Back to the City of Richmond where the majority of City Councillors have been absolutely complicit in the dismantling of the protected Agricultural Land Reserve farmlands which in this municipality are the best farmlands in Canada. Surprisingly there is not a bigger public outcry on how this City Council has failed future food security and the right of farmers to be able to own and access farmland close to market. Meanwhile Richmond City staff are processing 61 applications carving up farmland as approved by this Council for quick developer profit, despite staff’s recommendation to Council that this was a very bad idea.
There is some weirdness in the majority of Council supporting supernormal land lift profits and a series of loopholes for offshore buyers in numbered companies. These “developers” are turning protected farmland into gated offshore owned estates. This is happening despite the fact that this farmland is designated as part of the Provincial Agricultural Land Reserve set up in the 1970’s.
Price Tags has been documenting the unbelievable usurping of these prime farmlands for gated estates, with mansions of almost 11,000 square feet, while 5,382 square feet is the permitted maximum under the provincial regulation. We’ve also documented that besides approving these monster houses on supposedly protected farmlands, Richmond City Council also rubber stamped an additional house of 3,200 square feet on larger properties for the “help”.
There has been some worrying optics, and Price Tags has reported on the barbeque that Richmond “Farm Land Owners” was to host to thank those councillors who approved the development of mega mansions on this prime farmland, and help those councillors get re-elected.
There has been some discussion that certain councillors have a close relationship with the development industry. Councillor Carol Day brought forward a motion that Richmond staff develop a code of ethics for city councillors, similar to that adopted for city managers.
As reported in the Richmond News the Councillors had a “heated debate” over the proposed code of ethics and it passed by a 5 to 3 vote.
Councillor Day directly addressed the problem stating: “There is a concern in the community regarding a code of ethics for councillors and we can’t have people mistrustful of council. What I believe is a big contributing factor is the fact that we have developers on council.
The new policy would mean that City Council members “not deal in property directly or indirectly within the municipality he/she serves other than his/her personal residence without first informing the Municipal Council, in writing, As Councillor Day observed “I don’t have any problem with a developer being on council as long as they’re developing in another city.”
Recognizing that this overly friendly to developers council has created angst in the community, an unprecedented alliance of two parties with candidates running for Council has formed. RITE Richmond and the Richmond Citizens Association have teamed together to support each other’s candidates, advocating for housing affordability and to preserve farmland for farmers.
And here is a video by Richmond Voices showing the size of some of these new “mansion farmhouses” that are eating up the best agricultural land in Canada, produced by Richmond Voices.
What do you expect with a CAO George Duncan , Mayor Malcolm Brodie and some of the Councillors that have been in City Hall for 4, 5, 6 Terms. The future of Richmond is screwed with a Civic Government like that!
It will be interesting to find out the names of these on council ..
Goodness knows it’s time for the Richmond trustees to go as well .
Richmond definitely needs an overhaul .
Richmond is going under water. Sure, it might still be a few decades before it’s a real threat but that’s pretty short for “investments” of tens of millions of dollars. There’s absolutely no reason the taxpayer should help protect these properties from rising oceans. We can save a lot of money by sacrificing certain areas to the sea. These should be the first to go and that should be strongly communicated right now.