Water, Sewer, Garbage, Dog Licensing, and Timms Community Centre Fee Increases

At yesterday’s Langely City Council meeting, Council approved the new 2022 water, sewer, and garbage rates. The water rate is increasing by 9¢/m3, the sewer rate is increasing by 8¢/m3, and the garbage rate is increasing by $20 per year. You can read more in a previous post.

Council also gave first, second, and third reading to update the Fees and Charges Bylaw.

Of interesting, the City is proposing to increase the dog licensing fees by one to five dollars depending on if you are a senior, pay early, and if your pet is neutered or spayed.

The annual Timms Community Centre games room or fitness track pass will increase from $10 to $20. While this is still a great value at about 5¢/day, for some younger people who use our games room, paying $20 to access the room may limit access. I asked City staff about this, and they told me that young people could apply for the Leisure Access Grant Program without needing their parents, which would provide a deep discount (up to 75%) for the pass. The City’s youth worker would help any young person complete the grant application.

Not everyone has a great home life, so providing low barrier access to our games room helps provide an escape for many young people. I’m glad that the Leisure Access Grant Program can mitigate the proposed fee increase.

The City is also introducing a $300 annual external trainer pass or $90/quarter pass for an external trainer and their client to use City facilities.

The City is increasing the business licensing fees by 3%, which happens automatically every year.

You can download a complete list of proposed fee increases from the City’s website.

The best neighbours are the ones you don’t hear. We need to do better in multifamily housing.

I’ve lived in multifamily housing in Langley City for almost all of my adult life. My first experience was living in the Wyndham Lane townhouses, which were new builds when I moved there in the 2000s. My second and longest time lived was in the Rivers Edge apartments for around 15 years. This building was constructed in the 1980s and was significantly rebuilt in the 2000s due to a fire. I purchased a new-build townhouse earlier this year and sold my apartment. I rented in The Landing apartments on Industrial Avenue, next to the fire hall, for around seven months. This weekend, I’ve moved into my new townhouse called Elevation at the end of 55A Avenue.

One of the trade-offs of living in multifamily housing is that you can hear your neighbours from time to time. A building’s construction makes a big difference in how often and what kind of sounds you hear from your neighbours.

For example, in Rivers Edge, you could hear people’s footfalls, loud TVs, and even loud conversations. As a strata council member, one of the top complaints we received was neighour noise. We even had some people leave our building because of it.

In 2018, the BC Building Code started to include requirements around sound isolation in multifamily housing.

Without going into too much detail, there are two types of sound, airborne (when you talk or turn on your TV) and impact sounds (such as walking around or dropping things on the floor.)

The BC Building code only addresses airborne sounds, which is disappointing. While loud TVs and music is a concern, it is easy to remedy. You cannot tell people to stop walking. These impact sounds are more concerning when people are on different schedules.

For example, I’m up from around 5 am to 9 pm. I know my neighbours are up until midnight in my previous rental and new townhouse. I can tell because I hear footfalls. In the apartments, I could hear people walking on top of me, and in the townhouse, I can hear people using the stairs. Compared to my 1980s apartment, the sound transference is less, but still there.

There are simple ways to reduce impact noise in new construction, but it does require developers to spend a little more money to go beyond the BC Building Code. Sound clips, acoustic insulation, and noise damping compound between drywall layers dramatically reduce impact and bass sounds.

So why is reducing noise necessary? There is a strong correlation between noise and mental health.

In Langley City, Council and City Staff are in the process of updating our zoning and building bylaws. I will work to see if we can go beyond the BC Building code in our community to reduce impact noise between units in townhouses and apartments.

As our community continues to develop, we must address mitigating impact noise to improve people’s mental health.

Mentorship for BIPOC, LGBTQ2+, women, and youth considering running for local government

With local government elections less than a year away, some people may be considering running for council or mayor for the first time. One of the challenges in our region is that our council makeups don’t reflect the diversity of our communities.

When CBC investigated council makeups in Metro Vancouver, they found that less than 10% of councillors are visible minorities.

This lack of diversity means that as municipalities, we are missing out on perspectives that will help make our communities better places to live. It also means that as councils, we have blind spots that we could otherwise address if we had a more diverse makeup of people, with their unique lived experiences, in positions of power.

BIPOC, LGBTQ2+, women, and youth often face barriers beyond what others face to make a successful run for office and stay in office.

Mentorship is one way to help, and the site “Nominee” aims to connect mentors and mentees. I was happy to put myself down as a mentor, as were others on Langley City Council, such as Teri James and Rosemary Wallace. There are other councillors, MPPs, MLAs, and MPs from throughout Metro Vancouver, BC, and Canada.

The site does charge a fee, though the first 60 days are free. I don’t receive any compensation in connection with this site. It might be worth visiting the site if you are considering running for office. Optionally, you can also reach out to me directly as I don't charge a fee.

Help Shape Langley’s Poverty Reduction Strategy. Your Input Requested.

Langley City and the Township of Langley are jointly working on a Poverty Reduction Strategy for our community through the Langley Poverty Reduction Task Group. As one of the first steps in creating this strategy, the task group would like to understand people’s experiences living in Langley via a survey.

The survey will take about 15 minutes to complete, and people who complete the survey will be entered into a draw to win one of three $100 grocery store gift cards.

The task group would like to understand what makes Langley a good place to live and understand what barriers and challenges people face living in the community, including financial concerns. The task group would also like to understand what would help people overcome their barriers and challenges.

You can take the survey online at: https://www.surveymonkey.ca/r/LangleyPovertyReductionSurvey

You can also pick up a paper copy of the survey at any Fraser Valley Regional Library branch in Langley.

If you have time, please take this survey and encourage others you know to take it. If you know someone with limited mobility and no Internet access, please pick up a survey at a library branch, so that they can complete it.

The survey is open until December 10th.

Please visit the City’s website to learn more about the “Live well in Langley” Poverty Reduction Strategy. The task group is planning to complete the strategy in the spring of 2022.