Douglas Todd: Why is Vancouver so secretive about this First Nations' highrise project?

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Bulldozers recently dug up land next to the Burrard Bridge. Large trees have been cut down. Construction fences went up last week.

And new survey signs mark where a road is planned to run across Vanier Park, which will provide access to Sen̓áḵw, which urban analysts say is the most dense highrise development ever proposed for Canada.

Yet last week, until nearby residents notified them, even Vancouver park board officials didn’t know a road was being prepared across the parkland it operates. They launched an investigation and requested a stop on the encroaching work.

Meanwhile, Vancouver city council is doing everything it can to support the Squamish First Nation in erecting 11 highrise towers, with some skyscrapers soaring to 59 storeys, on a narrow portion of reserve land in Kitsilano at the west side of the bridge.

The Kitsilano Point Residents Association strongly supports the Indigenous undertaking, seeing it as a potential act of reconciliation. But its directors believe, along with former Vancouver mayor and B.C. premier Mike Harcourt, that the property is being overdeveloped.

And they’re especially bothered by city council’s secrecy, the complete lack of any consultation with residents and voters. They describe the city as operating behind a thick cloud of non-transparency, confidentiality, hidden reports, in-camera meetings and councillors being sworn to secrecy — while the city paves the way for roughly 10,000 new residents to pack in closely beside the bridge.

The city says it has no “mandate” to hold hearings on the massive construction effort, since it’s on a reserve. But in May the city signed a memorandum of understanding, which isn’t available to the public, to provide water, sewer, electricity, police and firefighter services to the project of the Squamish Nation, which is in partnership with Westbank Corp., a developer of mostly luxury condos.

Kits Point residents, however, are among those bothered that the city hasn’t held one public event on Sen̓áḵw’s community impact or on whether it intends to provide schools, transportation, recreational centres, traffic mitigation or amenities in response to the megaproject, which they say will be 10 times more dense than the West End.

The residents’ group isn’t alone in being worried. Former Vancouver councillor Gordon Price, an urban affairs scholar, has written a piece about it, titled, How do we talk about Senakw?

While Price endorses B.C.’s “new era of billion dollar Indigenous real estate projects,” he laments there was no public consultation a decade ago when the Tsawwassen First Nation built a megamall on precious Delta farmland. He fears the Senakw project will also be pushed through by hushing dissent.

“But if reconciliation of any kind means being honest and open, to declare interests and be open to accommodation, then this is that time,” Price says. “The best outcomes will be if there’s a sense of mutual benefit.”

Neither the city, nor the 4,000-member Squamish Nation’s development arm, the Nch’Kay Corp., have provided Vancouver residents with commitments regarding Sen̓áḵw, including the proportion of units for renters, condo owners or businesses.

Still, a Westbank-developed website, called Sen̓áḵw, says the highrise development “represents an opportunity to heal.”

The site adds: “The world is full of too much talk, and too little action.” The aim of the Sen̓áḵw development is to “construct 6,000 homes in Downtown Vancouver in as little as five years, start to finish. Ready to commence construction in 2022.”

Sen̓áḵw will help resolve the city’s housing crisis, the website claims, because it’s being built on “reserve land, with the Squamish Nation in the driver’s seat: no drawn-out approvals or permitting delays.”

A Nch’Kay Corp. representative said officials weren’t immediately available to respond to Postmedia News’s questions.

A City of Vancouver official, however, said in a statement: “Vancouver land-use policies and regulations are not applicable to these (reserve) lands, nor is the city directly involved in any part of the planning or design.”

Even though city officials have been negotiating for two years to provide infrastructure to Sen̓áḵw, the statement said, “there is no timeline” on when staff or council will engage with residents on transportation or other issues. In regard to a services agreement, it said, “the city will make the details public shortly.”

While the city acknowledged Vanier Park is leased by the federal government to Vancouver and is operated by the park board, it suggested Ottawa is responsible for approving the road through the park. Staff ignored a question about whether the city, as lessee, requested the roadway.

Eve Munro of the Kits Point Residents Association said city councillors and officials are being “disingenuous,” including about “the unprecedented level of secrecy surrounding the Sen̓áḵw development.”

Munro, a lawyer, accepts that Sen̓áḵw isn’t subject to the city’s normal consultation process because it’s on reserve land, which was granted to the Squamish Nation in 2000, along with $92 million, for relinquishing its claim to Kits Point and other lands.

However, Munro said “there is nothing stopping the city from consulting about how the residents of the city would like to have their resources deployed … in support of a development of this scale and density.”

Vancouver Mayor Kennedy Stewart recently commented about a services deal with the Nch’Kay Corp.: “We have an obligation to provide services as a good neighbour. To use that as a tool for blackmail really isn’t in the spirit of reconciliation.”

But Munro said the mayor and staff are “promoting a false narrative suggesting the nature of the development is beyond their influence and control.”

Other B.C. municipalities faced with urban reserve developments, she said, have not been so reluctant to protect their community’s interests.

Jeremy Braud, whose home is close to the project, said Kits Point residents generally feel “a lot of good will” toward the Sen̓áḵw development. But he worries the lack of transparency is creating a “public relations disaster. If I don’t know what’s going on in my backyard, I think the worst.”

It’s not only the city, he said. There is nothing to stop the Nch’Kay Corp. from reaching out to residents.

In his article on Sen̓áḵw, Price cautioned that “there will be a real danger of it getting pulled into a political culture war” if community concerns aren’t taken seriously.

“Guilt and shame are ultimately counterproductive ways to negotiate a healing future,” Price said. But he said if Sen̓áḵw, one of many Indigenous developments in the works in Metro Vancouver, proceeds with respect shown by all sides it could turn into the city’s “next great megaproject.”

dtodd@postmedia.com

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