The city's Mayor and six councillors saw some welcome engagement from the public gallery at City Hall on Monday evening, as a number of residents took advantage of the monthly Committee of the Whole community engagement period to raise a number of items of interest, or concern to the council members.
The process one which is available each month, suffered somewhat of a suspension during the COVID period as Council members gathered remotely and through Zoom over much of last the last two years, a process which seemed to dissuade the public from participating.
And while the Council members returned to the City Hall Chamber in February, it has taken a bit of time it seems for the public to re-engage with their elected officials, with Monday marking the first real session of expansive commentary for the year.
On the night, four residents came forward to speak, with a variety of topics of note for the Council members to take in.
The first, Chris Gamble is a property owner in the city who was seeking clarification of the city's bylaws related to modular homes. City Manager Rob Buchan provided some guidance for the resident to move his application process ahead.
A second resident, Larry Golden, who is a familiar face for the Councillors from past presentations, was seeking guidance of staff towards finding elements of Civic Bylaw items through the city website. Corporate Administrator Rosa Miller noted she would investigate the status and confirm the online information on Tuesday.
A third participant, who did not state her name during her presentation, raised concerns about weeds, grass and other unsightly elements of the civic curb and sidewalk and rock wall infrastructure in side street areas outside of the city's downtown core area.
"I've just come to ask a question. What does the city plan on doing regarding our infrastructure our weeds, curbs, sidewalks and rock walls for the next year and forever"
Director of Operations Richard Pucci observed that there is money in the budget for condition assessments to prioritize any kind of work that is required ahead.
"We do have monies in our budget, we are looking at doing some wall investigations for retaining walls this year. However as everyone knows, there are many walls in the community some in different states, so we are working on getting a tally on those together and finding our their priority sequence. Also we are completing a fairly extensive asset condition assessment, so that we can prioritize our investment into our assets which would include roads, sidewalks, curbs, gutters, drainage, etcetera" -- Operations Director Richard Pucci
In a follow up comment the resident asked if any thought had been given to a tax break for residents to take action towards cleaning up areas of their own neighbourhood.
"Has it ever been proposed that the homeowner cleaned his curb and got some kind of a tax deduction ... I've walked on sidewalks where I've had to phone the city and say I had to walk on the road because it's so overgrown and they would come and clean it, all they do is weed eat it, it grows back a month later.
What I guess I'm trying to get at is there anything that we can do, so that it doesn't do that, doesn't wreck our curbs our sidewalks and we're paying money to fix our infrastructure, I'm talking about side streets, I'm not talking about Second Avenue or Third Avenue "
The Operations Manager did not have any knowledge of such a recommendation and from that the City Manager observed how some municipalities have passed bylaws to have property owners maintain their own boulevard areas and noted he believes that the city has that element in its own bylaw, adding he would confirm if that option is in place for Council to consider.
"This is a difficult challenge when there's limited resources that Council has through taxation, to do work. Council is always contingent of the problem in raising taxes to increase service. So I think what is being referred to as an increase of service to expand maintenance along the roadways and the boulevards.
One thing that some municipalities do is, they pass a bylaw and I think that we may have a similar one here, that puts the onus and responsibility of property owners to look after their own boulevards. If there's grass that means cutting the grass and so forth. So that's one approach that municipalities do in order to keep the burden of taxes down is to put the onus on the property owner, we can confirm whether or not that is in our bylaw, but I think that it is" -- City Manager Rob Buchan
In a concluding comment, the resident noted of the city's current focus on attention to the main streets of the downtown area and a request that they distribute that work force in a wider coverage area.
Further noting for Council that many long time residents who have left town have observed as to how sad it is to see the direction that Prince Rupert is going in its repair of infrastructure and how she would like to see it get better.
The City Manager's overview and possible civic measure of enforcing bylaw measures, calls to mind the discussion of last year over the prospect of a Local Services Taxation Plan an expansive discussion at the time that generated a fair bit of controversy and in the end did not seem to gain much traction .
A similar suggestion that city residents may take on more of the burden of community maintenance one that is likely to generate similar interest and feedback it would seem.
The fourth and final resident to speak on the evening was Jennifer Nelson who provided for an extensive review of her concerns over air pollution in the region and what she believes is an ongoing aerial spraying program taking place in the area, a program taking place without any information provided to residents of the City.
Her presentation to Council was one of a follow up of a correspondence she had forwarded to Council members, which expanded on her notes and provided photos of some of the elements of note from her observations.
As a natural harvester she highlighted how that impacts on the ability to harvest from local vegetation.
"I've been noticing a lot of increased air pollution in and around our city, I am a First Nations natural harvester so I am always out in nature and I'm always harvesting seasonally. There's a few things that have really come to light lately, in the past year I've really tried to make a point of taking pictures of when I notice the air pollution of what I'm about to talk about. And it comes in the way of the chemical pollutants that are left behind from all the air traffic in our area. I don't know why there is this increase of air traffic in our area. I'm not talking about float planes I'm talking about the commercial flights are supposed to be way up there, because every city has a protected air space"
She spoke expansively on the impact of that increased air traffic in the skies over Prince Rupert and the damage provided by any kind of aerial spraying program, she also noted of her frustrations in having her concerns addressed by local RCMP officials along with the MLA's office, as well as the challenges found navigating a number of other government offices.
"We're getting something put down on us and this is not right, my Questions for the RCMP and to all of you is to please take note of this. It's the air we breathe, I'm not doing this just for me, I'm doing this because I care about this world right now. I care about the animals, I absolutely care about continuing to harvest food and medicines from our forests because that's our rights and its out there free for the taking"
To conclude her overview she brought the issue closer to home for the Council members
"So I'm asking for the city's awareness, this is our home, these streets, our air, our water, they are crucial. And why do you think people are leaving here in a mass exodus. Pretty soon nobody is going to have a job here, there's going to be no taxpayers, you know And there's some of us that really still care about where they live"
Council thanked her for her presentation, though none of the members offered any advice as to a course she may wish to follow towards her concerns.
Cross posted from the North Coast Review.
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