Editorial: Councillors should have known funding was available

Despite expensive travel to connect with higher levels of government, committee missed out on this one

The province handed out $9 million to 56 BC municipalities last week — but Prince George wasn’t one of them. Somehow, our elected officials didn’t know about the Local Government Development Approvals Program, which helps municipalities streamline the permit process to accelerate housing construction. Seventy local governments applied.

Fifty-six of them received funding in the first round, including Vanderhoof, Dawson Creek and Prince Rupert. Prince George got nothing. Not because other cities won out, but because PG didn’t even apply.

For the city councillors on the city’s Standing Committee on Intergovernmental Affairs who have spent months insisting their recent advocacy trip to Victoria was worth it, this should be embarrassing. The councillors on that committee — Garth Frizell, Kyle Sampson, Susan Scott — have defended their taxpayer-funded junkets to Victoria and Ottawa by arguing that maintaining relationships with decision-makers at higher levels of government is essential to securing funding and advancing Prince George's interests. After their Victoria trip, they pointed to their meetings with cabinet ministers and Premier David Eby as evidence that the city was making its case.

As we argued then, that access is meaningless without results. (A fourth member of the committee, Coun. Brian Skakun, voted against the travel funding and did not go with the other three.)

Sampson, Scott and Skakun told us that they didn’t know the funding program existed, but said that wasn’t an issue — they would not have been interested because development approvals are primarily a municipal responsibility, while their advocacy efforts have focused on infrastructure. Sorry, councillors. We’re not buying that.

The province is offering municipalities money to improve a municipal responsibility, so why wouldn't Prince George ask for it? Every municipality is responsible for its planning and permitting processes, and that’s why this program exists. The province recognizes that local governments often need additional resources to modernize systems, hire expertise and reduce approval timelines.

This available funding should have been on the committee members’ radar. They should have started the process to apply. Prince George should have had a share of that $9 million.

The city needs it. We know this because of the experiences people continue to share with us. The Citizen has heard from builders, developers, business owners and residents who describe development approvals in Prince George as frustratingly slow and unnecessarily cumbersome.

Individual projects differ, and anecdotes are not data, but when the same concerns are raised repeatedly by people navigating the system, they deserve attention. It’s an issue we’re investigating. In other words, funding intended to improve permitting may not solve every problem, but it certainly would have helped.

Sampson told us that Prince George meets its provincially mandated housing targets and suggests future funding rounds could support his proposal for a fast-track permitting program. That’s all the more reason to apply and use readily available provincial funding to do it. Sampson’s dismissal of this opportunity is baffling when he should have been aware of a major grant that would have boosted his proposal.

Frizzell’s deflection that municipalities desperately need more predictable infrastructure funding misses the point. Of course, Prince George should continue pressing Victoria for roads, water systems, sewer capacity and every other investment required to support growth. But this isn’t about that.

This was easy money that Frizzell, as the chair of Intergovernmental Affairs, should have been aware was available. These same councillors in their last term were oblivious about, or chose not to join, the Northwest BC Resource Benefits Alliance — a group of communities from Vanderhoof to Masset advocating for a fair share of resource revenue. That decision cost the city of Prince George its share of $250 million over five years.

Good advocacy means being aware of, and pursuing, every reasonable opportunity. Somehow, in all of their meetings with the premier and ministers, Frizzell, Sampson, Scott and Skakun were unaware of a major grant that could have helped our community. Taxpayers should expect more from elected officials who have repeatedly tried to justify spending thousands of dollars travelling to Victoria in the name of advocacy.

The irony is hard to ignore. These committee members argued that they should be in constant contact with provincial ministers because Prince George cannot afford to leave funding on the table. And then they left funding on the table.