Rob Shaw: Eby brushes off mayor revolt over B.C. housing laws |
Premier David Eby is shrugging off a blast of criticism on his housing policies from Metro Vancouver municipalities, telling a coalition of 15 mayors he’s not altering course or backing off on what they view as running roughshod over local community planning.
The mayors sent Eby a letter asking him to repeal legislation that set housing targets, mandatory density around transit hubs and mandatory zoning for quadplexes on single-family lots, saying the laws have caused chaos and backlash at a municipal level.
“Each community here is unique. One-size-fits-all does not work and it will never work,” Burnaby Mayor Mike Hurley said at a press conference flanked by numerous mayors at Metro Vancouver last week.
“The public does not want this and I would appeal to the premier to take a step back, start talking to municipalities, do some real communication with municipalities and allow us to do the job we were elected to do.”
No way, said Eby.
“In terms of backing off on the idea that someone should be able to build a townhome or a duplex or triplex, like I don't know why we would say to a family, ‘No, sorry you're not allowed to live in this established neighbourhood, we're not going to provide you options here, the only way to do it is through a multi-year rezoning process,’” Eby said.
“It would be nice if, voluntarily, cities would take this on. But the case is simple, that aside from some outstanding cities that really led the way here, the vast majority of municipalities in the province were unable or unwilling to make these necessary changes, and we had to take that step.”
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