Residents living below Third Street in Moodyville will be getting some extra attention from City of North Vancouver planners in the next few months as the city revamps and refines its draft official community plan.
The draft OCP released in December calls for the neighbourhood of primarily single-family homes to allow townhouses. But, since the public consultation typically only catches a fragment of the community at large, council members thought the neighbourhood ought to have a closer look when it comes to the substantive change contained in the proposed OCP.
The neighbourhood has already had to contend with massive change courtesy of the Low Level Road project and expansion of coal and grain handling facilities on Port Metro Vancouver's waterfront property.
Following a 7-0 vote at council Monday night, property owners between St. Patricks and Queensbury avenues will now be subject to "area specific consultation" by way of a direct notification of potential OCP changes from the city, a city-run information session and a mail-out survey that lays out a number of options for the neighbourhood and offers a various chances to respond.
This process is over and above the consultation the rest of the city is invited to be a part of through the regular CityShaping OCP review, including public information sessions, focus groups, online and paper feedback forms, a town hall meeting and public hearing, which are expected to roll out over the next four months with a council vote on the OCP in June.
Council had also considered a plebiscite - a legal but non-binding vote - to gauge what individual homeowners thought about Moodyville at an estimated cost of $70,000. That proved too pricey for council. By contrast, the survey method is expected to cost less than $5,000 and fit within the existing OCP budget.
"I think the way we're going here. .. is more costeffective and will, in essence, achieve the same thing - that of taking the pulse of the people," said Coun. Rod Clark, who had originally asked for a plebiscite.
Clark asked whether in the meantime a similar process could be carried out for the rest of the city's single-family neighbourhoods, since the draft OCP calls for allowing all single-family homes to contain both secondary suites and coach houses. The prevailing concern, Clark said, is that assessments will go up for all of the property owners, whether they have or plan to have a coach house and secondary suite or not.
"If that is indeed the case, they will be paying more taxes unless council, in its infinite wisdom, drops the mill rate, which in my experience, we have not, ever," he said.
Clark pledged to make a motion calling for a similar staff report with similar options for council to consider at a future council meeting.
But that is the type of issue the public is currently being asked to comment on as part of the feedback period on the draft OCP, Mayor Darrell Mussatto said.
"To be very clear, the OCP is out for public consultation now. Many of those issues that you raise are exactly what staff want to hear (about) and that's what we're expecting to hear from the public," Mussatto said.
One area resident came to the council meeting to give them a head start on their enhanced consultation.
Jan Malcolm, a Fourth Street resident, said the city needs to focus on existing problems in the neighbourhood - inadequate bus service, a shortage of street parking and the use of neighbouring streets as shorcuts when arterial roads like Third and Keith Road become clogged due to bridge accidents.
"Something needs to be done before you start making these broad policy considerations because it's just a disaster looking for a place to happen," she said.
