During the February 11th Council meeting Council dealt with a Development Variance Permit (at right).The Director of Development Services recommended NOT to approve the variance and provided an elegant set of reasons for his recommendation.
After a brief debate during which Councillors tried to find errors with the Director's reasoning they decided to ignore his recommendations and approved the very suspect variance. What was the most surprising aspect of this decision was the fact that they did not offer ANY reason for approving the variance. Councillor Williams made some half baked comment that went something like this: it is nice to plan for the future but we should consider the present need of the applicant. They even ignored a letter of complaint from the neighbor.
This action is nothing less than a slap in the face of a very competent and dedicated employee who is trying to do his job as he is supposed to do. The only one voting to deny the variance was Councillor Firman.
As the attached document states Council has done this several times before which makes me believe that they think they are better experts than the expert we hired with a salary of $80,000. So, if we don't need a Director of Development Services we could save $80,000 and reduce our taxes by over 3%.
What is wrong with a Council that regularly ignores it's expert planner and acts against his advice? If they think the bylaws are wrong and too restrictive they should change the bylaws so everyone else will live with the same rules. When Council approves some applications and rejects others there is a perception of favouritism. Looking at some of the other decisions, such as the extension of sewer at the expense of the existing sewer customers, this perception is reinforced.
Councillors and Mayors are elected to represent all taxpayers fairly and equally. I find much discrimination in applying the laws in the District of Coldstream. This practice must stop!
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