City Property Tax Revolt Brewing?

“Downtown redevelopment is an essentially infinite game, played not toward any conclusion or closure, but toward its own endless protraction.” The development industry’s “only authentic deep vision is the same as any casino’s: to keep the roulette wheels turning.” So says Mike Davis in The Infinite Game.

Norquay Neighbours, a residents organization emanating from the Norquay area of Vancouver threatens Mayor Sam’s Sullivan’s green-washed gentrification agenda for Vancouver known as Eco-density. It is on the back of taxpayers that the empires of the politicians, the developers, the construction companies and the financiers are built. Norquay Neighbours represents a broad-based, organized refusal from below to co-operate and it imperils the whole machine.

The Norquay area residents organized after seeing the effects of a rezoning of the nearby Knight-Kingsway area similar to the one proposed for their area. Property taxes in the Knight-Kingsway area after rezoning there rose radically, up to 70%.

Realizing their error, City Hall recently passed a retroactive amendment extending their land-assessment averaging to the Knight-Kingsway area, thereby mitigating the most severe effects of the tax jump. However, Alicia Barsallo, a spokesperson for the Norquay Residents’ Association, said in an e-mail to the City that while they support the land-assessment averaging, “The measure does not constitute the type of tax protection that can provide ongoing relief to the residents of [Knight-Kingsway], or any other rezoned area.” Barsallo alludes to the fact that the taxes will continue to rise the following year, as the averaging will then include figures from 2006, 2007 (the year the assessments jumped wildly), and 2008. The effect of the averaging is to cushion the steep climb of property taxes, not to arrest the climb.

Norquay provides some of the most affordable housing left in Vancouver. A city map based on the 2001 Census states that between 25 and 30% of the area’s residents are low income. The area is largely made up of single detached homes on small lots. Many houses have more than one suite in them. As the city rezones the areas and allows new development it affects the assessments of the surrounding neighbourhoods, driving up land values. Rising land values diminish availability of affordable housing for a number of reasons. Land values being what they are, all new housing will be beyond the reach of the majority of families, the elderly, and people working at median incomes. At the same time, using the land more intensely will lead to rising land value assessments, which in turn will drive up the cost of housing and drive out low and median income individuals and families.

The city proclaims that its densification plans will respect the neighbourhoods that become part of their scheme. However, based on the only two examples we have, this does not appear to be the case. Both the Knight-Kingsway rezoning and the proposed Norquay rezoning include mammoth developments at their centres, both completely at odds with the neighbourhoods they will soon dominate. A gigantic development, King Edward Village, anchors the Knight-Kingsway corner now. The development includes four buildings varying from six to 17 floors, and 400 units. One agent selling units there lists seven separate units ranging in cost from $299,000 to $399,000 for suites that run from 618 square feet to 902 square feet. Affordable? They are all well over $400 per square foot, the highest being almost $500 per square foot.

Similarly, the city redesign for the Norquay area is anchored around a mega-project that will look like any of a hundred others in the downtown core. This one, The Hills, is located at Nanaimo and Kingsway. A large local development firm, Holborn Real Estate, is behind the project. The proposed development will be a 22-storey monstrosity which will tower over the surrounding neighbourhood. Meanwhile, just a half block down from The Hills, Thind Holdings has purchased a very large lot, previously the home of the low-rise London Guard Motor Hotel, a single storey motel that rented large suites to low income people. Thind Holdings’ website promises 84 concrete residential units and 14 commercial units on the lot.

Engineering consent: “Processed” by the City

The City portrays their scheme as part of a resident-driven “process” hammered out after a number of City-advertised meetings and other types of community input. For example, one City document, Ecodensity 101: Introduction, states that, “Vancouver residents have identified 17 neighourhood centres they would like to see developed.” However, according to a press release issued by Norquay Neighbours, the proposed “mass rezoning has no basis in the Community Vision developed through [a] lengthy process and has involved no real consultation with neighbourhood residents.” A survey of the City “process” posted at the Norquay Neighbours website, vcn.bc.ca/norquay, provides a whole different perspective: “The City claims that the Norquay proposal is based on the 2002 Renfrew-Collingwood Community Vision. This is not true. The community vision prioritized parks and public places, community decision-making, single family neighbourhoods, seniors‚ housing, and services. The City proposal does not. The vision did not support apartments higher than four stories. The City proposal does.” Norquay Neighbours characterize the process as taking place “behind the backs of the community” and deride the survey and public meeting process as “poorly advertised open houses where the hard questions were not answered.”

Eco-density is gentrification

As we all know, everyone’s an environmentalist now. Even our Prime Minister from the oil patch, Steve Harper, has suddenly turned green. And so it is with skepticism that we should accept such Eco-density utterances as Vancouver’s Director of Planning, Brent Toderian: “Vancouver’s challenge is to grow in a way that reduces our ecological footprint. The neighborhood-centre model supports the principles of EcoDensity—smart, sustainable growth.”

In reality, the Eco-density initiative is meant to unleash a new round development upon the city. The development options in downtown Vancouver’s suburbanized core—Coal Harbour, Yaletown, Downtown South, and False Creek, vertical suburbs all—will soon be exhausted. Casting about for a sales pitch that could open green pastures for a new round of development, shrewd Mayor Sullivan minted the Eco-density coin. As it is the development industry that pays for the politicians and their campaigns, it should not surprise us that their interests are well represented at 12th and Cambie.

The Norquay Neighbours is sponsoring a demonstration for Tuesday, September 18th, at 6:30 pm at City Hall (at 12th and Cambie). Go.