A pause in the process to honour a First Nations request won’t necessarily delay a 50-unit affordable housing project, last week’s Salt Spring Local Trust Committee (LTC) meeting heard.
And since there’s concurrent work that can be done in that interim — and since Tsawout First Nation representatives have indicated they fully intend to provide comment on that project, but need time to consider it at their own meeting, according to staff — LTC voted Thursday, Oct. 16 to stop short of passing third reading of the bylaw that would rezone property at Kings Lane.
The Gulf Islands Senior Residence Association (GISRA) originally acquired that land to build another seniors’ housing complex, similar to the Meadowbrook independent living residences it currently operates — and in 2020, the LTC rezoned the property to allow 50 such housing units.
But as the market shifted, GISRA said, the seniors’ housing model wasn’t economically viable for the society; and with so few options for workers on Salt Spring, a move towards creating more broadly available affordable housing began — shepherded by local trustees, Salt Spring’s Local Community Commission and Capital Regional District director Gary Holman.
The LTC plans, through amendment of Salt Spring’s Land Use Bylaw, to create a new “R13” zone specific to the Kings Lane property, permitting the use GISRA envisions. Trustees agreed Thursday the project was consistent with the Islands Trust’s extant Policy Statement and passed the first two readings unanimously, while agreeing to wait for Tsawout’s comments to arrive before proceeding to the third.
“So that will be coming, ideally before November,” said regional planning manager Chris Hutton.
“But for the purposes of where we’re at right now, there’s a housing agreement process that needs to be completed [anyway] before we move this application forward to third reading.”
According to a staff report, Tsawout First Nation requested a 30-day extension of the referral period as they believe the amendment to the land use bylaw that would effect the rezoning is likely to adversely affect their rights and title interests.
Islands Trust staff, trustees and indeed proponents have characterized the rezoning for the parcel as “relatively minor,” as it would not materially change the number of dwellings already permitted from an earlier LTC decision on the property.