Frankly Speaking

Photo by Dan Ferguson/Langley Times The fire which destroyed a portion of the Paddington Station apartment block in Langley City on Dec. 11 has put even more pressure on the Langley rental market. More than 80 families will be out of their homes there for as long as two years. There has been a lot of focus on affordable housing in the past year, but much of the political attention and media coverage has focused on people who want to buy a home. Meanwhile, renters are facing many challenges, with some of the most significant ones coming at them in the next year or two. The skyrocketing price of real estate, which is reflected in the recent assessment notices, means that landlords will seek to boost rents as much as they are able to. Meanwhile, the supply of rental housing is not increasing at the level it should be in an area with steady economic growth and a growing population. This lack of supply also gives landlords another incentive to boost rents – they know they ca...

It is most fitting that Langley Township is putting its public engagement strategy to its first test, with the establishment of a community planning team (CPT) for Brookswood-Fernridge. It was in Brookswood-Fernridge where the last Township council ran up against the wishes of the community, when it dealt with the deeply unpopular Griffith Neighbourhood Plan. Hearings on the plan were lengthy and the level of interest was very high. While council eventually rejected the plan by a 7-2 vote, its approach to public engagement was judged by many to be severely challenged. Three members of the last council were defeated in November, 2014 - the first councillors to lose their seats since 2002 – and this was at least partially due to the pro-development impression they left with residents. Only one of them, former councillor Grant Ward, had supported the plan at the final vote. The Brookswood-Fernridge debacle also gave rise to the very successful Unelection campaign which played a...