Wildsight responds to City of Kimberley on boundary expansion
Dear Editor,
There have been a number of letters and articles in the Bulletin this week, as well as a mailout from the City itself, that take exception to the recently distributed Wildsight boundary expansion handout. I would like to make a few brief comments on some of the arguments we have seen.
1. It has been asserted that to prevent unwanted development we must take control of the land outside our municipal boundary by extending the boundary.
We can do this. Then when we build expensive homes on that land, we will find we have no control of the land just beyond the new boundary and someone can build a feedlot or gravel pit next to those million dollar homes. So then we need to expand again to protect that land, creating a new problem farther out and so on, and so on and so on. If the intent is to prevent unwanted development near residential areas, a wiser option would be to rezone parts of the concentrator hill lands currently inside the City boundary as green space buffer. According to the proponent’s consultant, a scenario something like this was originally suggested by City planning staff and rejected by the proponent for economic reasons.
2. The City has stated that “Kimberley’s professional water consultants have advised that there is sufficient water supply to support the City’s projected growth including the areas being considered in the Boundary Extension.”
Actually, what Dayton & Knight Consulting Engineers said in their August 27th technical memo is that unless we reduce our water consumption, Kimberley's peak demand "may exceed the capacity of the Mark Creek Supply System" with the build-out of the ski hill and boundary expansion lands. What's worse, their analysis doesn't include water use from areas currently zoned for development inside our existing boundaries, such as Lois Creek or the Watkins School site, or even current water use for irrigation on the Trickle Creek golf course. The memo also doesn't include snow-making, which has used as much Mark Creek water as the rest of Kimberley on some winter days in the past few years. Finally, the Dayton and Knight study does not consider leaving any water in the creek for the cutthroat trout.
To be prudent, we should postpone the boundary expansion for the time being, develop our water conservation programs and then see if we have enough water for expansion in 5 or 10 years time.
3. A number of people have argued that Kimberley needs to grow to support our tax base, fill our schools, create affordable and seniors housing and make us a vibrant community.
And it can grow, to 12,000 or more people using land inside our boundary, already designated for housing.
4. At the municipal election forum on Thursday evening every candidate spoke eloquently about the efforts made to revitalize the Platzl and support the local businesses around it. Taylor’s Mill proposes to build two new village centres on Concentrator Hill, complete with a village square, an outdoor amphitheatre, two pubs, at least two restaurants and some commercial/retail space. In what way will that support our existing downtown core?
This has been a great public debate and we hope that everyone gets out to vote on Nov. 15th.
Kent Goodwin
Wildsight Kimberley/Cranbrook
