Canada needs national condominium-insurance program

Re: Best terms, bad deal: Secretive condo insurance price model may be boosting rates

Your article on condo insurance reveals that a handful of multinational insurance corporations are making all of the significant decisions regarding condo insurance in B.C. and in Canada. None of the provincial authorities in the article appear willing to recognize the broad implications of this fact.

They should also realize that a made-inCanada solution is the only viable and economically sound response to what is actually a national condominium-insurance problem.

If Canada, through CMHC, can create a successful national mortgage-insurance program, can we not also create a national condominium-insurance program for the whole country?

Canadians are paying for the losses of multinational insurance companies from fires in Australia and the U.S., and floods in the Caribbean. Did insurance rates for condominium corporations accelerate over the last several years because of significant condominium losses in Greater Vancouver? There is no evidence of that in the article. We need a made-in-Canada solution to address the condominium-insurance crisis.

— Richard Bushey, Richmond

Stop the abuse of farm land

B.C. has about three-per-cent arable land called “farm land.” The farm land in the warm valleys are very important for growing food. I have been in Kelowna since 1963, so I have been witness to many changes.

I saw Orchard Park grow from a large pear orchard to a paved parking lot — and no fruit. I watched 110 acres of prime farm land at the south end of the airport become a golf course, never to grow food again.

There are 25 acres between the mega churches on Springfield Road just waiting to be developed into condominiums and shopping as soon as it is released from the ALR. The city of Kelowna bought 33 acres to build a future sewer plant — there will only be smell developed there.

Now for the abuse: We see prime farm land covered in weeds, gravel piles from Mission Creek, topsoil stripped away to be sold, salty snow dumped on farm land, and so on.

The owners do not care what happens to this land — they wait for the ALR and the city to OK the release of the land to build on it.

Where are the city bylaw officers with respect to the noxious weeds growing wild on farm land? Do they wait for a complaint before writing a summons to cut the weeds?

If you own farm land, should some form of “farming” not occur so the soil is treated with respect? We will just have to import all our food from California and Mexico — the hell with our farm land, especially if I can afford to have it sit idle until I am able to build on it.

— Jorgen Hansen, Kelowna

— THE CANADIAN PRESS FILES A report commissioned by the B.C. government says insurance premiums for condominium buildings have increased by as much as 40 per cent year over year. A reader suggests it’s time Canada created a national insurance system.