North Saanich Community Voices: 2021

Tuesday 16 November 2021

The OCP - A Tough Decision

The OCP Review - Another Turning Point

A Tough Decision but Easier Than It Looks!

I believe, as do many in the Municipality, that the OCP Review has developed into a series of disappointments. The upshot of these has been an unfortunate but progressive erosion of trust by the residents in the management and prosecution of this Review.

These disappointments have arisen in spite of a very auspicious beginning with the Staff Report of 2 March 2020. This substantial and excellent report by Carly Rimell, entitled The Official Community Plan Review - Scope and Proposed Approach, was enthusiastically received by Mayor and Council on 9 March 2020. The report, which was adopted without modification, was very comprehensive and listed 20 Topics/Issues to be considered in the Review. Within these were 47 sub-topics. So far, 42 of these remain unaddressed, while two of them have consumed most of the Project budget and effort to date (report available).

Flowing from this Staff Report was the consultant RFP, the consultant selection and the High-Level Work Plan Engagement Strategy report of 14 September 2020. References to the Topic/Issues are found in the first two documents, are slightly referenced in the third then all but disappear as the Project moves along.

Council chose not to create any opportunities for review or revision of the Review process until 12 July 2021. By then the guidance offered in the March 2020 report was all but abandoned in favour of the obsessive focus on the Six Big Concepts.

As early as the fall of 2020, residents became concerned about the project direction. These concerns became ever stronger but were all deflected until the post-rally meeting in July 2021.

My disappointment stems mainly from two concerns:

That the Council directive of 9 March 2020 to proceed with the RFP and other initiatives "based upon the content of the [Staff] report" was not followed. The Project Team chose to ignore a specific Council resolution to follow a different path. This noncompliance was never questioned.
That the concerns of the residents were routinely forwarded to the Project Team and lay dormant until 12 July 2021. Citizen concerns may have been “listened to” but rarely received a response.

We are all clients of the Project Team who are working for us at our expense. Mayor and Council are their direct supervisors and are the agents of the residents in directing the work of the Project Team. As such, the Mayor and Council should have received, assessed and responded to our concerns as they arose, rather than allowing the PT to assess their own work often months after the fact.

I don't believe that the Project Team has followed the initial conceptual and specific directions "based upon the content of the [Staff] report” of March 2020 that was endorsed by Council.

Furthermore, the course that has been chosen, i.e., selective urbanization to the almost complete exclusion of other OCP Review priorities, has increasingly angered many residents. There has only been slight recognition of this by Mayor and Council.

It is worth repeating yet again that in an early Urgent Priorities survey by the Project Team, only 8% of the respondents consider housing to be an urgent priority but they rated four other topics more highly, 63% in aggregate. Recently, a PT summary of correspondence revealed that only 5% of those respondents were in favour of the Review process to that point. Yes, 5%! These remarkable statistics have been all but ignored by the PT and our representatives.

Another major turning point in this Project will be encountered on 22 November 2021.

In the Council meeting of 18 October 2021, it was established that the remaining term of the current Council is not sufficient to complete the OCP Review as planned. It was suggested that work continue until a draft OCP is complete. This would then be held in abeyance for action by the next Council.

For a variety of reasons, I do not feel that this course is supportable:

After over a year this Project is so far removed from the aspirations and specific directions given by Council in March 2020 that continuation could be considered reckless:

only 8% considered the chosen priority to be important; only 5% are content with the work to date
42 of 47 initial OCP Review targets remain substantially unaddressed after over one year of work
there is considerable uncertainty as to the basis for the intense urbanization focus (actual housing needs vs. existing supply, RGS/RCS considerations, UC Boundary, role of the District within the CRD, inappropriate use of the Complete Community concept, etc.)

Given that there is insufficient time remaining to complete this Review, continuation could again be considered reckless:

this Council should not in good faith commit further funds, resources, staff and community time to a project that they know will be completed by others, perhaps with different priorities
this Council cannot presuppose how the next Council will consider a draft OCP which they had no hand in preparing; the next Council could well decide to reject all or part of the work and the costs associated with it
if this Council cannot complete this project in the time available, then they cannot create obligations for a future Council

Thus, the situation as outlined above leaves Council with only one viable choice on 22 November 2021, but not entirely a bad one:

1. Receive the OCP Review Staff Reports as planned but “for information only”

2. terminate further work on the OCP Review but to be resumed by the next Council

3. file, safeguard and store the data and reports generated to date

This choice has the advantages of :

§ regaining the trust and support of the community

§ avoiding the further entrenchment of a flawed process

§ eliminating further costs of uncertain value

§ reducing the stress and anxiety for all parties involved

§ not creating, at substantial cost, unreasonable obligations for the next Council

I hope this perspective is helpful in your deliberations.

Spring Harrison, North Saanich

Sunday 24 October 2021

The OCP - A Different Drummer

The OCP Review - A Mid-Term Scorecard

Suddenly There's a Different Drummer

Introduction

The North Saanich OCP Review began in March of 2020 with a formative Staff Report outlining the Scope and Proposed Approach. It was well-written and well received and was soon followed by a Request for Proposals. In July 2020 the consultant, Modus Planning was contracted to undertake the OCP Review and in September 2020 the first planning document was presented to Council by Modus.

As the project progressed through Phases 1 and 2 in the hands of Modus and Staff, public sentiment towards the project grew ever more negative, culminating in a large rally at the Municipal Hall on 12 July 2021.

A review of that history provides considerable insight into the cause of the public dissatisfaction and decreasing trust.

History

At the 9 March 2020 Council meeting, a Staff Report dated 2 Mar 2020 was presented to kick off the North Saanich OCP Review. It was entitled the Official Community Plan Review -- Scope and Proposed Approach. Well-written and well received it provided a comprehensive OCP background, the list of Topics/Issues to be considered, a proposal for a review plan and other details. Council discussed and endorsed the report enthusiastically then directed Staff “…to develop a Request for Proposals based on the content of the report.”

The intent of that plan carried over to the Request for Proposals in May of 2020 and there was some evidence of it in the Evaluation of Proposals in July of 2020. Related details can be found in the Appendix, page 7.

A key element in the March 2020 Staff Report was a list of 20 “Topics/lssues to be considered through OCP Review.” It is a broad and inclusive list. A full listing of the Topic/Issues and the sub-topics can be found in Table 2 of the Appendix on page 7.

Topics/Issues “to be considered through OCP Review”

1. Agriculture and Food Systems

2. Residential/Housing

3. Light Industry

4. Commercial

5. Marine

6. Environmentally Sensitive Areas

7. Roads and Transportation

8. Community Amenities and Green Spaces

9. Servicing

10. Heritage and Archaeology

11. Airport

12. Special Development Areas

13. Development Permit Areas

14. Regional Context Statement

15. Climate Action

16. Community and Social Wellness

17. Local Neighbourhood Planning Policies

18. Economic Development

19. Temporary Use Permits

20. Shoal Harbor and Tsehum Harbour

Within those 20 categories are contained 47 sub-topics that are also wide-ranging. The scope of these two lists, and the report in general, is a credit to the author and provides a comprehensive blueprint to guide the OCP Review. At that point in the history of the OCP Review, there was every expectation that it would be thorough and deal equitably with the broad range of issues listed.

Sub-topics. These are drawn from Table 2 and are necessarily brief.

1. DNS as a food shed

2. implications of ALC changes re Agriculture

3. definition of rural character re Agriculture

4. agribusiness and agri-tourism guidelines and policies

5. Farm Protection DPA

6. clearer boundaries re ALR, Rural, Agricultural

7. Housing needs assessment report

8. Area 1 and 2 boundaries

9. guest cottages

10. vacation rentals

11. appropriate infill housing and locations

12. revisiting multi-family affordable housing policies

13. Review policies and DPA re Light Industry

14. Review Marine base policies re Commercial

15. review land based policies re Commercial

16. Marine planning based on recent SLR reports

17. policies for marine and shoreline development

18. Marine task force recommendations

19. review of Marina structures

20. Policies and DPAs relating to new species at risk re ESAs

21. Review of Schedule D

22. reconsider Littlewood Road extension

23. EV infrastructure

24. prioritization of transit and active modes of transport facilities design

25. Review and expand the Community Amenities section of the OCP

26. review and update Schedule C

27. Assess the Sanitary Sewer Master Plan, Asset Renewal Master Plan And Water System Master Plan with reference to capacity and phasing in relation to any proposed land-use scenarios

28. review and update Schedule E and the RCS Map with respect to the NSSA boundaries

29. Review and update Schedule F

30. consider broadening this section re Heritage and Archaeology

31. engage with First Nations re Heritage and Archaeology

32. Review the airport land-use policies to further develop policy alignment

33. Review the remaining areas and assess their alignment with the community's vision re SDAs

34. Review the guidelines and mapping re DPAs

35. consider additional DPAs regarding sea level rise and wildfire

36. consider an Energy Efficiency DPA

37. consider a Farm Protection DPA

38. Review six topics to confirm alignment of the OCP with the RGS

39. Review the boundaries of Areas 1 and 2 re the RGS

40. update the RCS

41. Create a new climate action section within the OCP

42. explore new policies regarding the district's role in this area re Community and Social Wellness

43. "Depending on the OCP plan development…” re Local Neighbourhood Planning Policies

44. Consideration for "inclusion of a few high-level policies which can guide the long-term vision … of these general areas" re Local Neighbourhood Planning Policies

45. Explore further insight into the desired minimum jobs/population ratio target of the RGS

46. Consider designating TUPs through the OCP as opposed to the Zoning Bylaw

47. Consider a special DPA for this area re Shoal Harbour and Tsehum Harbour

Although during the Council meeting of 9 March 2020, the Topic/Issues and the contained 47 sub-topics were not discussed in detail, none were modified or rejected. As noted above, Staff were directed to develop an RFP “based upon the content of the report."

In due course Modus the consultant was appointed and Phases 1 and 2 rolled out. The opinion sampling process of Phase 1 yielded very useful results, among them the Urgent Priorities survey reproduced in the graphic t

o the right. It clearly shows that housing concerns ranked fifth (8%) behind four other environmentally oriented categories totalling 63% in combination.

Based upon this ranking of priorities by the residents, which aligns well with the Vision Statements of the existing and previous OCPs, and the all-inclusive Topic/Issue list, one would expect that the Review process would have similar priorities and a similarly wide range of issues being explored.

However, a review of the early OCP Review project documents reveals a marked change in direction and emphasis from the initial plan in March 2020 and the Request for Proposals of May 2020.

In the High Level Work Plan Engagement Strategy report of 14th of September 2020 a distinct change of direction was evident with the arrival of the Emerging Concepts focus. Although this report did tentatively ("It is anticipated that participants will be engaged on the following topics:…") propose a list similar to the Topics/Issues list of the initial report, that was the last visible reference to most topics other than urbanization. This report was the first by Modus since their appointment in July 2020 and marked an ever-increasing focus on urbanization themes to the exclusion of other Topics having a higher priority.

It foretold the all but complete abandonment of most of the proposed OCP Review topics of the March 2020 initial report. Added to which, is the almost complete disconnection from the public opinion findings of Phase 1, shown above.

The Workshop of 22 September 2021 provided confirming evidence that the original March 2020 plan had been abandoned. In the agenda, one of the listed purposes of the workshop is, "Revalidate our shared understanding of project principles and baseline information feeding into the OCP update process." There is no mention of re-examining the project principles, only revalidating them. The bulk of the agenda for that 7.5 hour meeting was almost exclusively housing related, much of it in great detail.

The OCP Review has been very badly received by the residents, their discontent stemming primarily from the lack of attention to the Urgent Priority items identified in the Project Team's own survey and the intense focus on urbanization and densification.

Findings

To provide more detail on the guidance provided by the initial Staff Report of March 2020, a "scorecard" table has been compiled to assess the progress of the various Topics/Issues. Each of the 47 sub-topics are listed within their parent category and rated as to their completion status. The full table of results is given in Table 2 in the Appendix, page 7.

To complete the assessment, each Topic/Issue was reviewed and items definitely described as OCP Review targets were selected as sub-topics. Each of these was then assessed as:

0 No Visible Activity

1 Started Or Partially Complete

2 Advanced

3 Completed

Sub-topics falling within the four highest Urgent Priorities levels were also noted.

In addition, a table of Missing but Significant Items or those not included in the main Topics/Issues table has been compiled as Table 1, also in the Appendix. This Table is not yet complete.

The results of Table 2 are summarized as follows:

Metric	Code	Count	Notes
Topics		20
Sub-topics		47
No Visible Activity	0	42	Some might be, verification needed
Partial completion	1	3	2. Residential/Housing
Well advanced	2	2	17. Local Neighbourhood Planning Policies
Completed	3	0	After over 1 year, this seems low
Urgent Priority		16	All are tagged as No Visible Activity

It is surprising to note that of the 47 sub-topics, 42 are flagged as having No Visible Activity. After over a year of Review activity, this is a very concerning statistic.

Discussion

Although probably not intended as such, this has all the earmarks of a "bait and switch" process. Irrespective of the intention, the effect has been to completely restructure the content and direction of the OCP Review from the initial March 2020 report. Of the initial 47 subtopics listed in the initial planning report of March 2020, fully 42 of them show No Visible Activity. Those five that have absorbed almost the full time and financial budget of the project so far are all strictly housing and urbanization.

This reveals a glaring imbalance in the prosecution of the original OCP Review topics. It also indicates that the initial direction to Staff by Council has not been followed.

Conclusions

This progress assessment or scorecard is challenging to interpret. Essentially, two sub-topics out of 47 have consumed almost the entire time and financial budget to date. This is very difficult to comprehend but perhaps there is an explanation:

The initial list of 20 topics and 47 sub-topics was prepared in error
The list was not intended to be followed or completed as given
91.5% of the planned work will still be completed in the time remaining and within the expected budget
The consultant and/or Staff decided to create and work from a different list using different priorities that were not “based on the content of the [9 Mar 2020 Staff] report.”

These points are entirely speculative as no explanation for the great disparity has ever been sought or given.

So, we must assume that the original list was genuine and was produced and accepted with sincere good intentions all around. That the actual outcome to date bears almost no resemblance to the initial plan raises some serious concerns:

Was the initial plan not intended to be followed?
Why was the initial plan almost completely rewritten?
Who devised the highly modified plan?
Who authorized the highly modified plan?
Why was Council not advised of this complete change of direction?
Why did Council not question this complete change of direction?
If the initial list is indeed valid, when and how will the remaining 91.5% of the intended sub-topics be completed?
Given that the project is approximately 50% complete, what impact will this situation have upon the budget? And timeline?
16 sub-topics are flagged as having a high priority on the Urgent Priorities survey in 2020. There is No Visible Activity for any of them. When and how will they be completed?

The history of this project has been one of unmet expectations and steadily diminishing contentment and trust on the part of the citizens of North Saanich.

This scorecard, if accurate, only erodes that trust further.

Recommendations

It is difficult to picture this situation as anything but a grave departure from a clear Council directive to Staff. Why this happened is probably no longer relevant. But it is important, even at this late date, to bring the OCP Review back into alignment with the original list of Topics/Issues.

There is no obvious reason why this departure should have taken place and no obvious reason to not correct it.

Accordingly, would be helpful for:

Council to assess the current status of the OCP Review vs. the intended program offered, accepted and mandated in the original Staff Report of March 2020.
Council to devise a process to reconnect to those original OCP Review Topics/Issues "based upon the content of the [March 2020 Staff ] report” in accordance with the original Council motion.

Appendix – Supporting Information

RFP language regarding the Review content and scope

The language in the Request for Proposals document is quite clear as to the scope of the OCP Review:

“…the consultant will be the team member that is principally responsible for leading all aspects of the official community plan project from start to finish, including by:

…

(c) providing recommendations and analysis regarding the manner by which the issues referred to in the Staff Report are best addressed in the official community plan, …” [Emphasis added]

In the evaluation of proposals, Modus indicated an awareness of, and an intention, to comply with the prescriptions of the formative Staff Report:

“Demonstrated understanding of the District’s project objectives and approach

…

- Outlined how the team would address each topic/issue as outlined within the RFP”

Table 1. Items Missing or not in the Topics/Issues List. This table is not complete.

#	Topic	Sub-topic	Status	Comment
1.	Vision Statements or Objectives	1. Vision 2. Goals	1. Draft 2. Draft	· Generic · Better to update the existing
2.	Agriculture	3. Underutilized farmland 4. Land access for young farmers 5. Other	3. Not planned 4. Not planned 5.	· When will these be addressed? · Should be supported by an integrated and diverse local food system
3.	?	6. Blue-Green Networks	6. Dormant	· Origin not clear · Purpose not clear
4.	?	7. Food hubs	7. Dormant	· Origin not clear

Table 2. Topics/Issues to be considered through the OCP Review.

Under “Status”, the following codes are used: