What’s your vision for Corner Brook?
City seeks public input as it updates its sustainability plan
CORNER BROOK — Whether they're in the city of Corner Brook, the town of Gillams or the town of Benoit's Cove, it's important for businesspeople to be engaged in whatever goes on it those municipalities, Keith Goulding says.
The president of the Greater Corner Brook Board of Trade said they are the ones who live in, work in and service those communities as business owners.
“And we, as the board of trade, will be engaged whenever we can in making sure that the community that we live and breathe and work in is the best community it can be," he said. "Even if it's not directly related to business, it helps business owners attract and retain qualified employees.”
Goulding said he is quite certain the board will provide input as the City of Corner Brook goes about updating its integrated municipal sustainability plan (IMSP) and development regulations.
“It's important for us to see what the conversation is about as well,” he said.
Goulding said he worries that when governments make changes, they have to find a way of paying for it, and that could negatively affect businesses, so the board wants to be aware of that, too.
The city's IMSP and development regulations are its two main planning documents.
Randa James, the city's supervisor of planning services, said the IMSP is the city's policy framework and sets out how the city views the future based on the aspects it contains.
“It sort of lays out the city's vision,” she said.
The development regulations come out of that policy framework.
While both are constantly updated, the city is legally required to update both documents every 10 years, James said.
“Because a lot happens in 10 years.”
James said some areas being focused on in the current review include active transportation, the environment and climate change, urban agriculture, renewable energy, housing and residential development, and commercial and industrial development.
Making changes in the plan starts with a vision, and that comes from the community, James said.
“Which is why our public consultation piece is so important to us,” she said. “We don't want to tell people what to do. We want the residents to tell us what they want to do, what they want to be able to do that maybe they can't now. And that's important because this is our city, and we want to make it the best we can make it for everybody who lives here.
“The more people that can weigh in on what they want, the better off we are.”
To get that community input, the city has engaged the services of Uplands Planning and Design Studio of Nova Scotia.
The consultants have put together a website, www.cornerbrookplan.ca, that provides information on the process, copies of the existing documents and ways for people to have a say, including interactive maps and surveys that target residents, businesspeople, and developers and builders. People can also email comments or suggestions to hello@cornerbrookplan.ca.
The initial consultation process is expected to continue until July and might be followed with some in-person activities where people can also provide input and targeted consultations with specific stakeholder groups.
It's during this phase that the board of trade will have a few things to say, especially around tourism, Goulding said.
Goulding said Gros Morne always seems to be the main tourism focus of the province, but that means a lot of traffic bypasses Corner Brook.
“I'd like to get people off the road and coming to Corner Brook and actually spending time in Corner Brook,” he said.
There is more that can be done to make it accessible, and that includes building on the ATV access that could lead to a whole new tourism sector, he said.
“We should be doing whatever we can to promote the tourism sector, to get that new money coming into city, because there's only so much money in the city to sustain the city, so we've got to do something to build, to bring in new sources of revenue.”
Once the initial consultation is completed, Uplands will create a draft report, which will be made public for further comment before the final plan is developed. Review of the plan and approval by the province won't happen until next year.