Community Engagement on North Shuswap Issues
Area F Identification Meeting at the Lakeview Centre in Anglemont on January 20. Jay Simpson (left) with consultant Allan Neilson (Kicker photo)
By Jo Anne Malpass
Community engagement on the Electoral Area F Issues Identification Study is underway, with community open houses held January 20 at Lakeview Centre and North Shuswap Community Hall. Because of wintery road conditions that day, a zoom meeting is planned for Wednesday, February 21 from 6pm-8pm.
At the open houses, Consultant Allan Neilson of Neilson Strategies Inc. gives an overview of how regional government works, calling them a federation of unincorporated electoral areas and incorporated municipalities, existing to provide local government services in response to the needs of their members.
Presentation boards (Kicker photo)
He explained the study is being conducted to identify changes that can and can’t be made within the existing system. Some things like level of certain services can be changed but others cannot. The BC Government is paying for the consultant and has laid out the scope of the study which can’t consider incorporation.
The Columbia Shuswap Regional District (CSRD) board has 12 directors, one from each of the seven areas and one from each of the four municipalities except Salmon Arm, which has two. Each area and municipal director receives one vote on some issues and on others, including financial matters, directors receive one vote for every 2,500 people in their area/municipality. Because of population, area directors have a total of 10 votes and municipalities have a total of 19. Voting rules are not something that can be changed as they apply to all regional districts in the province.
One difference between regional districts and municipalities is that regional districts cannot move funds from one service to another. For example, the CSRD budgets what it needs for fire services, taxes that amount for that specific service and can’t move any of those funds to another service. Municipalities have more flexibility, able to collect and allocate general revenues to their services.
At the Lakeview Centre meeting, audience members voiced concerns about development services including deficiencies in bylaw enforcement of Anglemont zoning bylaw, building permit requirements and wait times, do the taxes raised in this community come back to the community, CSRD management structure, management of funds, the lack of a road rescue service and a new fire hall in Anglemont.
All stakeholders, including non-resident property owners, can attend the zoom meeting to voice their concerns and take part in the survey being conducted to gather public feedback to better understand the questions and concerns that Electoral Area F residents may have with local services and the current system of local governance.
The survey will be open until the end of February and the consultant will send a report in March/April to the CSRD and the Ministry of Municipal Affairs, complete with recommendations the CSRD may wish to consider.
