Richmond council turned down two applications for exemptions to new rules on home sizes in the Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR).
The two applications were before council on Monday evening and a third one is expected later, asking to build homes larger than the 400-square-metre limit imposed by council in December.
Brodie told the Richmond News after the meeting that, when the new rules were being developed, council members told the public that they could bring variance applications to council, but now that the new rules have passed, the argument has become about not setting a precedent.
Council first looked at limiting ALR homes to 1,000 square metres, then it was reduced to 500 square metres to align with new provincial legislation.
It was only at the last minute, after the fall municipal election that Richmond council reduced the house size further to 400 square metres, noted Brodie. Now, some applicants have been “caught” by the new rules after starting the process, he added.
“I think some of our residents have been trying to comply with the letter and the spirit of the bylaws as they changed, they made significant investments and they’ve been caught by the changing rules.”
Brodie along with Couns. Alexa Loo, Linda McPhail and Chak Au in voting in favour of the applications in the 4-5 decision.
At Monday’s council meeting Coun. Harold Steves pointed out the Granville Avenue application came in during the city’s withholding period when no applications were being processed.
“You don’t pass a bylaw, you don’t pass a withholding period and the first thing you do is make exemptions because once you start, you exempt everybody,” he said. If this passed, every property on farmland would be allowed to come forward and ask for the same exemption, he added.
The property is right in the middle of agricultural land, Coun. Carol Day said, and a larger home would threaten the viability of farmland.
“The time has come to stick to our guns,” she said.
Coun. Kelly Greene said she echoed Steves’ comments and said that allowing the application would set a “precedent.”
However, Loo pointed out staff have told them only three applications for houses larger than 400 square metres have come to the city since the bylaw passed.
“This isn’t the opening of a barn door, it’s not a slippery slope, it’s not any of those things,” she said. “This is about one person getting caught in the process.”
McPhail, who is the chair of the planning committee, said council owed it to the applicants to look at their situation again.
McPhail pointed out that the bylaw on house sizes in the ALR changed three times during the time they were working through the paperwork.
“Through no fault of their own” McPhail said they missed getting their application in before the house size limit was changed.
The River Road applicants said they had plans to build a home that could accommodate two elderly family members, and of the square footage, about a thousand would be to make it accessible, for example, for wheelchairs,’ McPhail explained to the Richmond News.
Council also turned down this application with the same votes as the Granville Avenue one.
A third application for a home larger than 400 square metres was received by the city and is being reviewed by staff.
