the all all the background information again.

Part of our reports is to just get a synopsis and staff's opinions.

And so in this case, it'd just be staff's opinion on what the negative consequences are.

Thank you.

Did you want to comment on that, Safe?

Uh thank you, Mary Tobias.

Uh, in the analysis section of staff reports, um, there are comments, there are often comments on on the impacts of the proposal.

Thank you.

Just for clarification, it's a it's a one-line consequences, and if there aren't any, none.

Councillor McKenzie.

So I also had some issues with the um variance permit bylaw process that I'm hoping to hear maybe from staff.

So currently there's not really parameters in terms of when we should approve a variance or not.

Um I previously mentioned at the Board of Variants, you know, it came down to whether compliance with our bylaws would be would cause financial hardship or it's just not possible within the the property itself given the geography.

So I would like to see this applied also to variances that come to us, because otherwise I often question why have the bylaws if we are regularly almost always approving variances to uh to them I'll go to any other first-time speakers first.

Uh councilor Rogers, then Councilor Matzer, please.

Yeah, yes, thank you.

To uh Councilor Brown's point, uh, this is not about uh those individuals that build and ask uh ask forgiveness later.

Uh this is this is all circumstances not just um retrofitting uh an error in what they started.

Um I um I I don't think we're taking into account the intimidation factor and uh the fear factor of uh next door neighbors.

That was the instance recently that they did not want to come forward.

They had hoped that um someone would come by and they had hoped that perhaps the staff report would have, you know, been a little more investigative on the impacts to them.

So um, you know, one it may be that um staff perceive that there's no problems, but how would you really know if and and I guess one of the advantages of staff is that I think they can go on the property.

I can't.

I can't trespass.

And I know that the Board of Variants, there was a particular instance many years, you know, three or four years ago, when the Board of Variants could not go on the adjacent properties, but I was asked to.

And I was asked, and I did speak to those other individuals and understood where, and what that was became quite an interesting revealing of how other municipalities are, I think, more considerate to the plights of neighbors.

And so it it's um I I suppose we could test, and I would very much be watching, but an aerial photograph doesn't always solve.

I use it as well.

Sometimes I say staff have not the aerial photograph.

They didn't go back to 2013, see what the variances were and the in the adjacent properties.

And so I think my motion was because there were so many instances of this not happening and me being really uh discouraged that we weren't having it and so I thought fine then if it has to be in the bylaws and the policies then maybe we'll finally be able to get some objective information on those neighbors and what the impacts are.

Now if we can get assurances that we're going to do a better job in adhering to those uh and re recognizing their plight then we shall see I I guess I'm still not clear on your motion counselor rogers in that what are we directing staff to do here?

We um uh you know specifically you mentioned aerial photographs more information and knocking on doors and talking to neighbors like what do we what are we asking staff to do so contour lines always put in the contour lines of not only just of that property but the uh properties the adjacent properties next door um give distances of the proposed structures in relation to those other properties and and not only distances but building heights so that they would and we would understand the shadowing impact um assess uh I think it's a it was reasonable to assess noise impact.

We've got a number of um of buildings that have um got balconies right next to just a short distance away from adjacent properties, and these are outdoor recreation decks.

And but Lions Co.

really, you know, didn't get much of an opportunity uh to really understand and see if we don't have it in the staff report, so when we send out the notice and and the neighbors look at it, they'll look at this and say, well, it looks okay.

But wait a minute, no, they missed a point.

They didn't catch this point, they didn't catch this point.

So it's um I I I think we need to do a better job.

Either we do it and we can see what happens in the next one, or we actually and you know move to protecting our neighbors.

Any other comments, Councilor Matson, please?

Uh two comments.

I understand what Councilor Rogers is asking for, and from my perspective, if staff had a checklist that they could just sort of look at and advise us if something was contrary to or potentially negative to that resident or the adjacent resident, I I think that'd be a good start, and we could just see what happens from there.

Uh my other comment was just in terms of uh a council-approved variants versus board of variants.

Like all council decisions are political decisions, and sometimes we use different criteria than the board of variants, and I would hate to try to see us urge the two.

Thank you, Counselor That's Councilor McKenzie.

Oh just to Counselor Rogers' motion, I am supportive of it because I what I understand is that he's asking for staff to advocate on behalf of the potentially impacted neighbors who might not be able to or feel um that they can come forward and speak because you know that's an aug it is awkward um a position to be in you don't want to make bad neighbors so I I I support that if that's the intent.

Thank you.

Uh any other comments?

Counselor Brown.

Yeah, I won't I won't uh belabor it, but I only seconded the motion for point of discussion.

I think we've had a pretty healthy discussion here now.

I don't see I don't really see the need to to um approve the mo I in fact I'll vote against it even though I seconded it.

I think we've uh expressed her issues and some of them are valid.

I think basically we're looking for a little bit more information from staff when they bring the variation reports to council and really I've I've seen letters come to my place asking me about uh variances in the area.

So it does happen.

Um we asked for something on our strata and a staff came out two staff members came out and they were going to send letters out to the neighborhood.

So I know it's I know it gets done.

So just I think it's just a matter and I like uh counselor madsen's idea of just a small section of any negative points and it might be nil but I think that would be helpful just that one small thing rather than having to review the whole policy and the whole bylaw uh counselor Dillon I think I think Councillor Brown just spoke for me um what I what I heard from staff was we're doing all of this but it's in most of it is in the appended report um so we're not necessarily reading you know deeply into it um so you you know yes I do agree with uh counselor madsen's suggestion that you just bring it up and you know are there are there any challenges with this any consequences yes no yes here's what's here's what they are um and just bring that up into the the presented report thanks um then um just just for what we've got on the table right now is a little vague for a motion and we're asking for something very specific right we we've got to be really clear what we're asking staff to do if we want to be successful in this counselor rogers and and so uh through our discussion counselor matsen had come up with something what you're looking for is um gathering information on impact to neighbors would the suggestion that counselor roger or counselor matzon brought up about um uh an impact area be sufficient and let's be clear if there is something that council needs more information on to make a decision then we vote as a council to acquire that information.

Let me speak to that.

Thank you.

One of the one of the things that we've just been working on folks is the sustainability checklist.

And I I see uh Councilor Mats's point.

Um indeed um and and Counselor Brown maybe if um if there is an adjacent property checklist uh that does um you know list out the issues of of you know like I say contours and photos and and um and all these kind of things just like the sustainability checklist in a staff report every time it's it's a uh a border variance or a um uh any kind of variance report or even a development report so if we have a neighborhood uh adjacent property impact checklist is that council brown is that what you're suggesting yeah that's kind of it's just uh expanding on what counselor matts and that's fine I would amend my motion I think the secondary would uh would agree I'd amend a motion to um suggest uh move that if I oh sorry thank you move that um uh uh staff reports on and um to council and to board of variants um that uh they include a uh adjacent property checklist um uh assessing pros and cons impacts and uh in in every staff report for variances specifically yeah okay okay so we got a mover and a seconder if counselor brown agrees leanne thank you mary device i just need to add one thing um because something was said that was a bit concerning is that staff cannot advocate for anyone we that is against our our our profess our code of ethics our professional conduct so um it's very important that council knows that um and uh and and also um when staff evaluate the applications we do look at the the neighbor impacts and also um how it fits in with the the context of the site as well as the neighborhood in general but there's no problem specifically with providing a checklist of that's what the motion is um um i i don't know what this checklist is gonna look like so um yeah counselor McKenzie I sorry just uh to clarify what I meant there is that I think not only should it state the facts as counselor Rogers was saying in terms of heights, things like that, but also potential issues.

No, so not just um stated issues, very technical issues, but potential issues, potential consequences.

That's what I would like to see in the reports, thinking ahead to things that might arise in the future.

Okay.

Okay.

Um realizing we're on the first agenda item of the evening, and in spirit of efficiency, Councilor Rogers, let's uh let's put this to vote.

And and specifically, as you've amended it, looking for a checklist from staff on neighborhood impact.

So all those in favor of Councillor Rogers motion.

Any opposed?

Seeing none opposed, motion carries.

Thank you, Councilor Rogers.

And item B was redesign Altham Road egress onto Helmkin Road.

That the road improvements for the development at 294-296 Eltham Road and 242 Helmkin Road include two separate exit turns left and right onto Helmkin Road.

Councilor Roger.

Yes, thank you.

And exiting um Eltham onto Helmakon.

And uh so I I went back and looked at the uh the traffic study for uh Eltham uh and um that was in February, the report was provided to us in February 2024.

Uh the traffic study was done in 2023, and with traffic reports and and analysis dating back to 2022.

Um what it did not show us was um the development on the corner that is now there.

And it did not indicate to us that there was now going to be another egress in and out of um of that six story uh residential building.

Um and um it made no mention of the bus stop that was uh there um south of the um uh the intersection.

And um the so it also probably didn't, and I don't believe it mentioned because nowadays we know that the traffic backs up significantly for that light on down towards Jedberg.

And it's very difficult to make a left out.

But somebody that lives on Eltham, either as a res current resident or a new resident from these buildings, if they want to make a left out and they're bound and determined to wait their moment to make that left, they are going to incur a lot of probable traffic buildup, particularly on rush hour AM, to uh try and get out with a lot of um, I would suggest uh uh anguish and and uh frustration and and confrontation on a very short street.

This is almost akin to Erskine Lane, where we did decide to put a traffic light for all those buildings that are going on there.

And we haven't even fully developed the other side of Eltham.

So I provided everyone a drawing that showed the um uh the issues, the buses, the traffic coming out of the new building, the congestion on Helmkin, of which a double yellow line would not stop anyone from trying to do a left out of Eltham.

Um and of course, the uh the children that are walking to school, um, this is a busy road for that.

And um, of course, we do have the cars rushing around the soft corner.

Um, and and on top of that, we also have more northbound vehicles exiting from the harbor uh towards uh VGH Hospital and Eagle Creek as it densifies.

So I build it and at the developer's cost, and we would probably have to fix it at the taxpayer's cost.

So now that uh we know that this is based on a traffic study of 2023, that we know there's a lot more congestion on this road, then I think we have to be a lot more um careful um in making sure that we get it right the first time so that we do not incur taxpayer expenses and and having to uh chop out uh boulevards and and whatnot.

So I I guess um I'm looking at the staff but I would hope either we uh place barriers on Helmakin to prevent a left out or we have left and right turn uh left turn right turn on Eltham um so that if anyone's gonna do a left they do not impede those that make a right so those are my comments we need to fix this thank you do you have a seconder Councilor Matson and I guess if my are you seconding because I'm seconding it, but I think I'm seconding that we want staff to review this and come back to with us with a report on how it's gonna work before we finalize everything.

Is that sufficient, Council?

I I yes, um, I guess so.

It's um um unless the staff wish to uh inform us now, but uh yeah, maybe we have an opportunity for staff to comment.

Okay.

Thank you, Mayor Tobias.

Yeah, it'd be a pleasure for me to provide some more information to the council um to determine whether or not they wish to have a staff report come their way.

Um I too read and reviewed the report.

Um Ultham Helmkin is also part of my commuter route too.

So I over the last three years I've passed by there at least three or four times a day.

Uh and with this in mind, I have checked the site from time to time to see the um impact of the region.

And um the report basically stipulates a few things here.

And uh what I'll try to do is to give you a little bit of the context of the background conditions that was put in and how they developed the um the model.

So uh with respect to the surrounding area and its usage of Elsom Road, uh the report specifically mentions something called pass-through traffic, and that's usually in collector roads or connector roads uh that go from point A to point B.

Um that can contribute to additional traffic.

But given this is a dead end road, um, pass through traffic was not an issue.

Uh the next thing they went through is the modeling of the of the number of vehicles going through Eltham Road.

Um, the existing conditions of making a left or right as it stands right now.

So rush hour, the backup on Eltham Road is one vehicle.

Actually, it's I think it's less than one vehicle, but because there's no such thing as a part of a vehicle, we round up to one.

Is a level service B, which is actually pretty good.

Um, talking about 10-second delay.

Uh, when they incorporated the uh the amount of traffic that would be caused by the development, um they used uh demand modeling of that.

It's a it's a um best practice, and so the backup, additional backup as a result of this development, the math says it is less than one vehicle, so about 0.7 meters.

And we round up into one to one vehicle because it doesn't make sense to do a portion of that.

Um the wait time is increased by 0.5 seconds.

So by widening the roads to um have two lanes, council has to ask themselves the question of is this a uh best value for dollars spent in accordance with our uh strategic plan.

In addition to that, uh with the bus stop in the area, there is a drive to have more people use active transportation.

And so by widening the area by about three and a half meters, you're increasing the pedestrian crossing time by about three seconds.

So uh council has to consider that is the additional 0.5 seconds of uh vehicle traffic improvements, is that worth the three second increase in pedestrian traffic that we'll continue to see more and more, uh, especially with uh density in the area and transit uh improvements.

So those are that's kind of the gist of it.

Um we can certainly provide a little bit more information should you wish.

Uh, but generally speaking, staff are in uh staff's position is that it doesn't quite fit the strategic plan in the sense of shifting the motor traffic from vehicles to uh pedestrians cycling in transit.

And so um that's the reason why that's uh it's not considered a need.

Now, when it comes to the asset management side of things, um, this may only be a small portion, it's actually gonna be cost $50,000 to do.

But, anyways, it's a small, it's it's it's small work.

It is also precedent setting in the in the is in given that uh we're catering to about additional seven vehicles peak hour.

And so it is precedent setting in the sense that every single other intersection along Helm Road could ask for the same thing.

And so if we were to do that, then through cumulatively, you would be increasing asphalt um area that needs to be maintained, that needs that drainage goes through, uh, which means additional six PPD clean on uh tire wear uh going into our creeks.

So that's another thing we gotta take a look at as well.

Um, like I said, happy to provide additional context, but that's the gist of it.

Thank you, Maryor Twice.

I love that Jeff Staff provide a say uh a report on on this okay so uh just to be clear um mover and the second are going to amend the motion uh to request a staff report on the uh Eltham to Helmkin um exit with with uh yeah staff provide a staff report on on this the suggestions provided and any other uh suggestions staff have um to recommend yeah just just for clarification my part I just want to know how this intersection is gonna work because it looks like it won't from my perspective, and so hearing staff's report to see how it would work would be appreciated.

Council McKenzie.

Along the same vein, uh, I've always been concerned with the left turns out of out of that place.

I I'm not concerned with the backup on Elfum itself.

Uh so I would appreciate if the report could look at uh yeah, the no left turn option.

Thank you.

Did you have something more you wanted to add um before we vote?

Uh yeah, thank you, Mayor Tobias.

Um it might be a little I'm we can certainly look into that.

I mean, my my opinion is that nothing else, nothing needs to be done at this time.

I mean, certainly maybe in the future in the long term, beyond um this development, which this development would not pay for this for this work, it'd be 100% on the town's dime to do this improvements.

Um, maybe in the future, but not for this development.

Um that said, should be council's wish to look at options.

We can certainly um pay some operational dollars to get something.

Yeah, I think we've closed the um window for uh negotiating this and counselor Rogers.

The only the only point to this is uh one staff report was also back in uh 23 was assessing whether or not there had been any collisions.

And I think that's that's the point that uh we're making here is um uh the more the traffic backs up on Eltham, it just have to be five cars, and then someone's gonna feel that they are very pressured to make that left turn, and then you're gonna get your T-bone.

So um we're pretty good in not having collisions right now.

Let's uh make sure that people we can keep people safe in uh in these uh scenarios.

And I'm gonna make a comment before we go to a vote.

Uh I'm challenged by this because it's got um Urchin Lane kind of written all over it um in that there wasn't a comprehensive area plan particularly to do with transportation that these developments just occurred over time, sometimes separated by years.

But out of all of this, the town is left to try to manage the transportation at the end of that.

I think as a council we just need to do a better job and start looking more future focused than just a single development on an area and look at the potential development of that area because it causes problems we get down the road.

So that that's my only observation.

But we've got to move or in a second or an amended motion.

Um to come back with a staff report.

All those in favor.

Any opposed?

Seeing none opposed, motion carries.

And Councilor Rogers, you've got an omnibus for your last one.

Um let's start with the um item C one, and that was to reduce the CRD arts funding from group one to group two.

My question to members uh are you wanted to have this discussion now, or when we go to April the 8th and and have our budget discussions?

I I you know I'm happy to I I think we've got some people here and we should have that discussion now.

Right, good.

Just want to be sure.

Um so um, yes, there's um do we need a second or is this just discussion.

Okay.

Uh no he's just introducing it and then he's gonna ask for a second.

So um uh this goes way back and I and I um for for clarification I used to be uh um a member of the CRD arts commission so uh I was right there uh advocating very strongly for the other municipalities to come by and this isn't Kelowna this are 13 municipalities of two scales and um we don't have a big update when I was on the the CRD commission um the SUK, sorry, Sydney joined and then quit because they didn't think it was viable and and and you know the bang for the buck for them so um indeed the the philosophy at the time was VUO was part of the core, part of San Esquamo, Victoria, and Esquamo.

We've shifted.

We have shifted to the West Shore.

And not only have we shifted to the West Shore, but the CRD is a the downtown Victoria is a heck of a lot harder to get into, to park in, and uh, you know, to be able to enjoy the venues.

And the CRD Arts Commission, frankly, has done nothing to support and proactively uh generate interest and recognize the need for an arts uh facility in the West Shore.

They're only focused on the Royal and the McPherson.

So and I and looking at the the tier two, um, tier one is about um um was it, I think it's can we get these things right?

Yeah, so there would be um, you know, the difference between 123,000 this year to 33,000.

That's the difference.

My my frustration is that all the arts foundations and um and uh even the CRD arts has struck out in in being able to convince the other municipalities, the others to come aboard and and see this as a regional service.

So I think um this is a considerable burden um on this town because the casino used to make it, it doesn't anymore.

We pay for the uh West Shore and that keeps going up.

Um we've got reserves, we're all tapped out on that.

And it's we're the conceito funds are going down.

We have an e com bill that's gonna add 2.5% on our taxes and uh and then 4.5 percent on our taxes in the next following year.

Um we have a police building, we have all these costs, and I think if I'm not mistaken, we are looking at a um a budget increase anywhere between 10 and 12 percent.

So 123,000 is one percent.

I know I I understand.

No, and and if we can bring the other ones on board aboard, then great then we're not having to worry about um where view oil is if there was three tiers so there's something in the middle that's great if the CRD had stepped forward and said yep we're gonna uh cost share and fund uh an initiative in the West Shore so the arts all those art performing folks can can also perform and have more days to perform and also have more tourism uh enticement to uh to go to the West Shore um and but at this point I see the writing of the wall no one else is going to join in and uh I don't think we can afford this anymore.

So my motion is to reduce uh the funding level um down to the um sorry.

Let me confirm this.

Down to group two, not group one.

Second.

That's my motion.

Thank you.

We've got a seconder.

Your second?

Uh do you want to say anything?

I mean, one of the fiscal realities is we have to look at where we can cut down.

Uh and if this isn't getting uh we stop providing funding or grants and aid to people who aren't in View Royal, and most of these services aren't in View Royal, and we should look at in the future in terms of where that money can be better spent in the West Shore where our residents can go.

So I'm supporting the motion.

Thank you, Councillor Matsu.

Councilor Lemon.

Thank you.

Um, I am on the Arts Commission.

And I'm also I also represent Council on the Intermunicipal Committee for the Guanta Fuca Performing Arts Society.

So two different entities.

But the fact is, any resident of this town, every anytime any of us enjoys a stage or performance or a music performance or an art show, it's because of the funding we provide through the arts Commission.

And if we cut that, the losers are not just us, but the artists and the volunteers across the region, many of whom live in Vure Royal.

We know this.

And we know that there are talented artists in every neighborhood of Bure Oil.

And if we reduce the funding, we reduce opportunities to enjoy the arts on a broad level.

And I I need to say it's not just a matter of moving funds to support a West Shore facility um vis a vis supporting the Arts Commission.

A Wonder Fuca Performing Arts Facility is years and years away.

And I need to remind my colleagues that the town would not be contributing to the physical facility facility.

Our costs would not be for the Capitol building.

They would be for eventually for contributing to the operation of the facility itself.

So we're not looking at millions in contributions to build a structure.

We're looking at supporting the arts here closer to home way way down the road.

In the meantime, we have artists among us, um, volunteers, tons of people in every neighborhood participate in the arts throughout the region.

And uh I would like to see us continue to contribute and support the arts um going forward.

Thank you, Council Levin.

Counselor Qualit, please.

Thank you.

Uh, I'm going to have to vote against this if it comes to a vote.

Arts, culture, performing arts play a significant role in society for many groups, in particular youth, uh, people that are not inclined physically, uh, physical activity, all sorts of user groups that can only be involved in arts and culture.

Right now, our only contribution is to the CRD Arts Fund.

There is no West Shore Arts building that is uh proposed to the point where we can put funding towards it.

Therefore, our decision point must be to remain funding what we have been for many years.

And our benefits are our residents do benefit from this.

Uh, it's hard to quantify at times, but uh I'm certain they do.

Um, also, and I would agree with the mayor, this uh is a bit of an omnibus section here.

I uh I do support the discussion of a destination Greater Victoria, but that's apples and oranges, as is the pop-up dog leash.

I do sympathize with counselor Rogers with the current economic state of Canada, British Columbia, and local government, but we just can't cut what I would call uh vital services that uh people rely on uh for arts and culture in the Greater Victoria area.

Thank you, Councilor Qualitage.

Councilor Brown.

Yeah, I strongly support the arts and unless there's something to replace it and there isn't at this point, maybe down the road, uh it is going to be a really tough discussion on our budget this year.

And it's tough to find places to cut, but I don't think that's the the right area.

I know um we were invited and I attended an opera which is pretty strange for me, but I quite enjoyed it.

And uh yeah.

And yeah, bottom line, if there's no replacement for it, I have to vote against.

Thank you.

I'm gonna ask staff a question.

Scott, um uh if I you don't mind me putting you on the spot.

If council was to vote in favor of a reduction from group one to group two, that would have to go to CRD, would it not?

For uh Yeah, my understanding is it would require a uh uh request to the CRD to be removed from the service, and then it would require a two-thirds vote of the participants in the service.

So it's not really up to View Royal anymore.

Um if it should get to that.

Thanks, Scott.

Um yeah, I wasn't uh completely sure on the process of movement, uh, but it would be similar to uh any service or sub-service that we sign on to.

Council Rogers.

Yes, no, we um the point uh there's no replacement of the risk.

You know, where this reduction that uh is not an easy one, but um given the uh the the uh the tax uh scenario that we have for the next few years, um um even if the police building is through the CRD, residents will still be paying a huge chunk of taxes towards that.

And um and and maybe you should look at that as as we heard from staff.

We make the application, it probably wouldn't be until 2026 when um uh the um CRD would be uh be considering if they did release us, uh then that would be good timing when we would be looking at a 15% tax increase.

So, you know, we're we're kind of looking forward, and and maybe all those individuals that are willing to stay on, please lobby Coldwood to come on, even as a group one, a group two, pardon me, they would be probably contributing far greater than our set of group two.

So it's um uh and Langford does its share.

Langford has its own uh education center, and and you know, the next motion I'll be making to uh notice the motion to this council is that we would make motion of the CRD to start investing in the West Shore for an arts facility.

No more games, no more second guessing.

If we really think uh uh the West Shore where we partner with police, fire, recreation, you know, that's we all go west, the library.

We all go west.

We want to support that library, not the downtown library.

Why?

Because that's where we go.

And um, you know, if if the the CRD would embrace the read uh the West Shore on uh having the equivalent of a um um a royal or whatever art center and and add to um uh Langford's model, then I think um, well, that'll certainly be my next motion if this one fails.

Even if this one fails, I still think we should do it.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Rogers, Council McKenzie.

Yeah, I appreciate uh Councillor Rogers actually bringing this forward.

Regardless of what it is, whether it's the library, the this arts fund, I think it's important that we evaluate these things that we are paying into regularly, uh, because it shouldn't be taken for granted that we're always going to pay into them, regardless of the value that our residents see in it.

I think it's important that we continue to contribute at the level two as proposed, at least, uh, which is more than our neighbors are doing in the West Shore.

You know, the times are very tight with the budgets.

I know it's not here yet, but even if we're considering and planning for uh the future West Shore um Arts Center, I think we should be looking now to see how we're going to be funding that and looking where we can make cuts, as Councillor Matson said.

We are the town in the middle of the West Shore and the downtown, we're always going to be pulled in these two directions.

So it makes sense to me that we are a middle ground in terms of what we're paying, that we're not paying the same as Victoria, and we're also contributing more than our West Shore neighbors.

So for that reason, I'm supportive of uh Councillor Rogers' motion.

Thank you.

Many of the comments?

Okay.

That's what we'll do.

Um all those in favor of reducing the CRD arts from group one to group two, all those in favor of reduction.

I've got Councilor McKenzie, Councilor Mattson, Councilor Rogers, all those opposed.

And I'm really on the wall, but I'm more opposed than I am for.

Yes, thank you.

One of the things that we're adding to the OCP is tourism as a as a means of boosting our local economy and supporting our local business.

And I had a meeting with Paul, nursery of Destination Greater Victoria.

They've got a brand new plan that's all about the whole region and it's very impressive.

And when you go in the tourist center and you look for um any information about Viewell, it's only the municipality you drive through.

There's nothing on a map.

You know, we don't not it is profoundly barren.

And um, but you can go to Langford because Langford's got a wonderful brochure um and a map of all the amenities and and features.

So one of the things that um Greater Destination Greater Victoria has offered is to uh bring on the expertise, the staff, and include, incorporate uh the many great amenities in our businesses so um uh for that 800 is cheap at twice the price um uh Paul will be coming to council uh to make a um uh a presentation and um I hope we can all say we're in the thank you we've got a seconder chair I'll second counselor matts and I have a question since I was I missed the grants and aid discussion was this included in that discussion uh it is not included because this is not a grant and aid, this is a membership.

Yeah okay uh so you're seconding though, to be clear.

Did you want to say anything for motivation, Councilor Matson?

No.

No.

Okay.

Counselor McKenzie.

Just a question for the mover.

I wonder if it would be best to wait until uh they come to present because I personally would like to know more about what they could do for us for that amount.

Okay.

Okay.

Call it a precursor.

Uh and uh for for Paul's uh presentation.

So um yeah, so uh just just for information.

I didn't know that uh Paul was going to be coming to council, so now that uh he is um you know that'd be great.

I I appreciate everyone's in trust.

Okay, so you're withdrawing that for now, and then you can always raise the motion after us.

Okay.

Uh so staff, are you okay with that?

Uh being withdrawn as a motion now.

Um and uh the last one inclusion of funds for four pop-up uh pop-up dog.

I had to say that right, pop-up dog off-leash areas, approximately five thousand dollars a year with maintenance provided by your place, Victoria in partnership with our place new road.

Mike Council Rogers.

Um I'm I'm providing a document.

This should be one for staff.

Uh this is um uh the approach that um uh we haven't had no new off-leash area since 2015.

None.

Our population has increased 30 percent, and no off-leased park areas, despite um um Choco and and Six Mile and Atkins all wanting to have an off leash, and despite staff's uh grand efforts to include something at Choco Park, and the residents riled against it, and despite the fact that we now have um the space available at the once um Thieves Lake Park Overflow.

And council did approve uh the installation of an off-leash park in the in that area, but unfortunately, we've only got in our budget $20,000 for 2029.

That's a long way away.

And here the the um the the staff were recommending uh an installation in Choco Park three years ago.

So what I'm proposing here is that you know, if we wanted and I'll give you the list of what we got here.

Uh so that is the first one, as you can see.

Uh this amazing uh space is uh directional, uh accessible from all four directions.

Uh it has a wonderful traffic circle where people can easily get across with their dogs, and it doesn't bother anybody, no neighbors to be concerned about.

The second one is Game Road Park.

Game Road Park is listed in our uh parks master plan as an off leash area, but it's not enclosed.

And so it uh becomes uh uh a problem in um defining it and where people can go.

And I'm my proposal here is that we work with the Sierra D water and provide a fenced area around the water right away.

As we know, the uh number nine Erskine Lane had uh an off leash area, but they did not want to share.

And when you look at what they've got, I wouldn't want it.

It's um it's not a very good off leash, and it has a remarkable proximity to uh the uh apartment buildings, and all that barking would drive me nuts.

This would be um a lot more accessible, more accessible uh than uh Alder Smith Park, which is um uh adjacent.

And I know that when we did the Watkins Gway Park um uh assessment there what people wanted uh they want an off leash area but we are not going to give it to them there so here is a another option in V Royal Park you would see on page three is two small dog off leash areas um as we know um um well you may not know but um a small dog was killed in V Will Park years ago because the large dog broke its back uh I accidentally I understand but off small dog areas are um really important um for a lot of people.

It provides a separation and it puts I think those small dogs a lot more at ease.

And again, really easy um to uh to put up.

Um, and we've uh given some uh you know some excerpts um on the small dog rationale one size do not fit all and this is optimum for those small dog owners to uh have their dogs go off leash.

The fourth is little road park.

As you know, we have uh the canoe and kayak where there are tons of dogs, and um it's uh if we consider doing a pilot, I know we haven't got the um um uh little road park feasibility study done yet, but this was what Santa's is doing is piloting.

When they started this three or four years ago, these were pilots.

These were to test and see what the public interest was, and they would do surveys and the the survey results uh that Sanitz gave me for these off leash areas was remarkable.

How much people appreciated the um uh the availability the opportunity to test these out and and um uh it worked uh very well so these are the four areas and the planet Penixby um I'm just giving you some information about the Sanitz Park program and um uh they had a budget of 30,000 for six off leash areas and the fencing is T bar posts with snow fencing around it uh the gate comes from Buckerfields and uh there's a bench, a garbage can, a water bowl, and off lease sign with rules and um and you know, they had it open from March to October because they have ballparks that are eligible to be off-leash uh when it's off season.

So the one of the things about um SANIT is they've modeled for us a successful um opportunity for us to go with confidence uh and and uh implement this.

Um the one of the great things is that it's an exciting opportunity to uh um um work with the landscaping business that's out of new roads, um uh new directions, um, our place.

Um just recently they've got a uh a landscaping program and um the BC Transit Handy Dart has contracted them to look after their grounds.

And these folks, Paul, I've talked to him, and he's quite prepared to help us um not put the burden on our staff, because we have limited staff, um, but they would be happy to contract and and um uh look after these parks uh for us as we uh pilot uh these off leash uh areas.

And if you just want one, please let's deliver for Choco, six mile and Atkins, all those dogs there.

Let's address the problem where people had wanted to have something in Choco and the in the various parks.

Um let's get this one.

Let's do this one, 2025, not four years from now.

So that's my motion.

There's the package.

I uh hope that we can support this folks.

Thanks, Councillor Rogers, and thanks for putting uh all this together.

I realize how much time and and thought you put in.

Do we have a seconder?

Well, I would second a one location pilot for a lesser amount of money.

Okay.

Uh is there another one that would second uh the entire package that Councillor Rogers have?

Counselor Brown.

Just a suggestion.

I live on Atkins Road, so I I know the seconder though, right now.

Oh okay, I'll second.

Okay.

So you're seconding the entire package that uh no.

Okay.

Uh so is there anybody that's willing to second Councilor Rogers' entire project?

So we've got one that uh so you can take your pick uh either counselor Madsen or Councilor Matson or Counselor Brown.

Uh they probably have uh big opinions about uh one as I as I had said are you willing to amend your yes I'm um if I I'm willing to support the motion if if we can do uh this six mile Atkins do that one because it it is uh council voted in support of the Ninsulation office space here.

This would enable um I pilot of that.

Um say so we're gonna do if we can if we can my the friendly amendment we do one ten thousand dollars uh and let it be the six mile atkins.

Well, ten would uh also ask facilitate the uh the contracting.

So let's be clear on your amendment because I just heard it go from five to ten thousand dollars or no one.

So um you're you're specifically talking about the uh proposed location, the one on the first page, which is Atkins six mile, right?

That's one that you're looking for.

And um can that one be ten thousand dollars?

One of the and I I I look to staff on this because one of the suggestions um on this site um is it's rather uneven.

And um I did have a um developer friend say if you made a donation to the food bank, a um someone with a backhoe would help come in and level the site to make it more attractive.

So I if we can if we can um Rogers come back next week with a motion.

Well let's let's yeah I think uh it's uh it's getting more confusing now.

I I I would recommend now that you um you really pare it down and come back, or your motion change to have staff go away and and probably have some um have some look at this as you do it, if this is what you want.

My my my concern is that staff have already made a recommendation for four years, way past what the residents have wanted three years ago.

So all right.

To make this easy, I would move that um we spend five thousand dollars on a pop-up part for the um Atkins six-mile area that and enables the um well staff have that have their hand up, your worship.

I don't thank you, Mary Tobias.

Staff actually haven't been engaged about this five thousand dollar cost yet.

I do uh I do thank um the move the motion or that is actually thirty thousand dollars from the Sanish because when we did our our pro forma after talking to Sanich about their operational costs and resources is about 10 times what that was there.

So um just want to just put that out there.

It also um just a point of clarification that the uh dog park at um at uh ADAKins was actually defeated in last year's council.

So it was not approved.

Um it was discussed during budgets.

Um part of it has to do with the um there was also a driver to perhaps put a playground there.

Um furthermore, council recall in the next draft financial plan that in 2026 there is quite a few parks master plans that's being done.

And as uh Council Rogers alluded to, um, previous engagement has has been fairly uh divisive when it comes to dog parks.

And so uh in keeping good governance and and having good community engagement, um staff would recommend going down the route of going through uh master planning before we put boots in the ground, but like I said, it's um up to council to determine.

Thanks, Evan.

Council Roger.

We have already done the community engagement, and they wanted the community, it was very strong on both sides: Nursery Hill, Choko, Atkins.

No, they want an off-leash area, they didn't want it in Choko, they wanted it away from the homes.

We have in since then created the solution.

Staff and and council has approved the installation of an off-leash park on this site.

So it's it meets all the requirements.

And um so you know, I council, please, let's get this thing rolling.

Let's get a motion, let's do the pop-up park, let's prove do proof of concept and uh allocate five thousand dollars.

Okay, uh we've got uh uh um obviously a mover and uh seconder, uh Counselor Brown.

Uh go ahead then Councilman Kent.

Yeah, just uh first of all, we do need an off-leash dog area.

Um Atkins Row, I live in Aken's Row.

Um that that piece is just sitting there empty.

It's uh kind of a uh other than f overflow parking for Thetis Lake, it was good for that.

It's a weird piece.

And and really we should be looking at um people in the area have been looking for a playground as well.

So that's a possibility.

And of course Chalco has quite a few areas.

I mean I know they're supposed to be on leash however how much that's I used to be the head dog catcher so I know about the complaints we got from those areas but it would be nice to do something with that little piece of property.

And the only thing I have downside I see to it is um people are gonna have to most people drive there with their dogs, so they might walk there, but still, if they drive, where are they going to park their cars?

Um, it's not a very big area.

Yeah, in in some ways, it was if it was in a different location, it would almost be ideal for a dog park because it's got some ups and downs and some trees and things.

Um my opinion, game park would be a better location for that because it's a park.

Um it gets used a lot by dog walkers, and it's it's quite a large park, surprisingly large park.

And um, the parking wouldn't be anywhere near as bad.

And uh the parks needs some uh upgrades, it needs something done to it.

I mean, I I didn't even know about it until it was discussed, and that's quite a kind of a cute little park.

Well, but it's it's actually, quite large, really.

So which part, which part are you referring to?

Okay, but folks, I mean, we're we're gonna have the topic.

I'm gonna bring us back down.

Right now we've got a single location, and and that's what we're really talking about for cost.

So please, Councilor Brown, if you could look at this location specifically.

You mentioned uh parking concerns.

I think you also brought up that there's been neighbors that have been petitioning for a children's park in the area.

Um, but I'll let you carry on from there.

None.

Thank you, Councillor Brown.

Uh Council McKenzie and then Councillor Lemon.

Yeah, so there's been reference to the public asking for these dog parks, but I have to say, during my term at least, I don't I can't recall a single email, a single speaker, uh, nor on social media have I seen people asking for a dog park.

So before I could support this, I would need evidence of that demand from the public.

Thank you, Council Mackenzie, Council Levant.

Me too.

Um, and to this particular side, I'll make this very quick so we can move on.

Um, I had spent a lot more than five thousand dollars to make my yard safe for a dog.

This is a high traffic area, and I I don't know how we can build a facility that will keep dogs safe and confined uh for five thousand dollars.

Go ahead, Council Roger.

Yes, thank you.

Um this is um again, Sanish had been able to achieve that, you know, with uh, and if you look at this park, it is already bounded uh by fencing on two sides.

So it's um uh you know they they had provided us the the details and and this is a pilot.

So what I'm uh hoping council would support is a pilot that Nate gives us an opportunity to to provide this, sign this, and um and then um and indeed I've had residents.

The the reason I learned about these San Is Papar parks because dog owners asked me to come with them to look at the San's Pope Park and ask if we could achieve the same in View Royal.

So it it it is the request, and we've seen the success, and we can do that.

That's when you can do the community survey thereafter.

This is a small investment to um uh do proof of concept, and I don't think there would be any problems whatsoever.

We would be stunning if you will resonance that we've we're being so proactive.

So thank you, Councillor Rogers.

If I have a recommendation to Councilor Rogers, pull this motion.

It's obvious it's not gonna pass.

Come back when you've actually had a chance to look at realistic costs and what's involved, and then motivate from that point.

And it doesn't matter which area it is, pick an area, come back with one.

But at this point, it's obviously not gonna pass.

So why don't we just withdraw it and come back and up to it?

Councilor Brown.

Sorry, I'll be real quick.

Uh just two good examples of dog parks in the Miss Belly or Langford's um Station Road and Danbrook Park.

They're both quite large, uh lots of parking, gravel, um, well used.

There's always dogs there, but um I I don't think it's high maintenance or or cost to maintain those.

Those are two examples that I observe on a regular basis.

Thank you, Councillor Brown.

Um, I think seeing how the motion is withdrawn, there's no other discussion uh required, but this is back to you, Councilor Brown for six mile road um uh for the uh shell gas station access and egress.

We brought this up, uh we sent it to staff.

I don't know if staff has anything on it at this date, but my biggest concern was when they put the extra lane in for the bus.

It already was a traffic hazard there already.

But now when you go down the bus lane, which you're allowed to go into the bus lane to turn right onto six mile road, uh you can't go you can't go straight.

You have to turn right.

So people are pulling out of the gas station onto the road, onto the bus lane, and all of a sudden they gotta zoop over to one or two lanes to get over to go through.

And that is an accident waiting to it.

It's always been bad.

The egress from the shell station onto the highway has always been bad.

And now it's worse.

It's uh I can't believe that they even allow it.

Uh personally, I'd be happy to see the cell state shell station gone.

It's a bit major traffic hazard.

People uh turning right onto six mile per turn, trying to turn left of six the car wash and everything else.

There's two exits there onto Suc Road.

To me, you close off one exit, the one that's closest to six mile road, and leave the other one open for people to access the road.

Because now, like I say, they're gonna they're gonna go on to right make a right turn, onto the road, into the bus lane, and all of a sudden they're gonna realize, oh my god, I want to go straight, and I can't go straight anymore.

So that's all I'm asking.

And I I think part of the report was just the uh perhaps t t asking the chief hearst maybe some examples of accidents there, because I know I've seen tons of bad accidents there, and it's it's only gonna get worse.

Thank you.

Uh Councilor Brown, do you have a seconder of this?

Councillor Matson seconds.

Uh Ivan, you had points.

Uh yeah, thank you, Mayor Tobias.

I can I can appreciate um Councilor Brown's uh fears on the uh increased accidents as part of the bus and shoulders.

I did have a quick chat with Chief Hearst.

We can't think of an acid accident in that actual entrance area, but that doesn't mean that it's not there.

So um should staff should council wish for staff to take a look at that.

We can certainly do that.

Um six mile road is uh the Ministry of Transportation and Transit roadway.

So our ability to make physical modifications is rather restricted.

Uh moreover, with respect to that grid area, there was a there was an agreement uh back in the day, um, an agreement with the six-mile pub where we were allowed to widen, I think, but the condition was that certain accesses were to be maintained.

So there's another that's another thing to be considered.

Specific with the shell gas station, um, you know, with the brand new roundabout that's installed on Atkins Road, there may be an opportunity to put signage up there to say, hey, here's a better way of going.

Make a right turn, go around a roundabout and do a U-turn back.

Um, but that will require permission from the province to do that.

Uh that's about as far as we can go because it's really close to intersection, and there are um reasons through agreements why we have to keep that open.

Um, but I'd say we can certainly look at that if council wishes for us to progress forward.

Just perhaps a discussion with the shell owners themselves.

They made um they I'm sure they observe it and they might be willing to uh restrict that that that one access because there is two axe exits onto Six Mile Road from the shell station.

Uh it would be a less of an inconvenience for people just to go you know 25 or 30 feet and go the other one rather than going all the way around to the roundabout and come back out again.

Just a suggestion.

Thanks, Councillor Brown.

Uh Councilor Rudd.

And the uh motion um that's that bring back options to the shell gas station access, egress as six mile road.

I if I um it's just a friendly amendment, a suggestion at six mile road/slash island highway, because at this moment it implies that um you're looking for options just on six mile road, which is a provincially owned road.

It's definitely both, yeah.

Yeah.

So uh so at six mile road slash island highway.

Yeah.

Okay, thank you.

Any other comments?

I think we're ready to vote on it.

All those in favor that uh staff will report back on options for shell gas station access and egress, and that'll be reading island highway and six mile road to alleviate traffic concerns.

All those in favor of that.

Any opposed to that?

Seeing none opposed, motion carries.

I think that brings us to you, staff for the development period or permit for 3560 Highland Road thank you mayor to bias jeff child senior planner um this is an application for a variance to prevent a car port in the front yard i can either do brief presentation to summarize the report or we can skip to questions if that if um if you'd like okay to very brief presentation here um this is a um uh this is a development permit that includes a variance uh this the subject property is 5.35 hectares.

It's um mostly forested.

Um, and uh a development permit was approved in 2024 to uh permit a house to be constructed at the south end of the site in a clearing, and we're gonna zoom into that yellow box here in the next slide.

Um the house that's under construction is um is the property backs onto Pike Lake, and uh the house is situated just out the riparian area.

Uh the house is currently under construction.

The proposal is to construct a carport kind of that's basically just uh um structure with metal roofs and columns uh in front of the house uh in an area that is um a clear area that's that was previously approved for a parking area.

Um in terms of the development permit guidelines, it is uh located in a location where no additional trees would be impacted.

And it uses a metal roof as would be it would have a metal roof as recommended in the wildfire hazard assessment or the work.

A variance is requested to site the building in the front yard.

This the front yard is kind of a you see here the yellow area on the on the site plan, which is basically in the front of the house.

So because the house is fairly set back in on the clearing, there's there's not much room to construct a uh a garage or a carport without uh without clearing, you know, altering land and and cutting down more trees uh in this case because that area is large the the building is more than 120 meters from from the road uh the road is actually a also a so we're controlled access road so only the the residence area and the town have access to it um and the uh south adjacent property which is kind of in that little triangle south is actually owned by the uh the uh the same family so uh for those reasons um the variants can be can be supported the purpose of this um this presentation today is to introduce the proposal and because it is a variance um notice would be conducted before a council makes a decision on the property.

So the recommendation is to um it's basically receive the report and uh for consideration at a at a later date.

So moved.

Second.

Do we need to do this?

Is gonna come to us again anyway.

Am I hearing that correct?

Okay.

So um do we really need to discuss this at length right now?

This is just receive for information, correct?

Uh through you, uh, if there's any additional information that uh that members of council would like to have to make that decision, um, this would be an opportunity to for the applicant to sort of provide that information.

I've just got one question.

Why is this even before us?

Like what is it because of what it's in the middle of the woods, uh, from what I understand, next to the lake.

Lovely piece of property.

But it's what the reason why it's in front of us, I'm assuming, is that the carport is in front of the house as opposed to behind the house.

Beside the front of the house.

The yeah, the front of the house uh is sort of the is the front yard is the whole kind of yellow area.

Which is that that's acres of area, correct?

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions?

Okay.

Uh all those in favor of uh of receiving it?

Any opposed?

Seeing no one opposed.

Thanks, Evan.

But there's a motion on this is it just receive or if that's future and I think this uh is this you as well Jeff for the official community plan review or this is Sterling we got done that so fast sterling we we shocked you good evening mayor and council uh sorry for the uh brief delay there technical difficulties.

Um, tonight I'm introducing the uh what we heard report for the business mixer workshop that took place on March the 6th.

This is part of our official community plan review and update.

The the workshop that took place uh was for uh the business community that uh works in uh View Royal.

It was advertised through uh mail outs.

Um approximately 425 uh business license holders were uh received a mail out.

Uh notification also went a new uh e newsletter, uh social media posts, uh stakeholder emails, approximately 315 businesses, uh, along with the town and uh West Shore Chamber websites.

And the purpose of this event was for uh business owners to participate in a workshop.

And staff uh led a workshop asking three different questions, which I'll show in a moment.

Um, there were approximately 30 uh, like I said, 30 business owners and 36 participants uh in total.

And um the three questions asked um really were to get an interest in how business uh could be better conducted in the community and what struggles uh and what challenges or opportunities uh business owners could see moving forward in the community.

So the first question was uh what is V Royal doing well that helps the growth of your business?

And the themes that emerged out of the workshop uh uh that was facilitated by staff uh was more growth equals more business opportunities, uh holding business mixer to help business owners meet, talk, and network with other business owners uh was uh seen as a an opportunity.

Uh, town staff, council, and community are supportive supportive of local businesses, and applying for business license is uh easy.

I'll just make a note too that when uh when I mean facilitate, uh there were multiple tables uh with members uh participating in these workshops, and uh each of the uh each of the tables had a staff member recording notes on a uh a flip chart, and then um after uh each of these questions there was a reporting back period uh in which a member of the group uh summarized what was discussed at that table for everybody else to hear at the uh the workshop.

The second question was: Are there any challenges specific to UROIL that are affecting your business?

And uh top four themes that were heard are traffic congestion, lack of affordable commercial space, confusing home occupation regulations, and slow processing times for applications, including development and business licensing.

And the third question that was asked at this workshop was what can be improved in V Royal to facilitate economic growth?

The four things that were identified were permitting more mixed-use developments, being commercial and residential, improving transportation connections throughout V Royal, providing more parking for customers and clients, and having a community space for public events.

At this event, staff also discussed with business owners outside of these workshops your overall purpose and intent of the official community plan and update review.

Leanne Taylor, a director for development services, gave a brief PowerPoint presentation that also went over the purpose of this update and shared how these business owners that uh business owners that attended could get involved in the project by visiting the project webpage, uh sharing the uh the vision and guiding principles survey, and uh really just spreading the word about uh about the project and uh what it is that we are uh trying to do as a community in updating this uh the uh official community plan.

Um the first purpose of this uh what we heard summary was just uh for a council to receive.

Um there's no action at this time.

And that is the uh conclusion of the presentation.

The staff report that goes with this presentation had a bit more of a summary in terms of the comments that were were heard, but uh I just tried to uh summarize in a quick snapshot uh in this presentation.

Thanks.

Um before I turn to the my colleagues, um I've got one question, and that um how are folks how are we incorporating the feedback into an NRESOL?

Like I'm a process guy, so I like to see we get an issue, we determine that it's an issue that we need a mitigation or it needs to be noted.

How do we cluster those around other relevant ones and then pulling it forward and then so people feel that they have been hurt not what we've been here hearing but people have spent a couple hours of their time whether it's surveys or this engagement and they've told us um that we asked them for feedback.

They provided it but have we told them how we're going to incorporate their input so that that is reflected ultimately in the um another series of questions or uh some recommendations to council like have we pathed that out a little bit thank you very toias uh and to answer your question the the purpose of this uh phase one is uh to review our vision uh our housing or land use um as we move through this process we'll be coming back and doing these what we heard report summaries in terms of actually identifying what was implemented in in this from this feedback we will be coming back with uh draft material so we'll have a draft vision um that the community council uh our official community plan uh review advisory committee can take a look at uh we will be uh going to the public and asking for feedback on that draft um and uh at that point we can we can ask um uh did we get it right um did we hear did we hear um and incorporate the feedback to uh meet the uh the objectives and the vision for for uh for the community moving forward if we don't if we hear it's not right then we we go back to the drawing board and and and uh prepare uh another draft cool and just one uh more one uh these two will also uh at the right time be brought to the OCP uh committee as well will it just for information the the um the reports were shared with the the committee uh via email um uh as a uh just a kind of a a checkpoint.

Um we will be meeting with uh the committee though moving forward on uh on uh different uh materials to come forward and uh just as we will with uh with council.

Great, thanks, Sterling.

Uh anybody else with questions of the report?

No, uh Councilor Brown?

Just a quick comment.

I'd like to thanks uh for organizing the event.

I think it was uh successful.

The only drawback was the then that hall, the acoustics are h horrible.

Um and um I guess if we're gonna do a future one, find a different place or or maybe they'll they'll upgrade your sound system because uh my table was great, we had a good discussion, but we couldn't hear what anyone else else was saying when when they were doing the reporting out.

And part of it's just them not projecting their voices or or whatever, but uh just a comment.

But thank you for organizing.

It was other than that, it was it was I enjoyed it.

Uh I have to support uh Council Brown's point of that.

Thanks, Councillor Brown.

Uh Councilor Rogers.

Um the uh Scaris Hall has terrible sound system.

Um, you know, it's it's terribly frustrating when the mic has gone to somebody at another table and you really want to hear their input and you can't make head or tail of it.

So today I hear you.

Then I did not hear you.

So it it really is frustrating and it defeats the purpose and uh is almost uh contrary and leaves a a very questionable concern on people's faces.

What happened?

Thank you.

Thanks, Councillor Rogers.

Council McKeddon.

Yes, I just wanted to provide some um additional context for those who might not have been there.

Um, I found it interesting that actually a lot of the business owners there I was speaking to were also residents of View Royal, which makes sense because you know there are home based res uh businesses.

However, I didn't really think that immediately when I read, for instance, the comments about more development.

At first I thought, oh, of course, that they're a business, they want more development, but then I thought they're also speaking um potentially as residents.

So I was wondering if future reports, if we could actually have some information around how many were home-based, um, or and potentially residences, uh residents of View Royal.

Uh uh thank you, Mary Tobias.

Do you want to reply to that?

Um, through the mayor, the um the bit of challenge to track that information sometimes with these open host events, but our online um uh surveys that we completed do have uh voluntary questions that uh respondents can provide answer to that uh ask whether they're residents or uh non-residents of View Royal.

Um uh so um when we look at our uh visioning and guiding principles survey results, uh, which is the next presentation, uh, and uh our future presentations on on surveys, we can we can definitely have that information for council.

So move through C.

Uh moved by Councilor Lemons, second by Councillor Rogers.

All those in favor, any opposed, seeing none opposed, motion carries and OCP vision guiding principles survey, and what we heard.

I'm assuming it's you, Sterling.

Okay, uh, yeah, so the second presentation, um uh also a what we heard report and uh also for council's information and uh also uh part of the official community plan review and update.

Uh this is the vision and guiding Principles Survey uh summary, and this was really the focal point for uh the first kind of touch point of the the launch of our official community plan review and update.

This event uh or these the the survey was available between uh January 24th uh to February 17th.

Staff also worked with Shoreline Community Middle School and had a youth survey that was completed between February 21st and March 2nd.

So these two surveys were um available online and circulated um through the project webpage through our social media um which include Facebook, Instagram, uh newly uh blue sky, and uh advertised uh on our town website uh via stakeholder emails.

Um we had uh various different touch points shown here on the screen.

We had newspaper ads in the Gold Streaming Gazette, news release, View Royal E Newsletter.

Staff also completed pop-up events, which are kind of informal pop-ups at various locations around the community, including Admiral's Walk commercial area, the Eagle Creek Village, a couple of our parks, including View Royal Park, and what staff did was uh handed out business cards uh that included a uh a link to the website and a link to the uh the QR code that uh directed people uh to the the website so they could learn more about the project uh and participate in the survey if they if they so wished uh the focus of this first uh uh kind of touch point uh was two parts one really to garner interest in the project and make sure people are aware of of the project moving forward uh and then also getting people involved in the visioning uh and guiding principles uh survey and um the purpose of this report is i'll get into a little bit of uh what we heard uh some kind of some theme major themes from the uh the the vision survey and youth survey.

So there was um about nine questions, 10 questions uh i'll do a kind of a an overview of those and then and and then do the uh the uh youth survey as well.

So the overall theme for uh question one in the visioning survey, uh, what do uh we you love most about living, working, or playing in V Royal?

Um, not surprisingly, maybe uh seeing View Royal Parks, Trails, and Green Space, uh, safe and secure neighborhoods uh and walkable neighborhoods.

In question two, uh, and before I go on to question two, if council does want to see all of the verbatim comments and all of the detailed responses, it is available in the the uh staff report as an attachment.

Um it's a lot of material to go through, but it is it's all in there.

And uh if there's any questions, happy to answer them.

Uh in question two, what are the most important things to have within walking distance?

Approximately 10 minutes from your home.

Uh again, we see parks, open space, bus stops, and grocery stores.

In question three, what are the most important aspects of ensuring that View World is a great place to live, work, and play in the next 20 years?

Again, this is kind of focusing on that visioning aspect so thinking into the future.

So seeing again parks, trails, green space, protecting view world's natural environments, walkable neighborhoods.

Responsible are also asked what is missing in our community.

And commercial services, a town center, and recreational centers and areas were identified as the top three themes.

And then wrapping up the last three questions here, what is the biggest challenge VRL will face now and between now and 2050?

Traffic congestion, growth management, housing need.

And in question six, use a single sentence to describe URL in 20 years from now, what does that future look like?

Staff were theming many of these comments.

If you have to keep in mind, these are open-ended questions.

So these themes are trying to compress and really draw out major ideas.

So we saw walkability, bikeable community, commercial and service, commercial services, economic development, and diverse and affordable housing.

And then the final question if you could change one thing about your neighborhood or view oil, what would you change?

And we saw transportation infrastructure, sidewalks, and traffic congestion listed in that.

The other aspect of this visioning survey was uh mapping exercise.

And um what was asked was um participants participants in the uh the survey could place pins on through questions eight, nine, and ten.

And the pins were classified as preserve, enhance, or change.

Uh, shown on the screen here is a a very comprehensive uh overview of all the pins collected through the three questions.

The red pins are preserve, the green pins are enhance, and the blue pins are change.

Uh each of these pins, you as a respondent and participant in the survey could also add a comment to each of these pins to better explain why you wanted to preserve something or change something.

So we have eight neighborhoods in the community.

Staff grouped the comments by neighborhood, so it's a little bit more easy to identify which comment you'd like to look at.

Each of the comments is also, or sorry, not comments, each of the pins rather is also numbered and is numbered to correspond to one of the comments provided.

The overall themes that uh staff heard from this, so we had uh about uh sorry, uh mental math here, uh we had about uh 420 uh give or take um uh responses and uh the the themes that emerged was a lot of preservation uh need for preservation of our parks so Thetis Lake Regional Park Portage Park and View Royal Park.

Uh there was an interest in enhancing and changing the intersection at Island Highway in Helmkin to be uh uh a commercial or uh you know, see more of a maybe commercial uh uh area there.

Uh there was mentioned quite a bit of a grocery store and and kind of um uh you know more residential as well.

And then the intersections at Waukas Way, uh Helmkin Road, Helmkin Road Bridge over to the Trans Canada Highway, and the intersection on Island Highway and Admiral's Road were all classified as enhanced and changed.

And um these were largely to do with uh pedestrian um pedestrian and uh cyclist um uh interaction between the uh the roads so improving safety.

In terms of the uh the demographics, um, I know there was a previous question about understanding who participated.

So uh 88% of the respondents uh live in in the town of U Royal.

Um approximately uh 23% of the pro respondents live in the harbor, uh the neighborhood uh uh being the highest represented.

Um 65% of the respondents live in single detached homes, uh, and 83 of those uh own the home they live in.

Uh the largest group of uh people uh responding to the survey are between 35 and 44 years old.

Uh we captured uh respondents being anyone over 15 years um up to and over 100.

Um there was nobody, uh I believe there's only one or two people that responded to the survey that were over the age of 85.

And um 52 percent of the respondents learned about the survey uh via social media or the town's website uh showing that uh a large portion of uh our our participation in this project is online uh what was interesting was looking at the data there was also roughly uh 15 or 17 percent i forget the exact number uh that learned about the project through word of mouth so uh there's still quite a bit of value in spreading the word and i remember going back to when we introduced this project the importance of our council and our uh OCCP visitor uh advisory committee uh about uh spreading the word and and uh uh getting their neighbors and and colleagues and friends involved in this project.

The uh next uh quick overview is for the youth survey uh this was quite a bit shorter um this was catered specifically to youth so uh grades uh six to eight um it was catered specifically for the um for that age group um staff tried to go to uh other schools in the neighbor uh in the community um we did do some pop-up events but we couldn't um participate uh or do some type of survey so this was uh for feedback only through uh the shoreline community school um we had um i should have said this earlier we had 130 responses for the uh main visioning survey.

And then we had 86 responses for the uh the youth survey and um we had four questions that i'll summarize here.

So question one was uh tell us about your favorite place in View Royal.

Uh a lot of uh a lot of kids said uh they're home, uh community, uh their their school and Portage Park.

Um a lot of uh interest in uh seeing uh what would make View Royal better.

So more shopping opportunities, more restaurants, uh more parks.

Uh imagine uh yourself uh 20 years you are the View uh mayor of View Royal, uh and a lot of uh students were saying they'd like to see uh additional housing, parks, and restaurants.

And um in thinking about the future, they also saw uh a great demand for single family housing and uh housing co-ops.

The uh the demographics for uh the the youth are fairly easy to summarize here.

Uh 61% lived in View Royal, uh 24% of the respondents lived in Craigflower neighborhood, and 19 in the Helm neighborhood, uh so quite local uh to the school, and uh 62% of the respondents lived in single family homes.

The uh that that's the conclusion of the presentation.

Um I appreciate that the the report uh while short the appendix uh and the attachment was quite long.

There's quite a bit of information to go through.

Um if staff uh can answer any questions, uh happy to do so.

Thank you.

Thanks for the report, Sterling.

Uh Council Lemmer, go ahead.

Just to um reiterate, Sterling, it was 130 completed the root the the survey.

Through the mayor, that's correct.

130 responses on the visioning survey.

I I would have thought it would be more given the astonishing pickup on social media and all other all the other sources.

Okay.

All right.

I'm surprised.

You know, looking at um Facebook views alone, that's almost the entire population of V Royal was aware of it.

Through the mayor, uh it is interesting to see the project web uh websites.

We had uh close to 1200 views and um rough close to 700 unique visitors, uh so that it would indicate that some visitors are are are viewing the page more than more than one time.

Um uh but not everybody's uh participating.

Um anyway, good job.

Thank you no big questions yeah um yeah thank you for the uh the report the attached report is um is obviously something that we have to really do a deep dive on um has the advisory committee had a chance to to look at the all this information yet uh as i uh through the mayor as i said earlier uh the uh advisory committee has received an email with the links to the uh the report uh so the uh business mixer report and the uh uh vision and guiding principles uh what we heard report oh yes they have okay the staff got a point yeah and just to add to what mr scorey said we will be bringing these reports to the OCP advisory committee um in the future along with other material so just an advanced copy to them but also will be on the agenda okay perfect yeah I I uh thank you for doing the survey with the youth um that's always great to reach out but I do notice that only 61% um are live in view oil that's shoreline school you know they live in in uh you know in being on the corner is this catchment area is probably more sandwich and and uh and first nations um uh so that that's interesting and I um and particularly when the area is just crayflower and Helmkin.

So we have no sense of what the youth um of that age from Northview oil choco, you know, would uh would be saying in this report.

We do have a a microcosm, but again, staff have their hand up.

Good Liam.

Through the mayor.

Um thank you for that comment, Mr.

Councillor Rogers.

Um it's I think it's important to note that staff did um several pop-up events at um Eagle View Elementary as well as V Royal Elementary, and um and we had strong interest from the principal offshoreline to carry out the youth survey um with those students.

And I believe we received correct me if I'm wrong, Sterling.

Did we get 80 response or 80 youth survey responses in addition to the 130 survey responses through the online survey?

So did so we had uh youth uh doing the online as well.

Uh Sterling will have to respond to that, but we had the separate youth survey that was completed by the Shoreline students, and I believe we received 80 responses to that survey plus the 130 responses for the online survey.

Yeah, like um Council Lemon, I'm surprised that um there was such a low uptake on the online survey.

Did you say 130 people?

Through the through the mayor, yes.

So 130 responses for the the main visioning survey and then 86 responses for the youth survey.

Yeah.

Um and so I see that would do sorry, there was an engaged section of which is 145 people, and you know, shopping centers and schools and so forth.

When you when you did that, um, what kind of how did you conduct those um those kind of engagement sessions uh say in in Eagle Creek?

Through the mayor, uh, like I said earlier in the PowerPoint presentation, staff went to uh different locations via pop-ups and handed out uh project business cards.

Council also would have received those uh business cards and their uh leadership kits.

Uh they would have received 10 each uh as well as posters that they could have uh distributed to their uh their network.

So that was the Huxley Month of the uh online survey.

Through the mayor, that's correct.

So the intent with those pop-ups was to garner interest and spread the word about the uh the project.

Thank you.

My last comment on page 17 of the report was uh there was a quote about um um you know car housing and there were three quotes uh that were taken but the most predominant things that I'm seeing you know throughout this report traffic congestion traffic congestion um and I didn't get a I didn't really pick up on any resident quote stressing over that so I would look forward to hearing more from the public on on uh the rows of trying to get through this town so it it definitely maybe that's the transportation system afterwards but it's it's a big theme.

Preserving preserving the community as it is, traffic congestion.

Those are the two things that I picked up in this report.

Thank you.

Move your seat.

Second it.

All those in favor.

Any opposed?

Seeing none opposed.

Motion carries.

Thanks, Sterling.

And I think that brings us down to grants and aid.

And if you're scrolling down and looking in the staff report, it is in Schedule A in the attachment.

Yeah.

I I don't think it's that easy for that one.

I think I think uh that we need to uh go through this.

No, we need to go through it and pull it out.

And uh folks, if I can, um, it's always hard to do when you get a list of things and everybody uh make a choice on them.

Um so I'm gonna go down and say one, two, three.

If nobody objects, I don't want a discussion around what it is.

If you're agreeing with it, let it roll.

If we all agree on it, we'll stop on the one that somebody has a problem with.

Okay?

Does that sound okay?

Um we will vote on them all at the end.

Uh uh, but uh we'll we'll pull those out as we need.

So number one is the one to FUCA performing arts society.

Last year we approved 2000.

They've requested another 2,000 this year.

So if there's no nothing there, no, no.

If it's just if it if it's just no, uh if you want if you don't support it and you want to pull it out then we can vote on it quickly are are you gonna do that with all of them just so we know okay um uh we can try it as a package so uh what are you gonna change we can vote on it as a package this is what they're requesting yeah right we can vote on it as a package and if somebody if council agrees as a package then that's what goes or do we want to go through it go through it we have to go through it in one at a time there's not that many twelve okay one hands up to supports to support hands up to say no so that one goes uh so one is approved two hands up to support and uh hands up to disapprove passes three hands up to support hands up to not support so one uh so one you got your hand up but I think it passed the way it was, uh councilor Rogers.

Uh and I think we're at four.

Are we?

Number four of you Royal Community Association.

Uh, all those in favor?

Any opposed?

Any opposed?

So we've got three opposed and four approving.

I'm happy with a lower amount.

So I think it passed.

Um five.

All those uh that's a life cycles project.

All those in support, all those opposed.

Seeing none opposed, that one is unanimous.

Um feed Urban agricultural Society.

Full compliance.

All those in favor.

Motion carries.

Any opposed.

Council Matson's is opposed.

Strawberry Vale District and Community Club for a new roof.

All those in favor.

Any opposed?

Seeing we've got three opposed.

And I think we've got uh say again for all of those in favor.

Uh so that's four and opposed.

And that's three.

So they're looking for a new roof for that.

Um, I note, Sarah, that you've got a missing uh resolution from a board of directors for that one.

Okay.

Uh yeah, if you don't have a new roof, you don't have a community club.

Uh eight is Peninsula Stream Society asking for 7,500.

All those in favor.

Any opposed?

Councilor Mattson is being consistent in his opposition.

Uh uh motion carries.

Uh Victoria Compost and Conservation Education Society for $2,000.

All those in favor.

Any opposed?

Councilor Mattson again is uh consistent.

Uh motion carries Gibraltar Bay uh strata gazebo.

We've already agreed on this as a council.

Yeah, go ahead.

Um so I know why it's showing up here because it's coming out of casino funds, but this isn't really a grant and aid, is it?

Because first of all, they're not a nonprofit, so they're not eligible for a grant and aid.

So um, yeah, I just wondered why it was on here.

Sure.

Or Scott.

Or Steve, seeing how it's finance now.

You're you're on the spot.