Auxiliary on board
Group pledges $2.4 million for hospital expansion
3
Bill brought back MLA pushing to have election date changed
7
At Home
Colour takes the gold
15-19
Optimist Delta
Newsstand $1
Basketball playoffs DSS junior boys team opens Valleys with win
27
Sport Showdown
YOUR SOURCE FOR LOCAL SPORTS, NEWS, WEATHER AND ENTERTAINMENT! WWW.DELTA-OPTIMIST.COM The Voice of Delta since 1922 WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 2014
See Page 22
SCAN WITH TO REVEAL PHOTOS & VIDEO
Southlands tab tops $300,000 BY
JESSICA KERR
jkerr@delta-optimist.com
PHOTO BY
Long-awaited dredging began in the secondary channels of the Fraser River late last month. The $10 million project will continue until November.
GORD GOBLE
Dredging proving costly
Money set aside to clear river channels in the future to be used this time around BY
SANDOR GYARMATI
sgyarmati@delta-optimist.com
The silt will build up again in Ladner Harbour and the Fraser River’s secondary channels, but there’s no money set aside to deal with that eventuality. That bit of news was one of many issues covered during a media roundtable with DeltaRichmond East MP Kerry-Lynne Findlay, who’s the minister of national revenue, and her guest,
Fisheries and Oceans Minister Gail Shea, at Findlay’s constituency office in Ladner Monday. After years of lobbying by the Ladner Sediment Group to have local channels of the river cleared, dredgers finally got to work last month on a $10-million project, a collaboration between Port Metro Vancouver, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, the B.C. Ministry of Transportation and See DREDGING page 3
PHOTO BY
GORD GOBLE
Federal cabinet ministers Kerry-Lynne Findlay (right) and Gail Shea met with the media Monday.
Delta shelled out more than $300,000 to process Century Group’s development application for the Southlands. The list of costs submitted to civic politicians Monday night includes $131,348 for three consultant reports, $98,844 for the five-day public hearing, more than $25,000 for two public information meetings and $58,000 in legal costs. The grand total comes in at $345,525. Century Group paid $43,381 in application fees to Delta. Jeff Day, director of community planning and development, said fees are based on a schedule in Delta’s bylaws. “The fee schedule considers the costs of staff time to process applications but it does not require applicants to pay the actual costs incurred by Delta in relation to individual development applications,” stated a report from Day to Delta council. Coun. Sylvia Bishop expressed concerns over the discrepancy between the actual cost of processing the application and how much Century Group paid in fees. “It seems to me that for the municipality, for our citizens, to bear $300,000 for an application when the applicant has paid $43,381 seems to be a little lopsided,” she said. Bishop put forward a motion asking municipal staff to look into the possibility of creating a sliding scale of development application fees. See SOUTHLANDS page 4