Open letter to Richmond mayor and councillors:
I’ve been trying to figure out what’s going on with the oversized-houses bylaw.
As far as I can tell, there was a late addition to the June 22 council agenda to give developers an extra two months to get permits to oppress our city’s family neighbourhoods with oversized houses.
The procrastination motion appears to be one more example of putting developers first instead of putting Richmond first.
When I looked through the meeting agenda and noticed the procrastination motion, it immediately brought to mind what happened with the tree bylaw in the fall of 2007.
There was a long period between the time when the bylaw provisions were known and the time when they came into effect. As a result, everyone whose business included tree removal was working from dawn to dusk six days a week to meet the demand to cut down trees before the deadline.
The sound of chainsaws was everywhere. I hope the equivalent won’t happen with applications to build oversized houses, but it’s likely that it will if the regulations are put off for the proposed procrastination period.
In this case, though, the rush during the summer would be to get permits for oversized-house building, not necessarily to begin the construction. If builders are close to being fully occupied over the summer, a good guess is that much of the actual additional construction of oversized-houses would occur later, with any new law — passed in September at best — NOT applying to the oversized-houses that got permits over the summer.
Passing the procrastination motion that was added to the June 22 council agenda would intensify the killing of neighbourhoods.
In contrast, acting decisively to protect neighbourhoods can only have good effects. The precautionary timely action can always be reviewed in the fall to make the protection laxer again if a council majority prefers that.
Jim Wright
Richmond
