It's eyes on the skies at New West council

Editor’s note: you can find full Twitter threads on the coverage here and here. There was a lot…so the meeting was tweeted out in multiple parts.

As was previously the case with Burnaby, New West council heard Monday night about the changes poised to come to our skies: NAV Canada gave a presentation about modifications that would shorten flight routes and create more precise flight paths.

But that wasn’t the only sky-related discussion that took place: talk of an Air Quality Application for part of Queensborough was top of mind.

Also up for discussion: the notice of motion report, which included a recommendation to limit councillor motions to one per meeting.

NAV Canada flight path

Jonathan Bagg of NAV Canada spoke to council about the purpose of the changes to the flight paths, which would impact the skies above New Westminster: shortening the flight routes would result in reducing the distance flown, theoretically reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The not-for-profit added the move also accounts for an increase in air traffic in the years ahead.

Bagg said this was an industry standard that was being adopted globally, followed by a top-down adoption within countries. He added that the current way in which said traffic is managed is not sustainable for the long-term.

“One of the key technologies that is behind this change is something called Required Navigation Performance (RNP). Basically, RNP is a new type of arrival procedure…that basically allows an aircraft to fly a three-dimensional path in the sky,” Bagg explained. “That makes it easier for us to design safe, efficient, and predictable procedures.”

Coun. Fontaine said that if he’d had it his way, NAV Canada would have been presenting to council much earlier—when New West residents would have been able to submit feedback.

“I can confirm we reached out to municipalities in the region, in advance of consultation,” replied Bagg, “so we were quite proactive in multiple follow-ups with each of the municipalities in the region…we were proactive, so I’m actually surprised at some of the comments that we didn’t reach out, because in fact we did.”

Fontaine wanted to know how many people responded in the engagement with the New West community—Bagg was not able to give an exact number. Fontaine followed up to ask how an increase or decrease in noise would be measured, with Bagg saying there is no formal installation of noise measurement, but that NAV Canada does work with the Vancouver Airport Authority when monitoring.

“I think the bottom line people will have is, ‘Will I hear more noise? And will I hear noise more often?’” added Coun. Jaimie McEvoy.

City staff have also provided NAV Canada with a number of questions for it to follow up on, and a report is slated to come back to the city at a later date.

Air Quality Application impacting Queensborough

The application is connected to Cedar Island Re-Manufacturing.

“The purpose of this application is to request authorization to discharge air contaminants from a lumber manufacturing facility located at 320 Ewen Avenue,” a report on Metro Vancouver’s website reads. In a report to council, staff said they were notified about the application on Dec. 14, 2022.

“Although Metro Vancouver has jurisdiction of air quality within its boundaries, the City is invited to review the Environmental Protection Notice…for this permit application and provide comments to Metro Vancouver for consideration,” the report to council reads.

Two residents who live near Cedar Island spoke during the delegation period to say they were already disappointed with all the sawdust that falls on their homes.

“We’ve been here since the beginning, for six years, and we’re the second house over from the mill,” explained Katherine Thompson. “Like, I’m not just exaggerating. My kids cannot go outside. [My son goes outside] to play soccer, and he’ll run back inside saying, ‘Mom, I can’t breathe.’”

Residents also noted they’d heard the plant was going to be closed in favour of adding a grocery store to the area, though it was later clarified in discussion that that would have been a part of the so-called Queensborough Triangle—not where the plant is currently.

Staff explained that Port Royal was designed on the assumption that there would be a residential development at the edge in question. Ultimately, staff noted it’d be up to the owner to transition elsewhere.

“I’ve been on council now for three months, and so maybe this isn’t a pattern, but it’s kind of the second time this has happened where residents have come in—and I’ll use the first example with Sapperton—where they said, ‘When we bought these places, we were told the train whistles were going to be stopping,’” said Fontaine. “Now we’re hearing from residents in Queensborough that they purchased, they invested their savings to buy these homes with the understanding that this mill was going to be a Save-On-Foods and [have] a cafe, and everything else. And now they’re choking on whatever’s coming out of the top of that cedar mill.”

Ultimately, Mayor Patrick Johnstone suggested that Metro Vancouver do a better job at meeting the threshold of consultation, and that a recommendation along those lines be passed to Metro Vancouver. Fontaine suggested the city take a stronger position to say that it doesn’t want any additional emissions than what currently exists.

Council agreed.

Staff’s report and recommendation on notices of motion

You may remember that, during the Jan. 30 meeting, Fontaine asked staff to report back on how the notice of motion worked during council. The procedure had changed since former mayor Jonathan Cote’s time leading council.

In the report submitted to council for review—which included recommendations to improve the bylaw—staff noted the need for a revision to the procedure bylaw, which included an ask to limit the number of notice of motions at each meeting to one per council member.

“The limit on the number of Notice of Motions at each meeting is designed to allow the existing staff adequate time to process the Notice of Motions within the allocated time frame,” the report from the Office of the Chief Administrative Officer reads.

Prior to the Monday night meeting, Couns. Fontaine and Paul Minhas—under the banner of the New West Progressives—sent out a press release calling out the recommendation to limit notices of motion “an attempt to muzzle us and ration democracy.”

“What’s being brought forward at tonight’s council meeting is a plan to severely limit the number of motions a councillor can bring forward to one per meeting,” Fontaine said in Monday morning’s statement. “City council is the place to bring forward and challenge ideas, not the place to limit debate or ration democracy because the mayor and his caucus colleagues don’t like what we’re proposing. I’m unaware of any other city in our province that tries to muzzle councillors like this.”

During the meeting, Fontaine wanted to know how what he’d asked for during the Jan. 30 council meeting became a report with graphs, charts, and background data. He also asked for clarity as to whether motions could be further limited, with staff replying to say that it’s ultimately up to council to add, take away from, or modify the policy.

“We felt that it was important to council to talk about the staffing challenges,” replied CAO Lisa Spitale, adding that staff had been asked by council to be up front about the challenges it faced if employees were unable to do their jobs. “This was the quickest of way of saying that they’re struggling. They’re struggling with the amount of time it takes to deal with [notices of motion].”

According to the CAO’s report, a member of council is required to submit the notice of motion to the city clerk eight business days prior to the council meeting, as it “will ensure that there is adequate time to assess whether changes may be needed.” A cited example during the meeting included whether the language properly captured the scope of the motion up for consideration.

Coun. Tasha Henderson said she believed the recommendations from staff were coming back to council in good faith, and that her takeaway from the report was to find more effective and efficient ways to bring ideas to the table.

“To me, that this strays slightly from the original motion is moot because they have the bits in there, purview to bring to us suggestions to streamline processes without council direction. And I would argue that, I think it’s fair to say that we have actually given them direction to do that,” Henderson said.

In response to simply voting down a motion that council didn’t agree with, Coun. Nadine Nakagawa said it wasn’t about having five minutes of debate and voting them down, but the scope of the work that the staff put into the notice of motion.

“I don’t think this is stunting democracy, I think this is streamlining, and I think this is being respectful to staff or plans.”

“We have to strike a balance between the various loads on this body and on the city, and I think that … the idea that we will limit a night’s discussion of motions from members to seven seems like a pretty reasonable limit on that ability of that part of the work we do, so it doesn’t overwhelm the other parts of the work we are doing,” Johnstone said.

Minhas called the approach “heavy handed”: “If this passes, councillors will have their hands tied. Good ideas, doesn’t matter what side it comes from, it limits the thought process because of political interference.”

As Coun. Ruby Campbell and Mayor Johnstone called point of order after Minhas’s comments, a member from the gallery stood up and started to yell at mayor and council.

“You people are out of control…you’ve raised our taxes…you’re nuts!” The man continued to rant for about a minute as the mayor asked the man to leave the chamber, and one of the staff members asked if security was around.

Eventually, this motion was referred to workshop, but before that was done, Campbell wanted to underscore that staff had been heard.

“We’ve heard them, we hear them; we’re listening…sometimes I feel like that can’t be said enough. And I’m OK with tabling this after listening to further discussion, but I don’t want that to be reflective, that we haven’t heard that, and I don’t want this to continue to be an issue for staff.”

Some other highlights from council…

Shrek and Pinocchio were delegates. OK, they were actually played by two students from New West Secondary School’s Musical Theatre group, Sophie Campbell and Rebecca Vander Zalm. Both will be making appearances in Shrek: the Musical, which runs from March 1 to 4. You can purchase your tickets here. 

Heritage designations. A number of plaques were handed out to locals who had successfully been granted heritage designations—there were 11 total.

The use of the Anvil Centre: Kurt Wipp, who owns Piva, discussed the need to better champion the Downtown centre, noting he felt that the programming could be more consistent, and that the space needed someone dedicated to better advocate for it.

Parking issues near Bully’s. Rob Leishman said his already struggling business was having more problems with a lack of parking. While he is supportive of the bike lane running along the soon-to-be-completed Agnes Greenway, he wanted to alert council to the fact of potential loss of gigs with bands going elsewhere to practice. Staff have committed to following up with Leishman to assist him with this issue.

Formalized partnership. Campbell’s motion formalized a relationship between the New Westminster Fire Department and the Gurdwara Sahib Sukh Sagar, so that it can explore potential ways to support emergency needs in Queensborough. This Gurdwara was the same one that helped a number of motorists stranded during November’s snowstorm.

The next council meeting is scheduled for Monday, Feb. 27 at 6:30pm, with a public hearing scheduled to take place before that at 6pm.