Where they stand
Council by-election hopefuls discuss the Southlands
3
56th St. traffic
Delta aims to improve vehicle flow along Tsaw.’s main drag
7
Subscription service Sidekick Players offer ticket plan for upcoming season
23
Optimist
Preparations begin
Giants to start training camp in Ladner next week
Delta
Newsstand 50¢
YOUR SOURCE FOR LOCAL SPORTS, NEWS, WEATHER AND ENTERTAINMENT! WWW.DELTA-OPTIMIST.COM The Voice of Delta since 1922 SATURDAY, AUGUST 21, 2010
28
Ride for Dad
See Page 17
Rowers gather for Masters regatta at Deas Island A Canadian Masters Regatta was held at Deas Island Regional Park last weekend. Delta Deas Rowing Club had a good showing with six firsts, seven seconds and five third place finishes. The local group came second behind Vancouver in total aggregate points. Aniko Takacs (left), from Deep Cove Rowing Club, reflects from her polished metal boat. A Delta quad rowing team (above) heads out to the start line.
Committee agrees to disagree
Tsawwassen Area Plan group members unable to come up with unanimous position at final meeting Thursday BY
SANDOR GYARMATI
sgyarmati@delta-optimist.com
The Tsawwassen Area Plan Committee agreed to disagree when it comes to the Southlands. At the committee’s final meeting Thursday, the members discussed and voted on several policy directions for a new area plan, making a few amendments to several of them including the future of the Southlands. Agreeing they couldn’t come up with a unanimous position, the majority voted in favour of a staff recommendation to retain the current agricultural designation. The policy will also note that the committee couldn’t reach a consensus. The committee also voted
to remove a phrase stating several members supported some residential development as an incentive to encourage active farming on the majority of the property. Committee member Ian Robertson said keeping the agricultural designation doesn’t close the door to a future proposal being considered. “I do not think if we leave it as agricultural, which is the essence of the policy document, that it closes the door forever, or for a particularly long time, for anyone coming forward with a proposal,” he said. The land could probably support almost 2,000 homes, but whether it’s appropriate there is not for the committee to decide,
said Robertson. Helen Kettle, however, said she supported calling for some development in exchange for upgrading the land and putting it into agricultural production. She said further consultation was needed with the community, which drew jeers from some in the audience who interrupted the meeting several times. Tasked with coming up with a new area plan, which hasn’t been updated in almost 20 years, the committee’s most controversial subject has been the 538-acre Southlands property. It’s zoned agricultural but no longer in the Agricultural Land Reserve. The Century Group wants to develop it with 1,900 homes on
part of the site using concepts of new urbanism and agricultural urbanism. Opponents to any development have been demanding the site be retained for farming only. Committee member Laura Dixon at Thursday’s meeting said there’s also a diversity of opinion on what type of agricultural activity should take place there. A mail-out survey conducted for Delta found a majority were not in favour of allowing development, but the Century Group says a telephone survey it had done found a more even split. Coun. Bruce McDonald, chair of the committee, said it was a given there wouldn’t be a consensus among the committee mem-
bers since the issue is clearly a divisive one in the community. Coun. Heather King noted she would like to see the issue finally resolved because it’s not going away. “When you have agricultural land owned by a developer there is no closure,” she said. At the committee’s meeting on Tuesday, McDonald said a new area plan would not automatically change current zoning. Applications to amend zonings would still have to go through a public hearing process, he said. The new area plan, which calls for “modest growth” in Tsawwassen, is to go to council on Aug. 30. See AREA PLAN page 3