The Town of Gibsons is nearing the final stages of its Official Community Plan (OCP) update and is encouraging residents to share their feedback before the current round of engagement closes on Aug. 25.
“We’re going through the entire plan and trying to simplify it, but also expand uses in the different land use designations,” director of planning Lesley-Anne Staats told Coast Reporter.
The draft plan incorporates recent studies and strategies, including the Urban Forest Plan, Active Transportation Network Plan, council’s new Strategic Plan, the Complete Communities Assessment, and the Housing Needs Report. “We’re filling it with a bunch of updated information,” she said.
Key changes include updated greenhouse gas reduction targets, revised development permit areas, and new geohazard mapping. Staats said this includes “areas subject to flooding from sea level rise or creek flooding, steep slope hazards and potentially seismic hazards.”
“We also have different neighbourhood plan areas, like the Upper Gibsons Neighbourhood Plan, the Gospel Rock Neighbourhood Plan, and the Harbour Area Plan. So all those plans are being retired and being incorporated into the main OCP,” she said.
Community input has been central to the process, said Staats.
“We built on the work that was done by the residents assembly … we put out a survey… and 75 per cent of survey respondents supported the residents assembly’s recommendations,” said Staats. “So they became the guiding principles in the new official community plan.”
While the OCP draft does not specifically address heritage buildings, recent discussions at the Advisory Design Panel highlight the importance of preserving Gibsons’ historic character.
During a January meeting, panel members reviewed a proposed development next to the Heritage Playhouse and noted that the “massive building dwarfs the Playhouse.”
These conversations reflect the kind of form and character considerations that the OCP’s updated development permit areas aim to guide.
Seven pop-up OCP engagement events reached 269 people, and the town is encouraging more residents to complete the online survey. “We’ve gotten some really good feedback on things we’ve missed or need to correct in the plan,” she said. “We’re hearing a lot of ‘this is great work,’… and then some areas where we could do better.”
A “What We Heard” report will be released in September. The final OCP is expected in October, with adoption targeted for December.
Residents can email [email protected] for more detailed feedback.
For more information or to participate, visit gibsons.ca/ocp-update.
The town also received funding through the federal Housing Accelerator Fund, which has helped support the update process.
Jordan Copp is Coast Reporter’s civic and Indigenous affairs reporter. This reporting beat is made possible by the Local Journalism Initiative.
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