WEDNESDAY
June 10 2015
Vol. 106 No. 45
SOAP BOX 14
Doubling down on propertyy tax URBAN SENIOR 15
Vacationing in paradise SPORTS 23
Stars of track and field There’s more online at
vancourier.com MIDWEEK EDITION
THE VOICE of VANCOUVER NEIGHBOURHOODS since 1908
Premier punts to Vancouver City needs ‘better land use planning’
Mike Howell
mhowell@vancourier.com
IN THE ZONE “Soccer Sistas” Heidi Spect and Jennifer Angeli entertained fans at the Vancouver FIFA Fan Zone in Larwill Park downtown as the World Cup arrived in the city Monday. See Friday’s Courier sports section for an ongoing schedule of games. PHOTO DAN TOULGOET
Pot foes form lobby Coalition creates petition against city dispensary plan Mike Howell
mhowell@vancourier.com
A new group calling itself the Coalition For Dispensary Free Communities is urging the public to sign a petition and support its call to oppose the city’s proposal to regulate marijuana dispensaries. The group, which surfaced online last week, set up a website and has Facebook and Twitter accounts aimed at convincing city council to oppose the city’s proposal, which goes to public hearing Wednesday. It also urges residents to write letters to city council and news outlets. “The Coalition For Dispensary Free
Communities believes the ongoing proliferation of illegal narcotics dispensaries in Vancouver must be stopped and existing federal laws should be enforced,” the coalition writes on its website, which has a link to a petition. “We are a group of concerned citizens who have come together to gather opposition, to stand up and say ‘No’ and to tell the mayor and council to prohibit these illegal businesses.” The city wants to regulate the growing number of pot shops, which total more than 80 at the city’s last count, by charging an annual $30,000 licence fee, require criminal record checks and ensure the businesses are at least 300 metres
from a school or community centre. The Courier attempted to contact the founders of the group but was not successful before deadline. Pamela McColl, a director of Smart Approaches to Marijuana Canada, said the coalition contacted her last Wednesday, saying they needed her help because they are worried about “the destruction of their neighbourhoods” from the proliferation of pot shops. McColl, a book publisher who lives in Vancouver, said the group’s members want to remain anonymous “because they’re very, very frightened.” She declined to divulge the number of members. Continued on page 7
PARADE • PARK • CARNIVAL
Premier Christy Clark says the City of Vancouver could do more to create affordable housing by resorting to better land use planning and lowering fees and levies for new homes. Clark made the recommendations in response to Mayor Gregor Robertson’s May 22 letter that requested the B.C. government build more housing and implement a tax to penalize property speculators and increase the property transfer tax on luxury homes. “Using any method of new taxation with the goal of driving down the price of housing could have the unintended effect of hurting current homeowners across the region,” Clark said in her June 4 letter, which was circulated to various news outlets, including the Courier. “Driving down the cost of housing by just 10 per cent would mean a family with a home currently worth $800,000, could lose $80,000 in equity in their home. That could put some homeowners with large mortgages into negative equity.” Spreading that same 10 per cent calculation across Greater Vancouver, roughly $60 billion in home equity would be lost, according to a Ministry of Finance analysis of the real estate market, which was attached to Clark’s letter. While acknowledging she shares a concern with the cost of housing in Vancouver, Clark pointed to a report done last year by the Urban Development Institute that estimated Vancouver’s civic fees and levies add $76,144 to the price of a new condo unit worth roughly $450,000. She added that “beyond any new taxes to curb demand, there is also the option of increasing supply through better land use planning.” Continued on page 14
June 19 ~ 20 ~ 21