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UDI “Areas of Focus” in Focus

By Sasha Izard
March 24, 2025

Given that the UDI took down all their branch websites in 2023, and has been hiding its members directory ever since, and in addition as of early 2025, its list of committees that meet with local governments and the Province of B.C. behind closed doors – I decided to make a snapshot of the UDI’s “Areas of Focus” page, lest it too gets taken down, and/or modified beyond recognition. With the branch websites gone, the content on the UDI’s website in B.C. in addition, appears to be getting thinner and thinner by the day.

Despite a wealth of evidence of the UDI lobbying at all levels of government, it only registers its lobbying activity on one level of government: the Provincial level. Such is the quickly collapsing house of cards, when a bit of scrutiny relieves any illusion the public might have had regarding any sense transparency around lobbying in Canada.

Although the Province of B.C. should be given credit for having a decent lobbyist registry, unlike the rest of the levels of government; 2 of those levels (local and regional governments) are under the Province’s jurisdiction, a gross double standard in B.C. law, that is done intentionally by the Provincial government, because it does not want transparency around lobbying to local and regional governments.

The Federal government has even less of an excuse. They have set the bar so unattainably high that even the most powerful lobby for real estate and development in B.C., is not required by it to fill out lobbying registrations and thus is left to fly freely under the radar, as it seeks to influence it.

For clearer reading:

“Federal

National Building Codes

Rental financing programs

Taxation (UHT, GST)

Budgets

Construction material tariffs

Green building policies

Data and demographic impacts on development”

Provincial

Taxation (SVT, AST, APTT)

BC Hydro distribution capacity

Early marketing periods (REDMA)

Mass timber and prefabrication

Digitization of building codes/ automated compliance checks

BC Energy Step Code/Zero Carbon Step Code

BC Building Code

Allowable Annual Rent Increases

Provincial permitting reforms

Water Sustainability Act

Contaminated sites remediation

Soil relocation

Regional

Transit and infrastructure

Industrial land-use

Regional planning

Regional policy coordination

Development Cost Charges (DCCs)

GHG emissions regulations

Municipal

City and area planning

Application processing and approvals

Zoning districts

Inclusionary zoning

Rental housing incentives

Fees and charges (CACs, DCCs, Density Bonuses)

Development restrictions

Green building policies

Parking Requirements

Transportation planning

EV charging requirements

Tenant relocation policies

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Conclusion: It is clear from the UDI’s “Areas of Focus” page, that the UDI’s influence activities are aimed at all levels of government. This was also apparent from their literature, including their annual reports.

On Sept 12, 2023, hoping to maintain View Royal’s recently joined membership with the UDI, the UDI Capital Region’s Executive Director made a presentation to the Township of View Royal.

The presentation didn’t have the desired effect. The Executive Director’s claim that “UDI is not a lobbying group” didn’t compare well with the BC Lobbyists Registry entry for the UDI which showed that she was registered as the UDI’s in-house lobbyist.

At the View Royal Sept 14, Committee of the Whole, the Mayor and Council affirmed based on the registrations that the UDI is a lobby, and unanimously decided to discontinue the district’s paid membership with the UDI. The elected officials had not voted to join in the first place, rather the Executive Director had approached View Royal staff, who signed the district up as a member of the lobbying organization, without the authorization or even the knowledge of elected officials.

The UDI Capital Region’s Executive Director’s presentation, did however prove informative about the UDI’s collaboration with all levels of government. Although it was somewhat difficult to follow the thread of it, without some serious transcription effort.

The following are excerpts:

“We [UDI] pride ourselves on working collaboratively with all levels of government by
sharing information and working together“

“We do extensive policy work, […] and this is where we look at informed changes across all levels of government. […] We try to align the […] policies, that are being […] brought forward by the federal government, the provincial government, and the municipal government, and to kind of help them align, so that they don’t […] collide with each other. […] So, we’re working with the province and the Feds, mainly the province on […] a variety of […] different policies“

“UDI representatives get together with the directors of the develop or the departments that work directly with development, and we exchange information and we help the municipalities out by creating working groups that can inform and, and help make decisions, uh for your policies.“

The original full verbatim quote from the executive director can be seen in the appendix to another article that I wrote, by clicking on this linked text.

The following is a snapshot of the UDI Capital Region’s website, which was taken down a couple months after this meeting:

This is a screenshot of the UDI Edmonton Metro page from a couple years back. 
Note: that the UDI is selling the idea of influencing planning departments to its members is very notable:

Also the UDI has advertised in its newsletters getting municipal employees involved in their advocacy work.  Note the UDI files its lobbying registrations on the BC Lobbyists Registry as “advocating”.

In essence, the UDI’s areas of focus are all levels of government (especially planning departments) and its advocacy is used by the UDI synonymously with lobbying when it files its lobbyist registrations with the Province. The fact that the UDI only files registrations at one level of government, shows that Canada’s government and democracy have been compromised by private interests.

It also shows a failure of intellectual curiosity by the so-called free press in Canada to show the public who and what is influencing political decision-making and how they achieve that.

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See also: How the Development and Real Estate Lobby Pressed Mandatory Housing Targets, Mass Upzoning, Captured Official Community Plans, and Made the Shutting Down of Public Hearings the Norm in British Columbia Under the NDP Government – CRD Watch Homepage

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.

Transparency International Knowledge Hub | Introduction to undue influence on decision-making

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_capture

Regulatory capture – Wikipedia

The Corporation (2003 film) – Wikipedia