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UDI ‘education’ course sponsored by FORTIS BC
comes with all meals included.

By Sasha Izard
Sept 28, 2025

A UDI ‘education’ course facilitated by Michael Von Hausen offers all meals included. The course is sponsored by FORTIS BC, as is the UDI’s FORTIS BC School of Development.

Offering all meals with the course, indicates that if government employees attend the course using taxpayer funds, then the meals will be paid for by the taxpayer.

During the deliberations in the City of Victoria on whether or not to withdraw the City’s paid membership from the UDI, a registered lobbying organization on the BC Lobbyists Registry, both councillors Thompson and Dell used the argument, that because the UDI lobbied the council against climate goals e.g. the Zero Carbon Step Code, and council didn’t listen to the UDI on the issue, then it has been shown that the UDI does not influence the councillors.

They did not however mention if they had ever in their entire time on council ever voted against the project of a UDI member company. Both Thompson and Dell received significant amounts of campaign income from employees of UDI member companies for their 2022 election campaigns.

The ultimate question though, is whether or not the UDI is influencing not just the politicians, but government staff in particular, which they are; having special access to government staff in the form of unrecorded backroom committee meetings.

If staff are to use government funds to attend UDI ‘educational courses’ they should keep in mind the sort of organization that funds such courses e.g. FORTIS BC, which profits massively from the natural gas industry, and as such has financial interests naturally pitted against climate goals, which could lower their profit margins.

Michael Von Hausen which is the facilitator for the above course, was the facilitator for the Saanich Cadboro Bay Local Area Plan Update Workshop held at Goward House in 2022, which I attended.

When the issue was repeatedly brought up that the Cadboro Bay Local Area Plan update survey was open to non-residents, had no address line in it, and no working verification process in-place to determine who is filling it out, Von Hausen shut down the meeting over half an hour early, so that the public could not ask questions, which was on the agenda for the last half hour of the workshop.

As it turned out a Stakeholder and Saanich Advisory Committees Consultation Meeting on the Local Area Plan Update was held with the Urban Development Institute on December 7, 2021. Presumably they were welcomed by the district as a stakeholder to give advice on other “Local Area Plans” as well.

            The Urban Development Institute in their 2021-2022 Annual report under “Advocacy Initiatives” for Saanich included:

 “• Local Area / Villages and Corridor Plan
• Cordova Bay Area Plan Review
• Cadboro Bay Area Plan Review”

UDI-Annual-Report_2021-2022-v1-web.pdf

             The UDI posted the Cadboro Bay Area Plan survey under their “Policy and Advocacy Updates” page.”

One wonders as to what sort of communications the UDI’s ‘educator’ Von Hausen had with Saanich staff that led him to facilitating their public workshop on updating the Local Area Plan.

The workshop led to significant public outcry, and Saanich essentially abandoned the update process, only to eliminate the Local Area Plans entirely 2 years later in 2024.

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The University of Victoria, which also had much interest in the plan, was to take a UDI course on “Community Relations”:

Surely, that must be the other way around? University of Victoria (UVic) paid lobbying group $500 for the group to have a tour of UVic’s facilities, and a month earlier, $577.50 for a UVic staffer to take the lobbying group’s course on “Community Relations”. – CRD Watch Homepage

That course was also sponsored by FORTIS BC:

One of its speakers was a top UDI ‘educator’ Mark Holland.

Mark Holland has been in the press for his dislike of Oak Tree root balls:

One more obstacle to building more houses in BC: root balls | iNhome

Appendix: Michael Von Hausen’s former “Great Communities Institute”.

Michael Von Hausen co-founded a briefly existing “Great Communities Institute”, which appeared much like the UDI, but the website for which, was pulled down. It offered education and training for municipal staff and elected officials.


On March 15, 2023, I recorded the following information about the website:

“https://www.greatcommunitiesinstitute.com/ has on its front page The UDI Pacific Region listed as one of their two “educational partners”.

The Great Communities Institute also offers educational opportunities to the following on their front page:

“Who this training is for

·         Real Estate Developers

You work at a real estate development company in a financing, procurement, project management, or administration function

·         Municipal staff

You work in planning, development services, or engineering, or legal services

·         Policy-makers

You are a municipal elected official, serving your community as a councillor or mayor

·         Landscape Architects

You are a landscape architect looking to understand how urban design interfaces with real estate development”

The institute on the website under the heading “Join the Movement” offers the following:

“We’re so glad you’re here. Sign up to our mailing list to learn more about our courses and bootcamps.”

Mailchimp Survey (list-manage.com)

Options that can be ticked for applicants include: “Where did you hear about us and an option “Urban Development Institute” is among the possibilities.

Also the following can be selected under the line  “Which of the following best describes what you do for work?

Architect

Landscape Architect

Policy-maker (muni/prov/fed)

Municipal or district staff (incl. land-use, planning, engineering, development services)

Real Estate Developer (incl. financing, procurement, coordinators, project managers etc.)

Engineer (private sector)”

On the Great Communities Institute “About Page” (as of July 9, 2023) The consultant is  described as having “20+ years of teaching at Simon Fraser University, The Urban Development Institute, and more.”

About Us — Great Communities Institute “

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See also:

Transcript of City of Victoria Council Deliberation on Motion put forward by Councillors Hammond and Gardiner to “Terminate Victoria’s membership in the Urban Development Institute”. (Sept 4, 2025) – CRD Watch Homepage

Letter to Councillor Dell in regard to your comments during the deliberations regarding the City’s membership in the Urban Development Institute at the City of Victoria Sept 4 Committee of the Whole – CRD Watch Homepage

Letter to Councillor Thompson in regard to your comments during the deliberations regarding the City’s membership in the Urban Development Institute at the City of Victoria Sept 4, 2025 Committee of the Whole – CRD Watch Homepage

LETTER: Cadboro Bay resident worries about village’s future – Saanich News

LETTER: Cadboro Bay survey sees outside influence – Saanich News

“Does Saanich want to hear from Cadboro Bay?” [June 21, 2022 – Times Colonist] Letters June 21: ‘Heat dome’ too rare to plan for; Langford should beware ‘woke’ candidates – Victoria Times Colonist

LETTER: UVic would benefit from Cadboro Bay density – Saanich News UVic’s Expansionism Behind Push to Densify Cadboro Bay (Published ironically as “UVic would benefit from Cadboro Bay density”) [July 3, 2022 – Saanich News]