Mayors close to unveiling referendum question
Closed- door session brings new civic leaders up to speed ahead of public meeting next week
Metro Vancouver mayors say they are close to unveiling a referendum question on transportation funding after spending a day cloistered in a closed- door workshop Friday.
Richard Walton, head of the mayors’ council on transportation, said the ballot would include a concise yes or no question on one of four proposed funding sources — the gas tax, vehicle levy, sales tax or regional carbon tax — with eight to 10 bullet points of where the money would be spent. He wouldn’t release further details until the question has been tweaked ahead of a public meeting next Thursday, when the region’s 21 mayors will officially vote on it.
Walton, who is also mayor of North Vancouver District, said it was necessary to meet in secret Friday afternoon to ensure the region’s seven new mayors, which include Surrey’s Linda Hepner and New Westminster’s Jonathan Cote, were up to speed on the process. Although the mayors’ council, which operates as part of TransLink, is not governed by legislation, Walton said it usually follows the Municipal Act for its meetings, which states municipal leaders can meet privately for matters of property, personnel and litigation.
Intergovernmental matters also fall under the legislation, Walton said, and it was within the mayors’ purview to hold a private workshop because they were discussing “strategic negotiations with the province.”
Media were not allowed to photograph the meeting room beforehand, while a security guard wouldn’t let anyone past the double glass doors to where the mayors were cloistered once the workshop started.
“Many of the council haven’t met since Oct. 17,” Walton said before the meeting. “We have to have a session to bring everyone up to speed. It’s effectively like a cabinet meeting, the same thing.”
Veteran mayors, as well as newcomers, agreed the meeting should not be public because of the serious subject matter. Outgoing Surrey mayor Dianne Watts noted the seven new mayors were there as observers and they should have the chance for open discussion, while Langley Township’s Jack Froese said “this is an important issue that is going to affect transportation for years to come and we have to get it right.”
Walton said all mayors will be able to speak at length during the public vote next week. If approved, the referendum question will then go to the provincial government for approval before the mayors’ council — along with what the mayors say could be one of the broadest yes-side coalitions that B. C. has ever seen — starts marketing the referendum to the public.
Walton said he is optimistic the referendum question will be approved, despite some “confusing” messaging from B. C. Transportation Minister Todd Stone, who said this week the council’s $ 7.5- billion transit expansion plan over a 10- year time frame “does not strike me as affordable.”
The plan calls for expanded services across the region, including more buses, a four- lane Pattullo Bridge, light rail for Surrey and a subway for Vancouver.
Stone noted that over the past 30 years of transit investments in Metro, major rapid transit projects like the Canada Line and Expo and Millennium Lines didn’t add up to $ 7.5 billion in 10 years.
“I’ve said very clearly and publicly as well to the mayors that an ask of $ 1.5 billion in a 10- year time frame is probably about twice what’s realistic,” Stone told The Vancouver Sun Friday. ” Now this is where I’ve also suggested if they were to stretch out their time frame somewhat, if they were asking for $ 1.5 billion from the province over a 15- or 20- year time frame, that is likely more doable. But within a 10- year time frame there’s just no chance that will happen.”
Walton said both he and Metro Vancouver board chairman Greg Moore have been in touch with the province and continue to negotiate. He added the mayors’ council has been working consistently on crafting the proposal and “obviously the intent isn’t to ambush the other one.”
“The minister has advance knowledge of what’s happening,” Walton said, adding the public expects to see the mayors’ council and the province work seamlessly together.
The mayors argue the transit expansion plan is desperately needed in order to handle another million people — and a potential three million more automobile trips per day — in the region by 2041.
“There’s no Plan B at this point; this is the plan,” Walton said. “If this does not pass in this region, it’s going to be a fair length of time before the funds do come to expand transit.”
Meanwhile, backroom support for a pro- transit vote is growing among business, labour, environmental and student groups in the region. Delegates at the B. C. Federation of Labour convention have unanimously agreed to back the transit referendum, while the Vancouver Board of Trade is preparing strategies on how to market the campaign once it gets underway.
At the same time, post- secondary student societies are already on board to ensure that tens of thousands of students in Metro Vancouver are registered to participate in the March referendum, likely to be conducted by mail- in ballot.