Is development good or bad? That depends on how it is done. Let me give you a simplified overview of the process – sort of a “Development 101”.
The Basics
Firstly the City has a pool of money that is topped up mostly by residential and business taxes, referred to as our “tax base”.
Using a budgeting process, overseen by mayor and council, the City annually determines the size of the pool of money needed and what percentage is to come from home owners, and what percentage from business.
The City staff then uses the money to build and maintain infrastructure like sewage, and to provide essential services like policing, street cleaning, etc. While some of this is done in-house, most is contracted out to private industry (which also contributes to our economy by the way).
New Development
Let’s now add new development, like a new shopping mall or the new civic centre, to the picture. The money for these development projects normally come from private sector investment, the provincial/federal governments, and for small projects from the City itself.
As a city we have always looked for development projects that will have positive spinoffs.
During the construction phase the developer teams support local restaurants and material suppliers.
Once the project is completed, the project must enable new businesses and these new businesses in turn will support existing business. For example, if a new gift shop goes into the River Market, and they then use existing local printers to print their promotional materials. So we are adding new business and building existing business.
As the diagram shows, the net result is that these new developments contribute to the tax base and thus reduces the tax rate that we have to pay – neat, eh?
There is a caveat though. The city staff act as project managers, especially during the early stages of a new development, and there is a cost to that. Also, new developments require additions to infrastructure, and, you guessed it, there is a cost to that as well. So as a city we need to keep an eye on these costs.
Now we could as a city, only go for industrial development projects which would be very good for the budget, but typically less good for the environment and liveability.
Liveability
Now that I have mentioned liveability, how does one ensure that development contributes to liveability?
It is a big subject, but simply put – having access to coffee shops, florists, parks, theatres, chocolate shops, hairdressers, arts exhibitions, and so on, make for a liveable city. The reality is that most of these components are only viable if one has sufficient population density.
Most of the new developments in New Westminster have been selected with this in mind. They are developments that decrease our tax burden, leaving money over for a cappuccino while looking out over the River. The developments encourage intelligent higher population density thus leading to higher liveability.
The InterUrban building is a good example in that it is a mixed commercial/residential development. Close by is the Pier Park development that will provide essential green space and still encourage tourism and economic growth (which I have discussed in an earlier post).
I believe that we have chosen an enviable model of development in New Westminster – and we have more projects like that “in the hopper”, making New Westminster THE city in the lower mainland to live, raise a family, work and play!
