The donation of a park to Squamish and rezoning the former Garibaldi Springs Golf Course to make way for housing has been pushed back by the District of Squamish's pet projects, says a local developer.
For the past year Doug Day has been waiting for his proposal to hand over 100 acres of the former golf course to the municipality and the rezoning of 45 acres to hit council's table, he told The Chief this week.
Last month, Townline Ventures Squamish Ltd. - who owns a portion of Day's 45 acres slated for development - held a public information meeting to discuss the proposed development. But since then, little has been done to move the project forward, said Day.
"We are not happy with the District of Squamish and the way that they've been dealing with this," he said. "They are jerking us around."
Thanks to some hardworking district staff, though, the project should come forward to Committee of the Whole on Tuesday (Nov. 8), Day said.
The project splits the 145-acre property into five parcels. As proposed, two of the parcels need to be rezoned to allow park use, while the three others are slated for single-family lots with a minimum lot size of 300 square metres.
Townline Ventures Squamish Ltd. owns a portion of the southernmost parcel and has a purchase option with Day to buy the remainder of the parcel and a chunk north of it (Parcel 4), said Tiffany Duzita, Townline's development manager.
"We are going for a subdivision of the parcel and the zoning," she told The Chief. "So we are strictly focusing on land use."
Not everyone sees the rezoning marching toward council as a step forward. Donald Byrne, who lives a block away from the proposed project, said the town claiming to be the Outdoor Recreation Capital of Canada needs two golf courses.
"It is the wrong thing for Squamish because it would be almost impossible to get another golf course site," Byrne said.
People bought townhomes and strata units at the Executive Suites Garibaldi Springs Hotel and Resort thinking the golf course was there to stay, he added. Placing a small-lot development on the property helps nobody, Byrne continued. The land is far away from schools and services, making it unsuitable for families, he said.
"It doesn't make any sense to turn a recreational area into housing when there is already lots of housing standing vacant," Byrne said.
