Items of Interest to the GBGPCA from Recent Council Meeting

The May 24, 2022 City of West Kelowna Council Meeting included various topics of interest to the GBGPCA which will be further reviewed by the association’s board members in the coming weeks. In the interim we wanted to provide a summary on the items of interest from this meeting which includes:

• Various comments, discussions and points as they relate specifically to the Gellatly Bay property adjacent to Willow Beach (i.e. the Gellatly Bay Neighbourhood Centre) including:
  • The developer and/or Neighbourhood Centre (NC) property owner has requested that site-specific consideration should be given to unique or constrained sites such as the Gellatly Bay NC because:
    • The site is constrained due to the high water table which will limit the support of underground parking.
    • A maximum of 6 stories in the Gellatly area is underutilizing the jewel of West Kelowna’s waterfront. The site characteristics and prominence on the waterfront should allow for additional height to ensure the building design is not constrained to a large block and can allow for an iconic design. 
  • This Council meeting did not focus on comments from the public but the following statement was included, “A majority of the respondents also included specific comments regarding concerns about the Gellatly Neighbourhood Centre.” However, there was no elaboration regarding the concerns.
    
• Other items of note that were discussed with regards to the OCP and the feedback received from the land owners of the potential NCs and/or developers which equate to significant changes being requested by these stakeholders including:
  • Request for heights over 8 stories in some areas.
    • This was supported by Councillor Friesen who after review of the stakeholder feedback feels there is a business case for going to 10 or 12 stories versus 8 stories.
  • Concern regarding the financial viability of the commercial component of mixed-use developments. 
    • It was expressed that there needs to be a critical mass of people living in an area in order for commercial to thrive.
  • Request to identify opportunities that provide flexibility for maintaining identified FARs (measure of the density of a project), while allowing for taller buildings which are more cost effective and allow for more design creativity.
  • Medium density residential sites surrounding Urban and NCs also need to be identified as part of the land use plan revisions.
• These additional requests are of concern to the GBGPCA as the Government of British Columbia is currently creating Bill 26, which will allow any development application that conforms to the OCP to go forward WITHOUT a public hearing.
  • City planners want to meet the requests of the NC land owners/developers in an effort to avoid public hearings.
  • The City’s CAO, Paul Gipps, encouraged more input from developers and land owners so that there will not need to be an amendment or public hearing within the first year or two after the OCP passes.
    
• Other notable remarks from Council included those from:
  • Councillor Findlater who cited concern that the elementary students in Goats Peak will be bussed to Peachland given the School Districts current position on land acquisition in the area (i.e. this is not within their current budgets). He questions if this will create a disincentive for people to build in the neighborhood.
  • Councillor Zannon who played the devil’s advocate and noted that based on the assessed value of single-family homes still rising more, it would seem that people want to live in single family homes and drive vehicles. She questioned if Council should be telling people what they should want.
  • Mayor Milsom enquired as to the possibility of adding duplexes and fourplexes to existing neighbourhoods to create additional density.

The full report and recording of the Council meeting can be reviewed here.

Overall, it seems that emphasis for this phase of the OCP is being given to feedback submitted by the NC landowners and developers. It is very clear that the owner/developer of the land across the street from Willow Beach desires higher building height and density. As a community our voice does not appear to be heard!

The GBGPCA board will be meeting on June 10 to consider all possible advocacy options to respond to this for our community so more action can be taken. If you have any feedback, comments or suggestions on this please send it through to us in advance of our meeting.