A proposed 850-home development near a new hospital has been given another chance after a North Cowichan councillor changed his mind on where higher density development should be allowed in the Bell McKinnon area.
Coun. Chris Istace said he’s clearly heard the need for local governments to be more proactive on housing after talking to other local government leaders and the passage of housing bills by the B.C. NDP government this year.
“The consensus is we kind of need to hurry up and get out of the way,” he said.
Istace said he initially voted against the proposal when it first came to council in March over infrastructure cost concerns.
But this past week, Istace voted in favour of an Official Community Plan amendment that would expand the urban containment boundary north of Herd Road by an additional 108 acres.
Istace said it does not make sense to draw the urban containment boundary on Herd Road, where the new hospital is located.
There are 150 individual land lots south of Herd Road and there’s no guarantee that landowners are in favour of development, he said.
It’s good news for developer John Lichtenwald, whose proposed West Vista development has been deadlocked since 2022 after North Cowichan excluded the development from its urban containment area as part of an Official Community Plan update.
“If you weren’t in the urban containment boundary, the planning department won’t even deal with you,” he said.
He and wife Elaine have been paying about $100,000 a month to service the debt they took on to purchase 31 acres of land across from the $1.4-billion hospital that’s under construction, Lichtenwald said.
“No banks during COVID were doing land loans so we ended up paying a premium,” he said.
In March, the Litchtenwalds’ first application to have their property included in the urban containment boundary failed by a three-three council tie vote. This past week, the vote passed four-to-two.
Council normally consists of seven members but Coun. Debra Toporowski, who was absent for the March vote, has since resigned her seat on council after being elected MLA for the Cowichan Valley.
Mayor Rob Douglas, who voted against the 108-acre expansion of the urban boundary alongside Coun. Christopher Justice, said residents have been “loud and clear in that process that they didn’t want to continue on with the urban sprawl.”
The initial 2022 urban containment boundary was set after significant public engagement, he said; “75 per cent of our residents who responded to our surveys wanted more focused growth rather than urban sprawl.”
“If there’s more than enough land available, if there’s already a lot of building activity taking place and planned as well, it’s not the time to be opening up more rural lands to development.”
Municipal plans have designated Bell McKinnon as an area that could see 6,000 new homes in the next 20 years for North Cowichan, which currently has about 14,000 homes, Douglas said.
Once the site of the Cowichan Tribe’s S’amuna (Somenos) winter village, Bell McKinnon was taken over by homesteads and farms following European settlement and the area was renamed after two early settler families, the Bells and the McKinnons, who lived on either ends of Bell McKinnon Road.
Douglas said there are six rezoning applications for developments south of Herd Road that would bring a combined 2,150 units of housing to the Bell McKinnon area.
Staff have estimated that there are about 50 years’ worth of land supply for housing within North Cowichan’s urban containment boundaries set in 2022, Douglas said, adding that North Cowichan is already well on its way to meet its B.C. provincial housing targets of 1,233 units in five years.
Douglas said the Official Community Plan amendment will have to go to public hearing.
Lichtenwald said the first buildings in West Vista could be ready in 18 months following municipal approval. The development will need a zoning amendment, development permit, and building permit before construction can begin.
