The City of Surrey has streamlined its development application process with the aim to reduce the number of projects referred to its advisory design panel by 75 per cent.
Council heard a presentation by Scott Neuman, Surrey’s general manager of engineering, and Don Luymes, general manager of planning and development, on Dec. 18, on the highlights, which Luymes said are “just a part of a larger enterprise, looking across the whole scope of the process of developing land and property.”
The intended result, Luymes said, is to reduce the time to get “good” development projects before council.
“We set a target here to improve that by an average of two months per project and also to reduce the number of projects that are referred to the ADP by a significant amount and that was really to maximize the value of the expertise and to streamline the value of expertise that the ADP brings,” he explained.
Luymes noted that currently about 50 projects are referred to the panel, which is comprised of expert volunteers, “and that’s a real burden on the volunteers who serve and we’ll have between 18 and 25 meetings per year so this will reduce the draw on our volunteers and really focus them on projects that are either large in scale or projects where staff and the applicant are at loggerheads.”
Council later in the meeting approved two related corporate reports concerning changes to the advisory design panel procedures for development applications and also improvements to the engineering development process, with the result being that apartment building projects six storeys or less and commercial and office building projects three storeys or less will be exempted from advisory design panel review as long as urban design city staff supports them.
Coun. Linda Annis called this “a great step forward in speeding up the timelines for some of our development applications. I think it’s a great move.”
Coun. Mandeep Nagra said it will save “millions and millions and millions” of dollars and Coun. Harry Bains said saving developers money will ultimately make homes more affordable.
Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke took a swipe at provincial Residential Development Bill 44, Bill 46 dealing with development financing and Bill 47, concerning density related to public transit.
“I really believe Surrey has done yeoman’s work in trying to address the housing shortage, or the housing crisis, and personally I think these bills are an insult to most cities that are working as hard as Surrey,” Locke said. “Cities recognize the need for housing far greater than any of the senior governments do because we are on the ground and living it every single day.”
About the Author: Tom Zytaruk
