It's difficult to know what to think in the aftermath of this week's Squamish council decision to appoint two of its members to a new Squamish Oceanfront Development Corp. (SODC) board of directors. Certainly, the online chatrooms were all-a-twitter with statements of outrage, and not without reason. The most oft-repeated point seemed to be that the optics of two current members of council being named to the board of a project in whose future the entire community has a huge stake - when they're slated to leave office in just a few weeks - are all wrong.
On that point, this writer is inclined to agree. On the surface, it looks like an attempt to stack the board with people who have signed off on a document (the Sub Area Plan) that lays out a blueprint for how development of Squamish's Oceanfront should proceed. Doing so right after an election, on the surface, makes it appear as though it's being done to ensure that the current decision-makers play a continuing role in this most important project. Nothing wrong with having them on board, but if a new leadership group is to be named, why not wait until after the Nov. 19 election and let the new council decide?
So perhaps the process of appointing members to the SODC, Squamish Sustainability Corp. and the board of other, similar district-controlled groups needs to be reviewed and made more transparent. Still, the reality is that the current council felt it was time to make a change. It has that authority; the new council will have the authority to turf one or all members of the SODC board any time it chooses after it's sworn in, if it so desires. While this move is certainly controversial, it's not one that should leave us all with our knickers in a knot.
More to the point is the question of whether the new people are the right people. All along, the intention has been to appoint a re-constituted board sometime after the Oceanfront Sub Area Plan was approved. That took place in June, so the appointment of new board members was overdue. There's little question that Paul Lalli and Greg Gardner have the passion and commitment to the community to help carry the project forward. But now that the community has weighed in and the Sub Area Plan has been adopted, are they best able to attract participants in the project from the development community?
Coun. Rob Kirkham, who is also seeking the mayor's chair in the upcoming election, seems to think so. He said the two sitting councillors' commitment is unquestioned and added that he and Councillors Doug Race and Corinne Lonsdale voted for a group that was meant to be "a smaller, more dynamic board that can drive the project ahead."
For the sake of the entire community, we hope he's right. If not, there's always the next council to ride to the rescue.
- David Burke
