Staff at the District of Sechelt say the SSC Properties development proposal will be the first to go through a new sustainability criteria screening tool as part the approval process.
The company is looking to create a mixed residential and commercial neighbourhood on a 170-hectare (420 acre) parcel of land on Sechelt Inlet Road and it’s covering the cost of having the Whistler Centre for Sus-tainability create the screening tool.
The Centre is a non-profit that works with local governments and other organizations on sustainability issues.
The Centre’s Dan Wilson was on hand at the Dec. 16 planning and community development committee meeting to walk councillors through the screening tool and how it will be used.
Wilson said they used the District’s Official Community Plan, the Sustainability Action Plan and international standards like LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) ND, which is similar to the LEED rating for buildings, but applied at the neighbourhood level.
Wilson described the screening tool as “taking the definition of sustainability, and operationalizing it” to help the District assess whether a development project will move the community closer to its sustainability goals by looking at how the proposal stacks up in six broad areas, which include 80 different criteria: location and land use; natural areas and parks; neighbourhood design and mobility; building and infrastructure; economy and jobs; and community well-being.
Wilson said the criteria are “robust” and it would be hard for a development to meet all of them, but he added it will create a picture of, “What is this proposal doing to move toward that ideal, that sustainability goal? Is it moving quickly toward it, slowly toward it, or is it just kind of status quo?
“The idea is to go through it quickly, screen it, then have a discussion about where there are discrepancies [between how staff and the developer rank the project] or where something doesn’t meet the criteria,” he said.
Acting director of development services Mike Vance told the committee that “it won’t be a ‘scorecard’ – it will be a process.”
The idea the screening tool will be used by development proponents and staff prompted Coun. Alice Lutes to wonder if council, or the general public, will see enough detail.
“I see that it’s a staff and developers tool to use to a certain stage of the development. Will that information come to council that’s collected through the tool and then go to the public as part of the public hearing?” she asked.
Vance replied that it will be treated like any other part of the development application process and the information will be part of the background available to residents.
Coun. Darnelda Siegers said it could also make that information more user-friendly.
“This is a really nice tool,” she said. “It’s a way to take all of that paper and those binders and all of that information and put it at the fingertips of the planners and the developer so it can inform the process.”
Committee chair Mike Shanks noted, “Interpretation’s the big thing.”
The screening tool is still a work in progress and the Whistler Centre will be meeting with officials from SSC and District staff to finalize it in time to be used with the master plan the company is drafting for the development.
Although SSC is covering the cost of creating the screening tool, Vance said the District will pay to have it updated from time to time, and one of those updates could come this year.
The committee also endorsed a recommendation to apply for a grant from the Federation of Canadian Muni-cipalities’ Green Municipal Fund to help pay for updates to the Integrated Community Sustainability Plan in 2016. The District’s share of the cost would work out to around $37,000.
