October 24 Council Notes: Budget Changes, Tax Exemptions, UBCM Grants

As I posted in September, Langley City Council amends its capital budget several times per year to account for revenue sources or project changes. The City might receive a grant for a project, or a project’s scope could change, for example. Council gave three readings to the most recent change to the capital budget at the September 19th meeting. Council provided an opportunity for people to give feedback on the proposed budget changes, either through email, mail or by appearing in person (via Zoom) at last Monday’s Council meeting. Council did not receive feedback, so Council gave final reading to the budget changes, approving them. You can learn more about the changes in a previous post.

Council also gave final reading to grant tax exemptions to certain charitable and non-profit organizations in our community. You can learn more about who received the tax exemption in a previous post.

At its September 19th meeting, Council approved City staff applying for a $24,600 grant administered by the Union of BC Municipalities to help with asset management. There was a mistake in the grant name, so Council approved a housekeeping motion directing staff to change from applying for the “UBCM Local Government Development Approvals Program” grant to the “UBCM 2022 Asset Management Planning Program”.

Council also approved staff applying to the “UBCM Community Preparedness Fund Volunteer & Composite Fire Departments Equipment & Training” grant for $25,356. If the City is successful in receiving the grant, the City will purchase new live fire training equipment and deliver two training programs each to 10 career and paid-on-call firefighters.

At the end of Monday’s Council meeting, each member of Council thanked those who served over the last four years who were not reelected.

New “King Taps” to replace “Red Robin” at 200th and the Langley Bypass

Yesterday was the final meeting of the current Langley City Council. The recently elected Council’s first meeting is on November 7th, but because Councils are continuing bodies in BC, the business of City Hall continues uninterrupted.

Council issued a development permit for redeveloping what is currently a Red Robin restaurant at 6141 200 Street at the Langley Bypass into a new King Taps restaurant.

View of the building from the parking lot. Select the image to enlarge.

All projects requiring rezoning or a development permit go through an Advisory Design Panel, a committee of Council that includes landscape architects, architects, accessibility representatives, the RCMP, and general members.

The Design Panel made the following recommendations:

• Review additional noise mitigation measures for the patios, including the potential for vertical elements
• Consider a refresh of the existing landscaped areas
• Provide more design interest to the 200 Street elevation, and the wood façade adjacent to the seasonal patio in particular, such as through the use of branding, vertical landscaping, or additional architectural features
• Review the security of the seasonal outdoor patio, including the use of physical barriers
• Consider adjusting the accessible parking space-adjacent landscape strip, such as replacing it with a concrete seat wall
• Provide an additional accessible parking space

Based on the feedback from the Design Panel, the project’s applicant increased the size of the landscaping strip next to the accessible parking spaces and increased the number of accessible parking spaces from two to three.

The applicant also updated the 200th Street frontage of the building.

Below is the initially proposed design.

The original design of the building fronting 200th Street. Select the image to enlarge.

The following is the updated design.

Updated design of building fronting 200th Street. Select the image to enlarge.

I was happy to see the building better integrated with 200th Street with the updated design. While this part of town is a typical shopping mall today, with SkyTrain coming, this area will become more walkable if it follows the trajectory of other mall sites by SkyTrain stations in our region. It is good to start building walkable, urban-designed buildings today in preparation.

Census finds the average age of Langley City’s population hasn’t changed

With the increase in population in Langley City and the construction of new apartments and townhouses over the last five years, I’ve seen many more families, and our schools have been busier. Anecdotally, it would seem that the population of Langley City is getting younger, but is that the case?

The following table looks at the broad age groups of people living in Langley City from census data.

Age Range	2016	2021
0-14 years	15.1%	15.3%
15-64 years	65.7%	64.7%
65 years and older	19.2%	20.1%
85 years and older	3.3%	2.9%

In 2016, the average age was 42.5, and the median was 42.2. The average age was 42.5, and the median was 41.2 in 2021.

In Metro Vancouver, the average age was 41.0, and the median was 40.9 in 2016. The average age was 41.7, and the median was 40.8 in 2021. Ages in Langley City and Metro Vancouver have remained relatively consistent even as the population increases.

A mayor is not the president of a municipality

I was handing out postcards in one of the townhouse complexes in Langley City. A kid rode his bicycle up to me and said, “Hey, are you running to be president of Langley City?” I chuckled and said, no, I was running to be mayor. We had a conversation about what a mayor does.

I’ve watched many TV shows over the years. When a mayor is involved in the storyline, they often have absolute authority over their community alongside the sheriff.

In the US, many communities and states operate under the “strong mayor” system. The mayor is essentially the CEO of a municipality, having the ability to hire/fire management and broad authority to manage the day-to-day of a municipality. Councillors are like the board of directors, setting the budget and policy.

In BC, we operate under the “weak mayor” system. If councillors are like the board of directors, a mayor acts as the chair of the board. A mayor has one vote like every other councillor. Mayor and councillors hire a municipality’s Chief Administrative Office (CAO). The CAO is the only employee of the mayor and councillors and is responsible for hiring/firing management, managing the day-to-day of a municipality, and implementing the budget and policies of council.

As the chair, a mayor has several important responsibilities to enable a productive council. The first is to act as a council facilitator, working to ensure that council is operating smoothly, that all councillors are empowered, and that council does not end up in deadlocks or dysfunction.

The second is to act as the representative of council, working with the CAO to implement council policies in the municipality.

The third is officially representing the municipality with residents and business owners, at events, or with the province and federal government.

In Metro Vancouver, mayors are also appointed by provincial legislation to the Mayors’ Council on Regional Transportation, which oversees TransLink.

In BC, mayors have some special authority that councillors do not.

Mayors can:

• Establish standing committees to consider any matter, and report back to council their findings
• Suspend municipal officers and employees, though a majority vote of council can override the suspension
• Schedule a council meeting
• Have council reconsider a matter or re-vote on a matter

While a mayor in BC does have a lot of responsibilities and some special authority, it doesn’t reflect what you see on many TV shows and movies.