City staff may still have more to say to council about the rezoning of the BBK Bottle Depot lot.
The owner of the depot, Austin Kim, has asked for permission to change a vacant adjacent lot from residential zoning to commercial zoning in order to put in a much more ambitious recycling centre.
The neighbours are in an uproar. They had already been complaining to City Hall about commercial encroachment into their neighbourhood, and were already on the record about negative side effects of the existing bottle depot. They were at the last council meeting in force to oppose any further expansions.
Nonetheless, in a 5-to-4 vote, council approved third reading of the rezoning application despite it being contrary to the Official Community Plan and contrary to staff recommendations about the best use of that lot.
Fourth and final reading could be a formality that gives the green light to the project, or it could still wither under administration scrutiny.
"There are quite a few steps yet," said Walter Babicz, Manager of Legislative Services for The City. "First of all, because this property is within 800 metres of a controlled-access highway intersection (provincially administrated traffic lights), it is forwarded to the Ministry Of Transportation and Infrastructure which is a legislated requirement. Now it is sitting with them, and their process is underway. They typically look at traffic concerns, if any, and if they are satisfied they sign it and return it to my department, and then it is brought back to council for final reading and adoption."
There is also a question of safety. Homeowner Ron Gobin was one of the most vehemently opposed. He collected more than 60 signatures on a petition [there are 72 affected properties] asking for council's support for keeping the lot zoned for residential development only.
"If they have all those plastics in there, all that paper, all those computer parts they say they'll be collecting, what happens if there is a fire?," Gobin said in a conversation with The Citizen. "There are all kinds of commercial stores around our area that have those risks, too, but there are buffer zones around them. If this goes ahead, my bedroom is the buffer zone."
"There is little in the way of prescriptive regulation in the zoning bylaw that addresses this issue," said Nelson Wight, Manager of Current Planning and Development. "Instead, we would look to the principles of land use planning when evaluating the merits of locating a particular use next to a different use and whether that could create any potential conflicts. As was noted in the staff report [on the BBK application to change zoning], the OCP has particular language that speaks to this matter, and provides direction in making decisions."
City council chose to ignore those directions by a slim majority, but perhaps a Fire Inspector might have something to say about it, said Gobin. He wants all the risks assessed before fourth reading is given.
