Now, or Never?
Sooke Mayor and Council
Upon Learning that the District is a Paying Member of a Registered Lobbyist Organization for Development and Real Estate:
Face ‘Tough Decision’ as to Whether or not
the District Should Leave it.
District of Sooke Councillors ask questions of District staff at the March 11, 2024 Council Meeting, as elected officials seek to learn why and when the district had joined a lobby for development and real estate as a paying member without a vote by elected officials.
by Sasha Izard
April 08, 2024
On March 11, 2024, at the District of Sooke Council meeting, a resident of Sooke, Mr. Alan Dolan presented to the Council during the public input portion of the meeting. Previously, on February 12, he had written the following letter to the Mayor and Council of Sooke:
Dear Mayor and Council,
The District of Sooke is a member of the Urban Development Institute (UDI) and pays a yearly membership.
The UDI is a legally registered lobbyist group and is listed in the BC Lobbyists Registry. It makes no sense at all that Sooke would pay to belong to the UDI so UDI can in turn lobby the District.
A number of municipalities in greater Victoria have recently opted out of their UDI membership and I believe the District of Sooke should do the same.
I am quite sure that UDI will be lobbying Sooke regardless of whether Sooke is actually a member of this group.
How are branches of the Government of British Columbia acting in good-faith to the public they are supposed to represent, by collaborating with, funding, having memberships in, and partnering with a legally registered lobbying group?
The District of Sooke needs to cancel its membership with UDI immediately.
Alan
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On March 11, the following item was on the council agenda:
11. CORRESPONDENCE REQUIRING ACTION
Sooke’s Membership in the Urban Development Institute
• Directed for discussion by Councillor Bateman.
20240212 RE_ Sooke’s membership in the Urban Development Institute (UDI) (Alan Dolan)
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Mr. Dolan spoke the following to council that night:
“Agenda Item 11., which is my letter on the Urban Development Institute. I just want to reinforce that I hope Council will give it some consideration.
Sooke is a member of the Urban Development Institute and pays a yearly membership of, I don’t know, somewhere around 700 dollars. There are some advantages of the institute, in terms of staff training and staff development and stuff, but the Urban Development Institute, is a lobby organization and is registered as a lobby organization, so it doesn’t make a lot of sense to me for Sooke to be paying money to, and belonging to an organization that’s lobbying it, and that doesn’t seem like a wise use of taxpayer money.
So, that’s really all I had to say. There’s a letter there, and Councillor Bateman will bring it forward in on that agenda item. I just wanted to reinforce my feeling that we should withdraw from that organization.”
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During the deliberations on Item 11, that followed later in the evening, Councillor Bateman would put forward a motion that the District of Sooke not renew its membership with the Urban Development Institute.
The deliberations that took place are very interesting, and informative of the Mayor and Councillor’s take on the issue of the District’s paid membership of the development/real estate lobby.
The following is a transcription of the deliberations on the item that took place that night, starting from time in the video 1:27:12:
Mayor Tait:
We’ll move onto item 11. please, and that is the correspondence brought forward by Councillor Bateman, and a member of the public spoke to it earlier.
Cllr. Bateman:
OK, Sooke’s membership in the Urban Development Institute. Now, this was quite a subject last year in Saanich, where Councillor Plant brought forward a motion to have Saanich discontinue its membership in the UDI. I’ve watched that meeting, as well as the View Royal discussions in November which reached the same conclusion, and what Mr. Dolan is pointing out in his correspondence is that UDI is a registered lobby group in the BC Lobbyist Registry, and it’s, I think there is no question that I think it’s a remarkably substantial organization that offers a lot of services, but at the View Royal meeting in November, or in September I should say, that the UDI Executive Director attended and she cited a number of good services it provides its members, of which there are 29 regional and local governments in B.C. are members of the UDI including Sooke, Langford, Colwood, Esquimalt, Oak Bay and Victoria. The rest of the CRD is not involved, and as I say Saanich and View Royal had terminated. So I was curious to ask staff, what do you see is the benefits of membership in this organization, and then I will offer some counter-points.
Staffer:
Through your worship, Mr. Riley couldn’t make it tonight, so he gave me a couple speaking points. I don’t know if I’ll have all the answers, but perhaps we can bring back a more fullsome report later.
So, some of the comments he gave me was the membership provides the district with opportunities to connect with various stakeholders and to learn about current trends affecting the development industry, and they’ve also in the past provided feedback on various bylaws and policies related to development process and land-use planning, similar to like the Sooke Builders Association, it’s the same kind of arrangement from the staff level with them, and UDI again, similar to the Sooke Builder’s Association is a collection of individuals and organizations involved in the development community and are considered a stakeholder from our perspectives that make up a public interest. I believe they hold lunches. Staff have not gone to hardly any lunches for that group, at least as far as I know. It’s been a few years, since I think, I think Mr. Palo (sp?) might have attended a lunch or two, but it wasn’t a regular occurrence for staff from a lunch perspective. So they’re just like a local, sorry, a south island group, similar to other development groups we correspond with and they’re considered a stakeholder, so we’d reach out for them for feedback on various initiatives and depending on what was going on with them. That’s all I know right now.
Bateman:
I will note that the Executive Director noted that the UDI creates liaison-committees with local municipalities, whereby their representatives will get together with the directors of departments that work directly with developers. We exchange information. We help municipalities out by creating working groups that can help inform your policies.
So that was a direct quote from her, believe its direct. It might be a little, I think it’s pretty much on point.
I guess what I want to do is bring a motion forward, that the District of Sooke not renew its membership with the Urban Development Institute.
And if I get a seconder for that, oh no that would be a notice for the next agenda.
Mayor Tait: It’s in the correspondence, so I think you can raise that tonight. You’ve moved it, so procedurally.
Cllr. Beddows: I’ll second that to get it on the floor for discussion, and I believe a seconder doesn’t necessarily have to vote for the motion. Is that correct?
Mayor Tait: No, and I even think that the mover doesn’t have to vote it for it so.
Cllr. St. Pierre: Ok, just to clarify that.
Staffer: That’s correct.
Mayor Tait: It just gets it on the floor, so go good ahead Councillor Bateman.
Cllr. Bateman. So, to motivate, as I say this is a really substantial organization, with much to offer. However, it is a registered lobby group, and there is a perception of bias that Mr. Dolan has identified in this letter, that was also identified in the unanimous votes in Saanich and View Royal to discontinue their memberships. I think that district staff can still take advantage of the UDI workshops and programs. I think it’s a false comparison with the Sooke Builders Association, because we are not members of that association, and we councillors and staff will happily work with the group, but not in a membership situation. We pay 636 dollars a year for membership, and I believe the decision to join UDI, was likely made exclusively by staff, and did not come to council for our recommendation.
Mayor Tait: Councillor Beddows
Cllr. Beddows: Yeah, to your worship to staff: Again, we’re not the experts at this table, so we have to rely on staff to be the experts. Do we get 700 dollars, or 6 whatever it was, worth of anything out of this membership?
It sounds like we don’t use it much, so do we get, I mean I’m putting you on the spot, I understand, but I don’t know, does staff, has staff used this group? Do we to get our 630 dollars out of it? Or, is it something we just throw to them once a year?
Staffer: Through your worship: I don’t know the history of when we started this membership of UDI. If it was staff driven, I’d have to go and research that. Whether we get a value of yeah 6 or 7 hundred dollars a year, I’m not sure at that stage.
Again, they’re just like a stakeholder, and yeah, correction to the we’re not a member of the Sooke Builders Association, I’m just, yeah, the way staff use that group, it’s just like another stakeholder to us that we would engage with, when we have, when we may need community feedback on a certain bylaw or initiative, we would reach out to UDI for feedback on a bylaw before it was presented to council, just like we would the Sooke Builders, just like we would other developers, and builders, or constructions as at Victoria.
Cllr. Beddows: So, we don’t have to be a member to do that, we just send that to them anyways, or, do they care?
Staffer: I don’t believe so, I think it’s you know, for anyone ever seeking feedback, nobodies required to provide us feedback, I don’t think to that aspect, so I don’t know tonight if this is a valuable membership, if there’d be any impact.
Cllr. Beddows: Ok, there’s a couple over there saying do we need this, if we need this, so?
Mayor Tait: So, I’d like to comment, because I was involved, as long as I’ve been elected, Sooke has been a member of the UDI. I recall times when, the mayor presented, our CAO presented to the group, showcasing what Sooke was doing, and the type of development we were looking to attract.
I was a part of a tour, so at that time I also worked downtown, so it was easier to attend a luncheon. At that time, I was also employed by the private sector, that also had a membership. So, I would attend a lunch, and different mayors, or CRD, there was always a presentation about what was going on, and then usually a lunch would follow, of which at that time, my company paid for to attend, and then there was a Westshore tour, where there was a tour of developers coming through various communities, to see highlights of what type of developments were happening.
So, at that time Mariner’s Village phase had opened, and the developers at Mariner’s Village had lunch, and then I spoke then as the councillor present, about what we were trying to achieve, and the types of development, we were looking for. They’ve also toured “This is what LEED Standard is”, “This is what platinum type developments are”. Over the years, they’ve had, so like Wiser for example, who is also involved with SearchIn (Sp?) as the consultant, did a showcase on Building Together non-profit housing partnerships, how the development industry is partnering with local communities, and local First Nations, to realize projects in their home communities. They’ve also showcased women in development, the 40 and under, achievers within the capital region, and I’ve also attended at one time, a very brief pro forma workshop and it was directed towards local government, so we can understand the pro forma that is needed for development projects to get out of the ground.
It was really intense learning, because usually that’s a micro-credential. That takes several weeks. We wanted a one-day workshop, in that day, so it at least gave a sense, that when developers are saying that their pro forma isn’t, the pro forma fails, at least we had a sense of OK, I get what you’re talking about, because of these pieces. It was always held in a nonpartisan view. It’s just working together. They have reached out to me, because they are wanting to do another Westshore tour. They want to know if there is a project that we want to highlight in Sooke, that is something that we’re proud of, that we want to attract more of.
So, I hear your point, as well as to the member of the public. I didn’t know that they were a registered lobby group, but at the same time we are trying to attract certain types of development to our community to advance certain initiatives. The health centre that we’re looking to build is an example of that, so how do we get the word out to the development community that we may need you to partner with us realize this out of the ground, so you know I appreciate where everyone’s at, I just wanted to share some context.
Pre-covid, there was sort of every, I guess it goes back in 2014. I was scheduled to appear to UDI again to showcase what council’s priorities were and what our plans were, and just to highlight those. It’s just I ended up on maternity leave and wasn’t in a position to present, and then after 2018 election, usually they would have the invite new mayors in, so they can, so mayors can talk about what they want to do in their community and connect to a greater audience, and so, in that case again, sometimes since I was elected as mayor, there was a conflict, because the luncheons usually overlap the CRD board meetings, so there was a challenge for elected officials to get to the meetings, because of that the scheduling conflicts, and so that’s where I think they’ve looked to move the dates, and then again, they’ve reached out.
They’ve commented certainly on DCC reviews that other communities may be doing, or through the CRD as well, of which we’ve received information on, and it just presents a different side, so once we advance something similarly, to the engagement with the Sooke Builders Association, is like here’s what we’re thinking of doing, how does this resonate in actual practical terms. The UDI is another entity, but in terms of this before I think Council, like I’m not speaking. I’m just sharing my experience with UDI to date, that maybe it may be beneficial to have UDI present to council directly and to share what their intentions are, so I’ll go to Councillor McMath and then councillor Lajeunesse.”
Cllr. McMath: I won’t be supporting this motion at this time. I’d rather, that we table that and have UDI back for a presentation. My other question is, how many memberships does the District of Sooke have with parties that are also registered as lobbyists?
Staffer: I’m not sure. I’d have to look into that and get back to you.
Cllr. Lajeunesse: Just because if, if that’s the, if that’s the direction we wish to go, which I’m open to considering, but I just rather than do a single shot based off two other municipalities without any of the context, that is what I’d like to know before we go ahead with this, so I would hope that this would be tabled for a following meeting.
Mayor Tait: OK, OK Lajeunesse then St.Pierre and then I can come back to Councillor McMath to make a motion to table it too.
Cllr. Lajeunesse: Yeah, I, I, as you know, I attended one event with U, I don’t know two years ago, I think it probably was, but I found it very informative. As, as a relatively new councillor at the time and learning about some of the challenges that they were facing with various municipalities and the challenges that we face and I, the conversations that took place there, were I found very valuable, as any networking opportunity. I, I, I kind of relish those opportunities. So, yeah, I’m happy to remain involved with them, or at least to be able to have a seat at the table with them, when they, when the opportunities arise.
Mayor Tait: Councillor St.Pierre.
Cllr. St.Pierre: I really appreciate the member of the public bringing this forward, because I think it’s important that we’re not funding people that are lobbying us for like particular stakeholders. Having said that, one of the questions that I would really have if we bring them forward and I actually like Councillor McMath’s suggestion of tabling this and having them do a presentation quite a lot, is I don’t know what their their target for lobbying is. If their target is actually the province, or other bodies, I’m not sure why they have that lobbying, you know label, but if we’re not the target of the lobbying, and if we’re actually one of the stakeholders that’s being lobbied for.
This makes sense to me, because from the sounds of things we’re getting cheap expert input. We’re getting forms for collaboration and putting forward our development vision to a larger community, but I’d like to know that we’re not the target of, like if their mandate is to actually approach local governments and convince them of things for developers, there’s no way we should be actually part of this, or contributing money, because they’ll come to us anyway.
I think that’s a, that’s a point well taken, but if that’s not actually their mandate, and I think that’s something that they would have to explain; then I’m more open.
Mayor Tait: OK, councillor Beddows.
Cllr. Beddows: Yeah of course I, I second this to get it on the floor. I’m glad I did. It’s an interesting conversation. I’m not so bothered by the lobbyist, as getting value for money, and I don’t have a problem, what I’d like to see, rather than table it, because you table it, you have to bring it back at the next meeting. I’d like to see it, a year, and in that year get them to come and get give a presentation and reexamine it a year from now, and if we’re not getting value for our money, then we drop it. Or, in case this councillor St.Pierre’s question, just who are they lobbying.
Are they lobbying on our behalf, or to us?
So, I think there’s a few questions there, I would rather not sever this relationship at this point in time, but I’d be open to maybe severing it a year from now. If, I haven’t seen any headway, because I haven’t seen any value here.
Mayor Tait: OK, Councillor Bateman, and then McMath
Cllr Bateman: Yeah, I can see where this is going, and I’m, I’m happy to, to, to table this to have a UDI representative in the room with us. I think it’s important to note that indeed they, they are a registered lobbyist. They work with the Province, so you can go online, and you see every one of the subject matters that they’ve, that they’ve been lobbying about. I’ve got a partial list right here, and yeah, I think, I think it’s, you know, I’m always want to delay, and get more information always, but I think a key point here is, there is a perception of bias being a member of this organization. So, but I will vote in favour of the amended, or, is it an amended motion that?
Mayor Tait: Well it is, it’s a bit hard when there’s a negative in it, because it it says, I think the motion, and we don’t have them on the screen yet, but that’s coming, would be that suit not renewed, that the suit not renewed, and it’s when there’s a negative in there, it’s just, it’s really awkward to untangle.
So, I’ll got to Councillor McMath and then ask for some guidance from our corporate officer here.
Cllr. McMath: When is the last time we paid the membership fee?
Staffer: That’s what I was just checking, I was, I was just gonna confirm, I believe we’ve already renewed the membership for this year, so.
Cllr. McMath: So, there’s no rush here, yep.
Mayor Tait: So is it po, so OK, so it’s renewed for the year. So then, can councillor, is it easier just to def, to call the question on the motion, or withdraw the motion?
Staffer: Well, there are certainly a few options that council can take, depending on the direction. I do hear a couple pieces of this. If it were something that Council would like to consider at a future date, we could have a motion to defer, or postpone to a future meeting.
Lay on the table is essential just for, we don’t know when we’re going to talk about this, and it’s going to be later this meeting, someone stepped out of the meeting, we lay it on the table. So, the appropriate verbiage would be to postpone to either a future meeting date, or a year from now, or to a time before the membership renewal. So that is certainly one option that Council has. Another option is to simply withdraw the motion, or we can consider the motion as it stands.
Mayor Tait: OK, so perhaps to postpone decision until Council has received a presentation from the UDI? And that could be sometime this year.
Received until council received a presentation…
Cllr. Bateman: ASAP
Mayor Tait: ASAP?
Cllr. Bateman: Yeah.
Mayor Tait: Well, we’ve renewed
Cllr. Bateman: We would like to see them as soon as they are available.
Mayor Tait: OK, well I’m just cognizant of, like we have, you know, just building it into the Council, so when I hear ASAP, I think, I think within a couple of meetings, but we also have delegations in the queue and other workshops and presentations from, you know prior to membership renewal, to membership renewal.
So that council postpone the decision until Council has received a presentation from UDI prior to membership renewal.
Does that make sense?
OK, who would, would anyone like to move the postponement?
OK, moved by St.Pierre and seconded by Councillor McMath. So, we’re postponing it until after we’ve received a presentation from the UDI.
OK?
All those in favour of the amendment?
[All councillors raise their hands, with the exception of Cllr. Bateman]
Mayor Tait: Anyone opposed? Councillor Bateman is opposed to the amendment, so now on the main amended motion.
Right, or?
Staffer: If may clarify,
Mayor Tait: No. So, this was not.
Staffer: so this was not an amendment, it was called a subsidiary motion, so that’s a motion that’s stacked on top of another motion that takes precedence.
Mayor Tait: OK
Staffer: So we don’t need to do a mean motion as amended, because it wasn’t an amendment.
Mayor Tait: Got it, so this is just a new motion to push it off, so I’ll call the question again.
All those in favour of the postponement?
[All councillors raise their hands, with the exception of Cllr. St.Pierre and Cllr. Bateman]
Mayor Tait: All those opposed?
Councillor Bateman is opposed. That carries.
Sooke Councillors vote on a subsidiary motion to postpone the decision on whether or not to discontinue the District’s UDI membership, pending the Urban Development Institute lobby explaining themselves to council first, within a year’s time.
The District became a paying member of the lobby without a vote by elected officials.
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Some thoughts on the deliberations that took place on the issue that night:
During the deliberations Mayor Tait said referring to the Urban Development Institute: “I didn’t know that they were a registered lobby group”.
I’m not sure how the Mayor could have made that remark.
Two weeks earlier on Feb 25, I Sasha Izard, had submitted an email to Sooke council asking them to review a letter to the editor published in the Saanich News titled: “Local Governments Should Distance Themselves from Lobbyists”, in which I had pointed out that the UDI is a registered lobbyist group.
If the Mayor was reading the correspondence sent to her and the council, she would have read that.
The previous year in May 2023, I had sent an email to Sooke Mayor and Council mentioning that the UDI is a lobby and mentioned ‘potential’ conflict of interest concerns regarding local governments like Sooke being paying members of a lobby.
One might think that if the mayor read that, that they would have looked into whether it was registered on the BC Lobbyists Registry.
In April of 2023, I had emailed the CRD Board asking the question: “Does the board consider it a conflict of interest for the Capital Regional District to be a paying member of a development lobby that targets the Capital Region?”
Mayor Tait was on the board during that time.
Now Mayors are very busy and I will give the Mayor the benefit of the doubt, and consider that they may not have had time to read all the correspondence sent to them.
Still, one might think having informed the CRD board and Sooke Council of the issue of branches of government being paying members of a lobbyist group, that the issue might have sparked some discussion and investigation of the issue previously that the Mayor would have been privy to. Apparently not.
Nor apparently, was the issue of the municipality being a paying member of the development and real estate lobby pressing enough to vote on the issue that night of March 11, but rather the UDI were given almost a year of lee-way to present to the District prior to Mayor and Council making a decision on whether or not to renew the membership, despite Councillor Bateman’s pressing for “ASAP” as to when the UDI should explain themselves before council.
If there is an issue, and in this case, it became pretty clear that there is; wouldn’t it make sense to deal with it now rather than later? Taking up to a year to deal with the issue could be viewed as a stalling-tactic and similar to filibustering an issue, rather than dealing with it in a timely manner.
The UDI lobby promotes “steady growth”.
Sooke’s population has almost doubled in 25 years. Development and resulting habitat loss has led to significant pressures on its environment and ecology. For many residents the traffic situation has become unbearable on its often-clogged roads. The former Colwood Crawl has now become colloquially referred to as the “Sooke crawl.”
There were many issues that arose during the deliberations on this topic between the elected officials on March 11. Dissecting and analyzing them thoroughly, as well as putting quite a few facts straight, may require a second part to this article. After all, this issue is not over. It is ongoing and has not been resolved. The prevailing impression that I had is that the elected officials were confused. This is not the first time a council has faced similar confusing deliberations over the subject.
Previously, I wrote about the deliberations faced by the Township of View Royal on the UDI issue, that although took more than one council meeting to conclude, did in the end ultimately lead to a unanimous decision by the Mayor and Council that the District discontinue its UDI membership. That whole process took several months, while Sooke’s decision on this matter may take much of a year.
View Royal’s initial confusion owed much to the UDI Executive Director’s comments to them that night, which included her saying “UDI is not a lobbying group”, which was revealed after to not be true. In fact, the Executive Director was at the time registered on the BC Lobbyists Registry as the UDI’s in-house lobbyist.
It is notable that a representative of the UDI did not speak to the same issue when it was brought up in Sooke that night. At the very least, this would result in Sooke waiting for the UDI for up to almost a year to present before council, before making a decision on this issue.
Without further ado, I leave it now to the residents of Sooke to ponder, review, research and determine for themselves what conclusions may be derived from the March 11 council meeting.
To be continued…
Resources:
Regular Council – 11 Mar 2024 – Agenda – Html (civicweb.net)
20240212 RE_ Sooke’s membership in the Urban Development Institute (UDI) (Alan Dolan)
Sooke Mayor Maja Tait embraces new challenge as federal NDP candidate – Sooke News Mirror
The Strange Case of How a Municipality in BC Became a Development and Real Estate Lobby Member Without Informing Mayor and Council and How a Local Government in BC Joining the Development and Real Estate Lobby as a Paying Member Without a Vote from Elected Officials Turned Out to Not be an Unusual Practice After All… Part I.
The Strange Case of How a Municipality in BC Became a Development and Real Estate Lobby Member Without Informing Mayor and Council and How a Local Government in BC Joining the Development and Real Estate Lobby as a Paying Member Without a Vote from Elected Officials Turned Out to Not be an Unusual Practice After All… Part II.
Saanich bails on membership in developers’ organization – Victoria Times Colonist
The BC NDP Government’s Forced Housing Targets and Shutting Down of Public Hearings have their Origin from the Development Lobby
LETTER: Local governments should distance themselves from lobbyists – Saanich News
Does the Provincial Government of British Columbia Legally Recognize the Existence of Any Lobby? – Creatively United Community
The Mystery of Sooke’s Transitory UDI Communications Continues – Reveals Failure of the BC Freedom of Information System to Provide Transparency Around Lobbying – CRD Watch Homepage
Did the District of Sooke Destroy Communications Material with and/or Regarding the Urban Development Institute (UDI), a Registered Lobbyist Organization Representing Development and Real Estate? – CRD Watch Homepage
The BC Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner (OIPC) Refuses to Search the District of Sooke’s Records to Determine if Information Regarding its Communications with and about a Registered Lobbying Organization for Development and Real Estate (the UDI) were Purged and/or Withheld from a Freedom of Information Request. – CRD Watch Homepage
CRD Watch Homepage 
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