Hansard Blues

Committee of the Whole –

Section A

Draft Report of Debates

The Honourable Raj Chouhan, Speaker

4th Session, 42nd Parliament

Tuesday, November

28, 2023

Morning Sitting

Draft Transcript — Terms of Use

PROCEEDINGS IN THE

DOUGLAS FIR ROOM

Committee of the Whole House

BILL 44 — HOUSING STATUTES

(RESIDENTIAL DEVELOPMENT)

AMENDMENT ACT, 2023

(continued)

The House in Committee of the Whole (Section

A) on Bill 44; H. Yao in the chair.

The committee met at 11:14 a.m.

On clause 15 (continued) .

The Chair: Good morning, Members. I call Committee of the Whole on Bill 44, Housing Statues (Residential

Development) Amendment Act, 2023, to order.

P. Milobar: I'm just waiting to see if my colleague might also have some questions. But just one

following question on clause 15 that we were talking about yesterday.

The rules are going to be set out. This is giving the minister the ability to do that.

Will these provisions also apply to bare land condos? It's going to be very prescriptive

and directive to municipalities what they can or cannot allow on single-family lots.

But on bare land condo lots, you could have a case where a strata doesn't want it;

someone wants to on their bare land. Will that be captured by this as well, or will

those be status quo?

[11:15 a.m.]

Hon. R. Kahlon: Only if it's zoned for single family or duplex zoning.

A. Walker: The policy guidelines that are the power that's granted to the minister under this

clause…. Have those guidelines been developed yet?

Hon. R. Kahlon: We canvassed this yesterday, so asked and answered.

A. Walker: We discussed extensively the design of the buildings. What I'm wondering is the policy

guidelines specifically for developing and adopting a municipal government — the policy

and process that they develop and move forward the rezoning under 41.3. I'm just wondering

if that guideline has been developed yet.

Hon. R. Kahlon: Respectfully, asked and answered yesterday, a couple of times.

A. Walker: I'll have to go back through Hansard . I don't believe that specific clause…. I know we've discussed this particular clause

in length. But the process itself, the questions that I received from planners and

local elected officials in my community…. It still remains ambiguous.

I understand the minister would like to move forward quickly on this, and I will try

to get through this as quickly as I can.

There are 353 mentions of "minister" in the Local Government Act. Can the minister

provide the number of times that a minister has been referenced that is not the Minister

of Municipal Affairs where that minister has not been specifically identified?

Hon. R. Kahlon: We're unable to provide that number to him right now.

A. Walker: This clause grants a power to the minister. Which minister is responsible for that?

Hon. R. Kahlon: Leg. counsel makes that public once the bill has royal assent.

A. Walker: I'm under the impression that as legislators, we draft the law. I'm just wondering

how leg. counsel makes it public which minister? Under this clause, when it says "the

minister," how is that made public?

Hon. R. Kahlon: The intention is this

section to be for the Ministry of Housing, but it is published

with legislation in B.C. Laws.

A. Walker: I understand that process. Through the Local Government Act, though, generally, when

a minister has referenced, it is implying the minister responsible for the governance

of the act. Otherwise, it is specifically identified as a minister responsible for

the School Act, the Heritage Conservation Act, the Right to Farm Act, the Transportation

Act, the Land Act.

Generally, when additions are made to the Local Government Act specific to a minister,

it identifies which minister will be responsible. This particular clause just says

"the minister," and I'm just seeking clarity as to how that will be interpreted in

the future. Could a future government, could any minister, take this new power?

[11:20 a.m.]

Hon. R. Kahlon: We canvassed this at length yesterday. It's the Minister of Housing or whoever is

responsible for the Ministry of Housing.

A. Olsen: Does the minister want to take the opportunity to amend this clause to reflect similar

language so that it's consistent throughout the Local Government Act?

Hon. R. Kahlon: We're not bringing forward an amendment at this time.

A. Olsen: Basically, the minister is giving the only remedy to understand which minister is

being referred to here. There's an assumption that we can have in this — because we're

having a conversation with the Minister of Housing — but it might be eight months,

12 months, 24 months, 36 months down the road, where that clarity has not been sorted

out. They'll have to go back to Hansard to find out that this law, which the minister is wanting us to pass, refers to a

minister that's unnamed in the law.

Hon. R. Kahlon: I've already answered this question, Chair. Once it gets royal assent, it gets published

in B.C. Laws' books.

The Chair: Shall clause 15 pass?

Division has been called.

[11:25 a.m. - 11:30 a.m.]

Before restating the question, I remind all members that only the permanent members

of

Section A or their authorized substitutes may vote.

The question is: shall clause 15 pass?

Clause 15 approved on the following division:

yeas — 8

Anderson

Bailey

Beare

Begg

Donnelly

Heyman

Kahlon

Sharma

nays — 6

Banman

Milobar

Olsen

Sturdy

Walker

Wat

On clause 16.

K. Kirkpatrick: Clause 16 is extending the requirement for the housing needs reports to five and 20

years. So my question to the minister is: how was 20 years chosen as a timeline? Why

wasn't that 15 years or 30 years? What was the basis of that?

[11:35 a.m.]

Hon. R. Kahlon: Thank you to the member for the question.

This was canvassed at great length early on. It aligns with good planning practices.

It was well agreed on by everyone that we talked to about good planning, and it aligns

with what the regional growth strategies are right now. They go off of 20 years as

well.

K. Kirkpatrick: Thank you to the minister for that.

When considering this, I would like to know what the minister and what the ministry

are thinking in terms of what are the expectations of government on housing in B.C.

for the next 20 years.

Hon. R. Kahlon: In the context of this legislation, our expectation is — our understanding would be

— that housing needs reports will be done based on that.

Again, we canvassed this, I believe it was, last week. CMHC has their kinds of targets

from the top level that they provide. But we believe that it's going to be more effective

if local governments do their analysis for 20 years. And because it's standardized,

we'll be able to get a good sense from the ground up of what the need will be over

20 years.

A. Olsen: So the CMHC sets the high-level target, and then the local governments have to figure

out how to achieve that locally. How is that connected regionally, subregionally and

across the province?

Hon. R. Kahlon: My previous answer was about what CMHC does at a global scale. For example, the consultant

that we've got, Urban Matters, that did the work for Sidney and Central Saanich, would

do their analysis — or whoever comes in to do their analysis for a housing needs report

— would do a projection for the local government based on B.C. Stats, Stats Canada,

all the information that's made public so that they can do their planning for 20 years.

A. Olsen: The district of Central Saanich has traditionally had a target in their official community

plan for a 1 percent growth rate annually — to increase.

Now, I don't believe that they've met that. I don't think that they've hit that 1

percent growth rate. But I guess what I'm trying to understand is it seems like, from

the minister's answer, they can still set that as their target, 1 percent, and then

they have to go about figuring that out. It's hard to understand how that links with

the global numbers, considering each municipality does their work kind of in a microcosm

on their own.

Hon. R. Kahlon: Again, there's no connection between the CMHC number. Local governments will be able

to do their planning based on their 20-year number, based on B.C. Stats and all the

data that they have available to them.

A. Olsen: Can a community, say, set it at zero, then? I mean, the minister is painting a picture

that it goes from the ground up. So the municipality says our target for the next

20 years is zero percent growth, and we're going to build a housing needs assessment

report around that.

I'm struggling to understand how it is that all of these pieces of data and pieces

of information link in order for that number…. You know, Sidney is different. They

have not set a specific number that they want to target to reach. At least I couldn't

find it in their report.

I'm wondering how all of the pieces of information link to then inform the community

about what their 20-year target is.

Hon. R. Kahlon: Yeah, thanks to the member for the question. There's no way a community could have

zero percent. The housing needs reports are based on all of the metrics that we canvassed

yesterday and based off of B.C. Stats of what the projection of population growth

is in each community.

A. Olsen: So B.C. Stats breaks down the potential growth for each community in the province

— or let's just say each community that's identified in the 85 currently. B.C. Stats

has a number by which they need to grow in the next 20 years. That number is available?

[11:40 a.m.]

Hon. R. Kahlon: B.C. Stats is one part of it. We've canvassed, at great lengths, the other components,

the five components that they have to consider in making their housing needs reports.

Many of the companies that do this work, consultants that are brought in, now will

be able to do it in a standardized way. When we collect that information, we'll be

able to see what the needs are, from the grassroots up.

A. Olsen: I recognize that we've canvassed this pretty extensively. The part that we canvassed

extensively was that the communities have already identified a growth rate. As I said

yesterday, the official community plan is done. They've identified a growth rate.

They've identified the areas in geography as to where that growth rate should be targeted

for. They've designated lands in order to accommodate that growth rate.

I have yet to have it made clear to me how it is that that connects — how Central

Saanich connects with Saanich, connects with Victoria, connects with the capital region,

how the capital region connects with the Lower Mainland and the most densely populated

parts of this province and how Kamloops and Kelowna and Prince George fit in. If we

don't have an overall targeted growth rate and no sort of coordinated determination

as to where we want those people to go, I'm not sure how it is that these communities

are supposed to come up with what their portion of it needs to be.

They're all working, like I said, in a microcosm to one another. Yes, we've got these

five guidelines, but the problem is that the minister has just suggested there's no

linkage between them, other than some B.C. Stats and some Stats Canada data.

Hon. R. Kahlon: I appreciate, certainly for me and maybe for other members, going in and figuring

out how the consultants come and model between ten and 20 years. We could be here

for ten and 20 years.

There is expertise. For most communities, when they get a housing needs report — the

member highlighted Central Saanich — there is expertise to help communities model

20 years out, based on the data that is available. That's what we're saying with this

— that we are making it standardized so that all communities are planning for 20 years

out.

A. Olsen: I mean, that's essentially…. There's a timeline now that the municipalities have.

The ones that have just completed their official community planning processes have

got their piece done. They got a bylaw freshly updated, as I was mentioning yesterday.

It has their targets.

But I don't know that the target the community has set is a target that has come from

other information other than the community. Past official community plans have said

that we're going to grow about 1 percent per year.

That was the number when the official community plan was being approved right before

the November 2008 municipal election that I got elected to the council in. They approved

that the last meeting before that election. They approved the official community plan,

and in that was: "We're going to grow at about 1 percent per year." And then they've

actually built their plan to that number.

What I'm wondering is…. I think that because we don't have it — and the minister can

be frustrated that he has to explain this — in front of us, because he hasn't provided

it to our colleagues at local government, he has to understand that he is at least

sharing frustration with hundreds and hundreds of other local government people who

are trying to understand what it is that he is….

Maybe he can walk us through and have it on the record, so it's there, what the intention

is behind the process for this, from the beginning all the way through to the end

of coming up with the housing needs, and how that informs the official community planning

process. It sounds like what the minister is suggesting is backwards from what's happened

in Central Saanich traditionally. I'm just wondering how they, as one example, but

others….

[11:45 a.m.]

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it's not opposite from what Central Saanich has done. That

would be good information too. It would help me understand the process, rather than

just saying: "I've talked a lot about this. I don't want to talk about it anymore."

"Let's move on to a different section" is the feeling that I'm getting with this.

But the reality is that I think it's worthwhile for the minister to articulate what

his intention is so that at least people know before we pass this bill, rather than

after the fact.

Hon. R. Kahlon: There are a few things there. The point I was making is that a lot of these questions

are questions that we've canvassed. We're canvassing the same questions over and over

again. That was the point I was trying to make to the member.

I can't speak to what happened on council when the member was there — I can't remember

the year — whenever it was.

The growth rate in population in B.C. is 3 percent. Planners, who are professionals

at this, understand what it means to plan for five years to ten years to 20 years.

They'll be able to now have certainty that they're planning for 20 years out. That's

what this clause does.

This clause says that communities will plan their housing needs reports for 20 years

out. That's what we're saying in this legislation. Planners understand what that means.

It's part of best practice. It's already happening. This is not something new. It's

happening in regional districts when they plan their growth plans. And now what it

does is it aligns it across the province.

I mean, I can continue to answer that question as many times as the members like to

raise it. But now I see the time has come short. So I move the committee rise, report

progress and ask leave to sit again.

Motion approved.

The committee rose at 11:47 a.m.

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