Postponing vote could raise house prices: officials

There was a subtle suggestion at city council’s meeting Monday that the majority of council is thinking about putting off the vote on the Porter Creek D proposal.

There was a subtle suggestion at city council’s meeting Monday that the majority of council is thinking about putting off the vote on the Porter Creek D proposal.

Newly elected-councillor Kirk Cameron confirmed this morning he is clearly in favour of delaying the vote scheduled for next Monday’s meeting.

Coun. Betty Irwin was also adamant last night she’d like to see a return to the public consultation process before making a final decision on the residential development.

Meanwhile, comments from Councillors Dave Stockdale and Ranj Pillai suggested they’re also thinking about putting off a final vote.

Council, on the other hand, also heard from city staff who indicated putting off a decision on Porter Creek D could ultimately inflate housing prices by delaying final preparations for an environmental review of the final three stages of the Whistle Bend subdivision development.

Knowing the future for Porter Creek D is required to finalize traffic-flow information for Whistle Bend, which is required for a submission to the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Review Board, council was told.

It was standing room only in council chambers last night, with all but a handful there to support environmental protection of the McIntyre Creek corridor proposed for the Porter Creek D development and a new road across the creek.

The issue over the proposed residential development and Pine Street extension has been burning red-hot for a year or more.

The same proposal, however, was also on fire back in 2006 when it was shelved after an equally divisive public debate.

For 2 1/2 hours last night, city council listened to presentations from members of the public, representatives of special interest groups and staff from the city’s planning department.

Karen Baltgailis of the Yukon Conservation Society repeated the society’s belief the public consultation and review process for Porter Creek D is seriously flawed, if not hijacked entirely by city staff in favour of development.

On the other hand, council again heard from Rick Karp, president of the Whitehorse Chamber of Commerce, about how Porter Creek D is crucial if the city ever hopes to catch up to the demand for housing and the soaring real estate market.

Of the seven who addressed council regarding the proposal, only Karp spoke in favour of the project.

Time after time, Cameron asked those making remarks if there was any hope of bringing compromise to the table by returning to further discussions.

Irwin told her colleagues she was bothered by the fact the Porter Creek D working group organized by the city has imploded with accusations from community organizations that city hall was driving the process in the direction it wanted to go.

There’s no question the public review should be revisited, regardless of what delays might occur, Irwin insisted.

“If there is something wrong with the process, then let’s do it again,” Irwin told her colleagues. “Let’s do it as many times as we need to get it right.”

Mayor Bev Buckway, however, questioned exactly was being suggested with thoughts of revisiting the review process, or going back to the drawing board and “getting some value on the table,” as Cameron had described it.

If council decides to return to the process of reviewing Porter Creek D, Buckway wondered, where exactly did it want to return to?

Does council, she asked, want to start at the beginning again?

City planner Mike Gau told members of council in a rather straightforward manner that what he was hearing suggested to him there is some doubt about the studies done showing why Porter Creek D was a sound and positive proposal.

Did council, he wondered, not accept the 2009 transportation study identifying the need to build a connector road from Pine Street to the Alaska Highway at the Kopper King, with a bridge across McIntyre Creek?

He wondered if the elected representatives were doubting the environmental assessment of the McIntyre Creek corridor that showed development in the area could occur without hurting local wildlife populations.

Does city council, Gau asked, want to redo the studies with different consultants, and does it want to revisit the Official Community Plan approved in 2010 that identified the area for future residential development?

The city planner said he can’t help but think the city is in a housing crunch because of the delays it encounters while reviewing these types of residential development proposals.

And the representative of the city’s business community emphasized while the Porter Creek D development may not address the city’s affordable housing issue directly, it is an essential piece of the puzzle nonetheless.

Karp said that by adding Porter Creek D to the mix, more housing options would become available across the board, creating a domino effect right down to the rental market.

Baltgailis, however, suggested while the conservation society might someday see its way through to supporting some development in the area, at this point, it can’t back the proposal based on the studies to date.

There is, for instance, no information regarding how far the transport study went in examining alternative solutions to building the Pine Street extension to handle anticipated to growth, she said.

City manager Dennis Shewfelt emphasized members of council were being asked to advance the Porter Creek D proposal to the preliminary planning stage, which will provide a whole new round of public consultation. Council, he said, is not being asked to given final project approval at this point.

Baltgailis suggested, however, there’s very little chance city council would back away from the project after spending $200,000 or more on preliminary planning and design.