Staff and students at a West Vancouver private school can get loud during their graduation ceremony without fear of being fined for noise.
On Monday, council narrowly granted a special event noise exemption for Collingwood School with a 4-3 vote.
Couns. Linda Watt, Christine Cassidy and Nora Gambioli dissented because they said that the school hasn’t done enough to address noise issues and other ongoing concerns from members of the surrounding community.
Collingwood had applied for the exemption for its Grade 12 graduation commencement ceremony on June 19, from 4 to 6:30 p.m.
The event is scheduled to take place on the school’s artificial turf field, which is separated from a row of five single-family homes by a paved lane, residential fence, hedges and trees.
According to the district’s policy, the exemption couldn’t be considered by staff because more than 80 guests will be in attendance.
Staff said they received correspondence from five community members opposing the exemption request. Their concerns include “a lack of effective measures to address illegal on-street parking disruptions, safety hazards due to the number of attendees … and excessive noise disturbances generated from these events.”
School should install sound buffer, councillors say
Coun. Nora Gambioli said there have been lots of problems between Collingwood School and neighbours living in the area during her nearly 14 years on council.
“As an issue, I don’t think alone [the exemption] is a problem, but I think that we should ask for something in return,” she said. “They should install some kind of noise-buffering material on the eastern-side fences, which we and the neighbours have been asking for many, many years, which can stay up after this event.”
Coun. Christine Cassidy agreed that an ask for sound-mitigation from the school has not been met.
“It also irritates me beyond belief that when we were given [community amenity contributions] for a project in that neighbourhood … we are spending them in that neighbourhood to mitigate the issues caused by this school, and yet this school, in turn, has done nothing to assist in being what I would use, in brackets, a good neighbour,” she said.
But Coun. Scott Snider said the graduation ceremony and the other complaints are two separate issues.
“I do agree with you, for the contribution, that they could be providing back to that neighbourhood,” he said. “I think that they’re two separate issues, and for that reason, this is a special event for a two-and-a-half-hour period,” he said. “I don’t see that you can relate the two.”
Mayor Mark Sager said the district will find a solution with Collingwood to make improvements in the neighbourhood.
“I wouldn’t interrupt a 4 p.m. in the afternoon high school event at this point in time,” he said. “I just couldn’t do that.”
In an emailed statement, head of school Lisa Evans said Collingwood has a task force to collaborate with neighbours, mayor and council to address concerns about parking, traffic and noise.
“We are committed to finding shared solutions that support our students’ active learning while ensuring we are good neighbours,” she said.
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