A landowner in Brackendale says he is “bewildered” that the District of Squamish is planning to borrow money to build a dike in Brackendale instead of letting him and another property owner do the job in exchange for developing residential housing on their land.
Council passed the first three readings of a dike upgrade loan authorization bylaw on April 5 to allow the district to borrow $899,786 for dike upgrades.
The funds will go toward an Eagle Viewing area dike upgrade, raising the Squamish River dike and Upper Judd Slough dike upgrades, according to district staff.
The total cost of the three projects, including financing costs, is $13 million, staff documents show.
“I’m bewildered at a municipality that would proceed with such debt to construct, in this case, Upper Judd Slough for nearly $9 million,” said Don McCargar, who lives in Edmonton and owns property in Squamish.
The district budget for the Upper Judd including financing costs is $8,850,000, according to the district.
McCargar said the expropriation of land for the dike statutory rights-of-way, which council has yet to approve, will cost even more.
“This, from my perspective, is an atrocity to say the least,” he said.
McCargar and another landowner have offered to help pay for a dike in their area if they can increase density on their properties at some point in the future. McCargar, who has property deemed high-risk for flood in the district’s Integrated Flood Hazard management Plan report, and the other landowner want to build a dike that would improve protection on their land and allow them to further develop in the future.
“I was proposing we will walk in and do dike upgrades… if they would help out with a little gravel from the gravel pit and a little riprap, and we would place it all and get the job done in six months,” he said. “We need some further development in terms of lots… to help recover the costs, and that is the standard way of doing business.”
McCargar said he has development permits for his land – which is designated greenway corridors and recreation – stalled at the district.
Mayor Patricia Heintzman said McCargar and other landowners in the area bought their properties knowing it was designated greenway in the Official Community Plan and knowing it was up to the district council whether or not to change the designation.
District staff has said not to put any more density on the properties owned by the landowners, “because this is a very at-risk area,” Heintzman said, noting the river’s velocity and volume.
McCargar spoke at a committee of the whole meeting March 22, when he offered the landowners’ plan for a dike.
At the time, Heintzman said the issue has to do with more than protecting just a portion of land or allowing certain landowners to develop in the flood area.
“The conversation is how do we ensure we are protecting Brackendale, how do we ensure that we are making a smart decision today for the future?” she told McCargar.
In 2014, council defeated an Official Community Plan amendment for 30 two-acre estate lots to be developed on McCargar’s property at the west end of Depot Road. Up to that point, five other applications had been submitted, according to The Squamish Chief stories at the time.
McCargar took the district to court over his land in 2009, and in 2011, the B.C. Supreme Court ruled the district had to give him a development permit to build a modular home on land, a request the district had denied.
The loan authorization bylaw, which is part of a package of loan authorizations sought by the district, must next go to the Inspector of Municipalities for approval, then an electoral approval process will be carried out and, if successful, council would consider the bylaw for adoption.
“I am a taxpayer in Squamish, and I am not in agreement with this,” McCargar said, adding that the landowners have a legal team and would be going over their options.
*** Please note this story has been corrected since it was first posted to correct a typo in the term riprap.
