Minutes - March 13th

Minutes

FVSG

13 March 2008, Fulford Hall, 3-5 pm

Core Group Members Present: Margaret Day, John Moore, John Rowlandson (chair), Ron Bain, Larry Woods (secretary)

Community Reference Group Members Present: David O’Flynn, Ted Bowland, Johan Gerritsen, Stan Shapiro

Community Members Present: Janice Gauthier, Gary Holman (CRD)

Regrets: Alan Goldin

[NB: All decisions taken by consensus.]

1. Adoption of agenda, including under Other Business: 1) Next meetings; 2) Waste Water; and 3) Fulford Profile.
2. Adoption of Minutes of 6 March meeting.
3. Chair’s Report: 22 vision statements re: Fulford in 2025 have been received from Fulford School children.  Thanks to Mr. Lightfoot’s class.
4. The Built Environment: Janice Gauthier spoke on the affordable housing on Salt Spring and in Fulford.  She is associated with the Murakami and Abbeyfield projects.  At present, all affordable housing projects are in Ganges.  She stressed the need on South End. Common community concerns re: safety, traffic, water, need for energy efficiency were discussed.  There are creative solutions.  BC Housing and Natural Resources Canada will provide funding for these sorts of projects.  Incomes on SSI are 15-20% lower than elsewhere in province and homelessness is an issue.  80% of market can afford a house of $250,000, while median list price is $800,000.  40% are spending 30% on housing.  Abbeyfield was discussed (to accommodate 10 seniors; might include a medical clinic open to public).  Habitat for Humanity option discussed.  Focus Group recommendations were noted and Janice supported the initiatives suggested.  Gary Holman noted that the Trust housing task force is exploring new ideas and the approval process could address various concerns.  Salt Spring taxpayers pay into a regional housing trust fund from which the Murakami and Grandma’s House projects have benefited.  A local fund could complement this.  The idea of minimalist housing was raised, as was the preference for building housing on SSI for people already living on SSI.  The latter can be done.  Janice indicated that the business community is concerned about housing for workers, but nothing is yet happening in this area.  The OCP talks of ability to change lot sizes for affordable housing in Fulford and nearby.  Questions about what nearby means were asked.  Janice noted that the Islands Trust is working on a housing needs assessment, sponsored by real estate association.  The school board and Abbeyfield are also involved.  This assessment should be available in about 6 months.  Using Fulford School for housing would be a sign of dwindling community in her view and is to be avoided if possible.  There is already strong political support for rezoning for affordable housing.  We may wish to comment on suites on SSI and if homeowners in Fulford can have suites.  We may wish to emphasize rental over owned, as the market does not provide or build rental housing.
5. John M presented working paper covering historical geography and natural environment.  Gary noted need to consider issue of storm drains and septic systems running off into harbour, tree cutting rules, and interface fire issues.  Do these issues need to be among development permit (DP) requirements?  Should Fulford have its own DP?
6. Requests for information from Trust: Maps have been received.  They still require interpretation re: boundary.  A build-out table was also received.  Gary indicated the CRD’s toll-free number is 1-800-663-4425.
7. Question Period: Could we propose no changes to Fulford at this time, while undertaking a detailed study of the next year?  Could the immediate need of Trustees be satisfied by proposing a freeze?  Can we do justice to all issues in next three weeks?  These questions would be taken up under new business.
8. Built Environment: The Chair introduced a list of guiding questions. What infrastructure needs to be upgraded for existing village?  Given state of infrastructure in village now, isn’t far more time needed to think things through?  Undeveloped lots accentuate problem.  But what is Fulford? Or should we consider everyone on SSI as part of Fulford?  Should we know responsibilities and costs before we define boundaries?  It was agreed we would respond to questions on email and John/Ron will synthesize for discussion at next meeting before we discuss Infrastructure and Open House idea.  Should we be at Fulford Flea Market, 29 March?
9. Next week (27 March) we will begin at 1:30 pm.  We will look at position paper and Focus Group recommendations (agree, agree with amendment, study further, and set aside).
10. Margaret reported on her demographic profile/survey of Fulford children, historical buildings, built/unbuilt lots, lots for sale, and businesses.
11. Ron introduced his draft paper on water and waste-water approaches.
12. Adjourned 5:35 pm.

 

LW 

Fulford Water Service Area Boundaries

The Fulford Water District/Capital Regional District have made this map available to the Fulford Study Group in digital format. The map immediately to the right shows the service boundaries of the Water District. These boundaries are different than the Village boundaries described in the Official Community Plan.  Note that the BC Ferries Terminal lies outside of the Water District. 

You can enlarge this map by placing your cursor over the map and clicking the left button. This will open another window with slide bars on the side and on the bottom. By moving these bars north-south and east-west you can see the whole map as well as the legend.

Working Paper #2 - Natural Environment

Fulford Village Study Group
Meeting of March 6th, 2008

Additions to: Understanding the Historical Geography

In discussion the following points were raised:

• Although there is provision for a Heritage Commission for Ganges in the 1998 OCP none has been formed to date.
• There is a need for some form of Historic Assets list for the village as a whole.
• There is provision under the Heritage Act to call for a temporary freeze (6 months to a year) on all development permits, while information is gathered in order to consider the implications of a Heritage Designation. James Bay was put forward as a good example of a local community where individual buildings had been designated as Heritage, rather than a whole district.
  

Concerns expressed:

• The need for Fulford to retain ownership of the concept of the “whole village”.
• The Heritage designation, if too particular (specific?) or bureaucratic, might stifle the
  village.
• That any decision re: Heritage should be enabling first and foremost.

Question to be answered:

1. Is there already provision in place to protect items/places of archeological importance
   within the Fulford village area?

Understanding the Natural Environment

General Agreement:

In terms of the environment, anything that affects Fulford should be within the purview
of the Study Group. Of particular concern were the effect of any development in Weston and Stowell Lake areas on the water supply of the village, and the health of Fulford Creek and Harbour. Also, it was recognized that any water supply development must be sustainable and nothave negative impacts on the watersheds.

All of the above underlined the need for baseline ecological studies of the Fulford area
watersheds and harbour before any decisions about further development could sensibly
be made.

The meeting shared the Focus Group’s concern over the problems of waste disposal by
live-aboards in the harbour. [NB: Johan Gerritsen offered to contact a friend who has been working on this problem elsewhere and report back]

Climate Change:
There was general agreement that, with the exception of the area in front of the Fulford
Inn, a worst-case scenario of a 2-metre sea level rise in 100 years would not adversely
affect any part of the Fulford area under discussion.

Water Supply:
John Rowlandson, speaking as Chair of the Fulford Water Board, said that the commitment to a proposed 20 housing units for seniors would leave the present supply in deficit, there being only an additional 10 units currently available. Forty percent of the water supply is currently believed to be lost due to leakage in the old system. In other districts where metering had been put in place consumption had gone down dramatically. Surface systems like Weston Lake are particularly vulnerable to contamination.

Energy:
Given the south facing, steeply sloping nature of Fulford solar potential should be considered.

Topography:
Planning, especially with regard to any proposed density transfers, should take into consideration vegetation and topography of the village. Voiced from the floor that density transfers should not be on the table for Fulford, given information already received. The focus in Fulford should shift to preserving what we have.

Viewscapes:
Voiced from the floor that there was a need to protect not just the view of Fulford Harbour but the also the view out from the village.

Zoning:
The group does not yet have all the information it needs regarding zoning.

Overall conclusion:
Discussion again underlined the need to identify what our natural assets are as a community and accept that they are finite.

Margaret Day, John Moore, Ron Bain
13 March 2008