Amalgamation saves money
Dear editor: Even though I live in West Kelowna, I am spending more time driving to Kelowna to buy something. Every couple of months another store closes in West Kelowna and/or on Westbank First Nation land. There is no shortage of gas bars opening.
I was talking to a local business owner who was complaining about all the different municipal rules, regulations to opening/expanding a business in the Okanagan Valley.
Also, how some municipalities were flexible and others as rigid as could be.
Under our constitution, municipalities can be created, amalgamated, or disbanded by the provincial government which controls them. I have lived in two other provinces that decided to amalgamate municipalities. I lived in Nepean, a city with a population of 40,000. It was similar to West Kelowna where most of the people lived in Nepean, but worked in Ottawa.
In 2001, the provincial government amalgamated the regional district, Ottawa, the surrounding five cities and four townships into the City of Ottawa. It is now the fourth largest city in Canada and therefore receives a lot of attention from the provincial government.
The city uses a ward system and therefore you vote for the councillor in your area/ ward. Ottawa has a total of 23 councillors compared to each city, town and district in the Okanagan, which has a minimum council size of five.
I was the president of a community association before and after the amalgamation and my level of access to city staff and politicians increased after the amalgamation.
The City of Nepean had a financial motto of pay as you go, save up the monies rather than borrow and therefore had a sizable reserve. Fifty percent of that reserve was transferred to the new City of Ottawa and the other half was given back to the taxpayers. The former city halls were turned into client centres, libraries and community halls.
Any service centre can be used to obtain a permit/licence within the 2,500 sq km city boundary. Okanagan Lake is 350 sq km.
Maybe it’s time for our provincial government to contemplate this idea.
David Perron
West Kelowna