Minority, how can it work?

[cakadu]

Linda are you going to attend the Action for Agriculture AGM ? If so are you going to pose some questions to the group from Red Deer ?

Smart Growth Planning has been a concept adopted by many communities in the US, and of course some communities in Alberta are trying to implement that same philosophy in their land use planning.
I can tell you from experience that it trying to create a balanced approach to municipal planning is no easy task and has caused many elected officials great stress.
I have always advocated that if the type of agriculture in any given area involves livestock operations of a significant size then that area should be left zoned agriculture to allow for expansion of existing operations if economics dictate that to be necessary.
Any land close to a city, town, village of hamlet or recreation area is prime for eventual country residential development and of course that means that the land is more valuable.
If a farmer decides he wants to subdivide his entire farm miles fron any urban centre I wonder if he is really a farmer or farming subdivisions !!!!


Cowman I can't wait for your response !!

[cakadu]

I wish I could attend emrald, but I don't think I'll be able to make it work, despite being a member. Trust me, I have asked questions of the planners.

What I would like to see is how they plan on turning Glennifer Lake into more of a hamlet type scenario when the ASP does not allow for that kind of thing. In addition, it is my understanding that when the dam went in and the intial sales took place for the recreational area, that one of the conditions sought and won was that there would be no permanent residents there. I know that they have relaxed that somewhat but there was never meant to be any kind of real development. Many of the groups that were working on it back then fought hard to get that put in there. How will they be able to change that now?

I will keep maintaining that if the only way we can see value in recreational and/or natural areas is to develop them then we have well and truly missed the boat.

[cakadu]

Area Structure Plans are easily amended by having first reading, holding a public hearing,then giving the plan second and third reading and it becomes a County By-Law.

Are you still on the Agricultural Service Board of Red Deer County, and if so are you attending the ASB Convention in Edmonton ? I will be there on Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday until around 2:00.

[cowman]

Emerald: I think the RD county plan is this "Smart Growth" deal? They sent two councillors to the states to some conference and they came back among the "converted and faithful"! Of course they already had subdivided their land...so the conversion might have been a little suspect?
The geological facts of Red Deer county is that running the length of the county is the "divide" which is a break of rough hills where the west is quite a bit lower in sea level from the east.
This whole "divide" is not the best farmland but a beautiful place for residential developement...it is the sensible place to build and eventually it will be developed...one way or the other?
Instead the "Smart Growth" plan calls for expansion and creation of hamlets and subdivisions around Red Deer on some of the best farm land in the province...well so much for saving good farmland!
If you are unlucky enough to be considered "Primary Agriculture" then no matter what, you are shut out of the gravy train, even though your land couldn't support a billygoat but would make a beautiful subdivision!
The land east of the divide is poorer soil and drier than west of the divide. This area is basically dying. Fewer people living there every year...and yet totally feasible to commute...but once again no developement!
Instead the "smart growth plan" is to cluster acreages and industry around Red Deer and close to highway #2. Is that smart?
The pressure to develope the area around Glennifer Lake is pretty powerful? The "money men" see a goldmine and I doubt they will be denied for long? I have often found high sounding plans and rules written in stone usually get the old heave ho when there is a dollar in sight? Don't forget the "plan" today can be ancient history real fast? Like one election away or one visionary planner sent packing?
Personally I am sort of ambivalent about the whole thing. I live basically right on the divide. Have land that is part of the divide but actually live just west of it. Without a doubt I don't like the fact that I have been deemed "primary agriculture" but have no doubt that will change someday. At my age and in my situation I don't really care if I make the big bucks, in fact I kind of enjoy not having to deal with a lot of developement pressure? But the fact is this: Everything in this world has a price and money makes the world go around? Its coming my way one way or the other and I might as well make the best of it? Although hopefully not in my lifetime!

[cowman]

In my area there are a couple of small feedlots and mainly cattle operations plus a few 'first parcel out' sites.
Neighbours tried to take a parcel out across from a feedlot, where their son had built a shop and also put an apartment over it which was against the rules within the land use by-law. The subdivision application was denied as it would have stifled any future growth of the feedlot which had been in existance for years with a permit.
Now the neighbour has decided that they want to apply for three subdivisions a little further away from the feedlot, and I happen to be an adjacent landowner.
I am going to oppose the application for the following reason:

This land is over ten miles from town, in the midst of agricultural lands where the main commodity is cattle. Cattle operations when they get large enough just do not mix with a bunch of country residential parcels across the road. I like the peace and quiet of my rural setting, and more important than that I like the fact that my neighbours are all in the cattle business, we understand that cows bawl, people haul silage, hay and manure and sometimes drive their cattle down the road.
We don't phone and complain to each other about generally accepted farming practices and we don't call the county by-law officer when somebody spreads manure or combines half the night...but just mix country residential and livestock and watch the fun begin.

I had a go round with the local Development Officer a year ago ( he has since been fired ), because he got pretty snarly with me when I asked him where the livestock operations were expected to be able to exist if they were surrounded by acreages 10-12 miles from town. He was adamant that there were no livestock operations of a significant size anywhere in my area of the county. Guess he figured that an operation with 1200 cow/calf pairs plus a 2500 head feedlot was just a hobby farm !!!

During my years as a municipal councillor I got my share of phone calls from constituents complaining because the neighbour was hauling cattle at midnight and making noise, or hauling manure and making ruts in THEIR road or heaven forbid was out on a tractor in the middle of the night keeping them awake...so I have a bit of experience to back up my position on this .

[cakadu]

No, emrald, I'm not on the ASB any longer and I haven't been considered as a candidate for much after my run for councillor. Now it could be that the two are not connected, but..... It would have been nice to meet you there.

Cowman, you may be right about the development thing and if this proposed power line goes through, then any chance or choice around developing the land will go right out the window. As of right now, we don't want to develop anything and we would like to keep the land in it's natural state. Having said that though there may come a day when we have to sell for any number of reasons - the first of which is we're not getting any younger - and it would be nice to have some options.

We like living out here and we have more parcels of land out here because of subdivision. While the landowner was a councillor he got a lot of subdividing for the 5 quarters of land the family owned. One quarter was able to be divided into two 80-acre parcels, one was turned into a 4, 76 and and 80 acre parcels, and out of the home quarter a 3 acre parcel was taken out. In fact, there were so many subdivisions granted that when we bought the home quarter there was a Caveat on it that if he went for any more subdivisions, he would have to give the most aethetically pleasing part of the quarter to the county.

Now we have plenty of acreage neighbors, not the least of which is one of the offspring of the original owner who lives in Calgary and lets any amount of drilling activity go on over there because they don't have to deal with any of the noise, inconvience, DUST etc. We have some of the opposite problems that you do emrald - city folk who came out to the country for the good life and wouldn't have a clue on how to burn garbage if their lives depended on it. Fire ban - we'll burn garbage. 70 km/h wind - we'll burn garbage. Plastic, no problem we'll burn it. Kids using the roads as speedways for their quads and motorbikes, no idea of how many animals should be on a 4-acre parcel and the list goes on.

[cowman]

Linda: Don't ask me how I know...but yep, you lost the election...you are gone from any committee involvement!
Lets face it the guy you lost to is the chairman of the ag service board?
Also the 4 members at large were handpicked by the ag fieldman...believe me I know...one of them is a relative.

[cowman]

Agricultural Fieldmen usually try to get farmer reps appointed that are forward thinking and willing to network with the other farmers in the community. In my area one of the farmer reps has been there for years and is a cousin of the chairman. He is an excellent rep. not afraid to speak up and put in his two cents worth so nobody questions it.

One other one seems to take his entire family whenever he can, the kids, and he has a bunch of them, are homeschooled so packing them up and taking them isn't a problem.

The parcel the county wanted to take would have been the Municipal Reserve land which amounts to 10% of the parcel being subdivided after the first parcel out. Some municipalities take cash in lieu, but those with significant growth take the land because of the future need for parks, schools etc.

Cowman there is a resolution coming up at the ASB Convention regarding a subsidy for fertilizer. Our ASB is voting against it, their reason being that grain is overproduced so giving a subsidy only encourages further production !!! I am waiting to hear the tongue lashing they get from the grain growing municipalities across the province. If I get a chance to speak to the ASB before the resolution session I am going to tell them they are NUTS !!!

[cowman]

Sorry for posting so much on this topic but another issue that has come to my attention is the recent decision by our Planning Commission to ignore legal advice on the need for a water study to be done prior to allowing six parcels out of a quarter.
This is consistent with the requirements of the Water Act, and during the MPC meeting they had the county's lawyer on the speaker phone advising that they require a study prior to approving the application.
One member of the planning commission said there was lots of water in the area and they didn't need a study so the rest of them raised their hand to approve the application.
If at anytime in the future existing water users can prove that they do not have ample water the entire liability rests with the members of the planning commission not the county due to the fact that they ignored a legal opinion !!!

cowman I don't think that your county has a monopoly on questionable decision making !!! Mind you, for the most part I am pleased with the direction our new council has gone. They have cancelled road projects that the previous council had debentured, paid off all the debt and are slowly restoring the services that the previous council had cut, but ignoring legislation and legal advice is a fairly serious blunder in my view.

[cowman]

So I have to ask, who makes up your planning commission? Council members or any public members at large? After the least election here they got rid of the appointed members and went with all 7 councillors. Not sure of the reason but I suspect it had something to do with the ex-councillor who sat on the planning board being involved in the decision making of granting the "hamlet" of Hidden Springs, which he was involved in? Haven't got the inside dope on that whole deal yet, but I suspect they didn't know he was involved in something he had direct influence on!
Red Deer County has a lawyer who attends every council meeting and MPC meeting. The day when much can be done without legal advice is pretty much over?
Being a municipal councillor has become a very complex job and one you really need to be on top of. The days of old farmer Brown glad handing the yokels and making decisions however he felt that day, are also pretty well over? I know there are still some who don't have a clue but there are some who are better informed and trying to do a better job. It's a tough business.

[cowman]

The planning commission here is made up of three members of council and two members at large, one of whom is a loose cannon and his wife is the taxation clerk of the county.
The new council has several oil patch guys that think money grows on trees, and also a small time developer who is taking advantage of everything he learns in the system to develop his own property.
Another council member has a small recreational river front property that he is trying to turn into a retreat type of development so he is attending every tourism conference he can find.
Of the council that was elected in 2004, four of them have never served on council or the planning commission previously. One was a councillor back years ago and is a fence sitter if ever there was one, he goes with the flow because he cannot stand anything confrontational even when it comes to turning down development when it makes no sense to approve it.

The other two members of council have been there for two terms.

I have always felt that members of the public on the planning commission and the agricultural service board are valuable and certainly should bring common sense into the equation if council doesn't have any !!

This council doesn't seem to feel the need to adhere to their own land use by-law and it will get them into trouble one of these days when they end up in court. Recently they had a Subdivision and Development Appeal Board hearing, made a decision that the appellants didn't like so they sought leave to appeal and won. The judge ordered the county to re-hear the appeal because they had not provided proper reasons for their decision. The Administrator doesn't have a clue about planning and he is the secretary to the SDAB. The Chair of the SDAB is a new counicllor and his idea of running a hearing is to crack jokes throughout, making foolish comments about the entire process.
One of these days that will come back to haunt them, any public hearing should be run with enough formality to ensure that everyone gets a fair unbiased opportunity to be heard.
The courts don't care whether the council or board members are inexperienced or not they expect proceedings to be run in an appropriate manner.
I have attended council meetings all across the province and many reeves run excellent meetings, however, some of the meetings I have attended have no concept of orderly conduct. Council members speak out whenever the urge hits them, no attempt to be recognized by the chair etc.
The best intentions by elected officials can get off track if there is no structure to council meetings, committee meetings etc. As you say cowman things have progressed from the old days when council meetings were just an informal get together to decide which road to gravel.

[cakadu]

Isn't it mandatory to disclose any dealings that you might be in conflict over? Or perhaps I'm just thinking that ethically you would want to disclose anything. Many councils and organizations have you sign that you aren't in conflict and you have to disclose anything that could even be perceived as a potential conflict. Are municipal councils any different?