Opinion: Top priorities for the Salt Spring Local Community Commission

By Brian Webster

Community Contributed, Elections & Candidates, Opinions & Reviews - May 12, 2023

Last week, I wrote about the pressing issue of housing for working people on Salt Spring. I suggested that this is a major issue in our community and requires attention by our new Local Community Commission (LCC) on a priority basis. However, housing isn’t the only important issue in our community, so this week, I want to cover some of the other topics that I believe will need LCC attention early on.

Make Smart Decisions on Existing LCC Services

The LCC has been delegated authority over 14 of the current CRD services on Salt Spring. This incudes 11 services where the LCC will make all administrative decisions – right up to, but not including final approval of regional district bylaws -- and another three ‘contributory services’ where the LCC will approve each annual budget subject to final sign-off by the CRD board.

There are plenty of issues to consider with these services. Some of these issues cross many services and others are super-specific. Here are some of the issues relating to current LCC services that I hope will be front and centre.

Consider the climate impacts of every decision the LCC makes.
Make sure our local government supports reconciliation with indigenous peoples.
Strengthen partnerships with Salt Spring non-profits.
Move forward with the Harbourwalk project.
Push for accelerated work on cycling and walking paths from Fulford to Ganges to Vesuvius to Long Harbour.
Encourage a safe and vibrant Ganges core area.
Increase the availability of local food to enhance our food security and encourage fuller use of our agricultural land.

Extend Lcc Responsibilities to Include All Local CRD Services

Creating the LCC is a good thing, but only a first step. To maximize local control and minimize fragmented decision-making, I think we should be working toward bringing all remaining CRD local services on Salt Spring under the purview of the LCC. These include seven area-specific water and sewer services, which currently have advisory commissions that provide recommendations to the CRD. Among many problems with the current system is a lack of clarity as to where those recommendations go and whether they are even taken seriously.

If governance of these water and sewer services was tweaked so they were included under the LCC, clarity and accountability for the work that is or isn’t done on then would be much improved. I believe the current advisory commissions – made up as they are of people receiving and paying for the particular service – should continue, as they provide vital input from the people affected by each service.

If their recommendations went to the LCC rather than to… well, maybe the electoral area director, maybe local CRD staff or maybe CRD staff in Victoria (as I said, this isn’t always clear) … then, at a minimum, the LCC could be held accountable for the results. And that would be a big step forward from where we are today.

Start a Discussion with Our Two Large Improvement Districts

To further reduce fragmentation, increase democratic control and gain access to federal/provincial funding, it’s time to start a discussion with Salt Spring’s two large improvement districts on how we can work together in the future for the benefit of our community.

Right now, North Salt Spring Waterworks District and Salt Spring Fire Protection District are governed by antiquated improvement district laws from an earlier era. The rules on voter eligibility, closed meetings and other aspects are out of date and the Province has made it clear they don’t intend to fix them. More importantly, they have also said that they will only provide federal/provincial infrastructure funding grants to services that have a formal relationship with their regional district.

Enter the LCC. If we can work out mutually agreeable arrangements, it’s possible that we could provide access to much-needed funding from higher levels of government while keeping decision-making here on Salt Spring. It could be a win-win-win for those agencies, the LCC and – by far most importantly – Salt Spring taxpayers and ratepayers.

So let’s start the conversation.

Consider the Best Ways to Address Other Pressing Community Issues

As I wrote last week, many Salt Spring residents consider housing for working families to be a pressing priority, yet our community lacks leadership in this critical area. I devoted an entire article to this topic recently and see both immediate and longer-term solutions that require attention. In the short term, I believe we should bring together Salt Springers who care about a stronger and clearer focus on housing and identify an agency – whether existing or new – to take the lead. Then the LCC should provide that agency with some economic development/sustainability funding to support its work while we develop the longer-term solution: a Salt Spring housing service with dedicated funding for this agency to do its work.

Other communities have made progress on this issue. Let’s learn from them as well as the smart Salt Springers who care about housing and then move forward decisively. It’s possible to address this issue while also protecting our natural environment, our community’s rural character and our precious drinking water resource. We can do it!

Tying It All Together

These priorities are the ones I will bring to the decision-making table if Salt Springers elect me to our first Local Community Commission. I hope you will join with me to help make it happen.

General voting day is May 27, with advance voting on May 17 and 24.

Please vote!

Brian Webster
Salt Spring Local Community Commission Candidate

9 responses to “Opinion: Top priorities for the Salt Spring Local Community Commission”

T

3 years ago

Pray tell. How will you consider the climate impacts of every decision the LCC makes? Secondly, is the LCC even qualified to make these assessments?
It is apparent that extending LCC responsibilities will require a greater time commitment, and correspondingly committee members will want/need increased compensation. And then the presumed budget for the LCC will no longer be valid. It appears that you are striving for incorporation with having to take care of the roads. An interesting social experiment. Maybe someone will study the thing that is Salt Spring and earn an Ph.D. in understanding dysfunctional governance.
1. Brian Webster author
  
  3 years ago
  
  Thanks for your questions/comments. The LCC can consider the climate impacts of every decision it makes by asking staff to identify those impacts in the staff report that accompanies every significant project proposal. Just like the report considers budget impacts.
  
  I am not striving for incorporation. I am striving for better coordination of local government decision-making within the unincorporated local government model that voters have chosen at referendum. Everything I have proposed can be done without any changes to provincial government legislation.
  1. T
    
    3 years ago
    
    Please be more specific on how the "staff" are going to identify the climate impacts. Is there a climate scientist on staff? You first wrote, every decision made by the LCC, and now you say "significant project proposal". When one throws out the word climate change - it is pandering to the populace, because you don't even know how assessment of these impact is done. Word candy.
    1. Brian Webster author
      
      3 years ago
      
      Some climate impacts are obvious: generally speaking, expanded public transit will reduce vehicle emissions, substituting heat pumps for oil burning furnaces will likewise. Others are less obvious: increased availability of local food (which replaces imports) will reduce emissions due to transportation. One does not need to be a climate scientist to quantify the expected impacts of a decision. It is not pandering to say that this needs to be part of the decision-making process. And this does not apply only to large projects. It is a matter of paying attention, quantifying as much as one reasonably can and making good decisions accordingly. It's good decision-making, not "word candy."
shelley mahoney

3 years ago

The mental gymnastics required to follow this reasoning is simply astounding.

You want control and authority...that is incorp.

Striving to do all of this to keep land use planning with the trust is foolish. The trust is a disaster...they use our money to create words and salary themselves while our community DIES a slow and hate filled death.

Worker only ferries and FedEx deliveries for all supplies is the next step in our demise unless we get these LCC winners to demand a restructure from the province to deliver real government to all the islands trust islands.
1. Brian Webster author
  
  3 years ago
  
  Shelley Mahoney, you are consistent in always, always only wanting to talk about incorporation. Salt Spring voters have rejected that on multiple occasions, so these proposals -- like the LCC itself -- are steps we can take within existing legislation and consistent with past referendum results.
  1. Maximillian
    
    3 years ago
    
    As the population ages out, fresh blood brings with it the changes that has carried us forward through centuries of improvement.
Simon Rompre

3 years ago

My hopes are that what you are proposing will help resolve many of our governance issues. I personally am especially interested in how we can get some traction with MoTI regarding safe shoulder for cyclists and vulnerable users along out narrow roads. Very little has happened to create bike lanes in spite of decade of advocacy because we don’t own our roads, how could this change under the LCC?
1. Brian Webster author
  
  3 years ago
  
  The LCC will also not own our roads. However, it can do two things directly relevant to more safe routes for cyclists, pedestrians and others. One, it can make the good work the Transportation Commission has done over the years an even higher priority, with more pathways, cycle lanes, etc. And two, the LCC can lobby CRD Regional Parks, which has a long-term plan to build cycle and footpaths from Fulford to Ganges to Vesuvius, to make that project a much higher priority. We should not be waiting a decade or more for this to happen and the LCC needs to make this point loud and clear so the works happens much sooner.

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