Victoria B.C. - Andrew Weaver, Leader of the B.C. Green Party and MLA for Oak Bay-Gordon Head, today introduced a Bill that would ensure municipalities could not be created unless there were people actually living in the area first.
“Normally you might assume that you would need to have people living in an area before you could form a municipality,” says Weaver. “That was the case in B.C. until the government made an exception a few years ago. In 2012 the government introduced a loophole that allowed Mountain Resort Municipalities to exist without any residents.”
Today Andrew Weaver introduced the Local Government Amendment Act, 2016. It is a bill designed to repeal the changes made in 2012 to the Local Government Act under the B.C. Liberals.
“The whole reason this ridiculous loophole exists in the first place is because this government has a pet project that it wanted to succeed, despite huge opposition from the local community and First Nations,” says Weaver. “Now a municipality exists that has no people, and to top it off it also has a mayor and councillors and the whole system is being funded by the British Columbian taxpayer. It’s an absurd situation and the bill I introduced today would close that loophole.”
“The approach to the Jumbo fiasco reminds me of how this government approached the Petronas deal last year. Not only are they choosing winners in the economy, they’re creating laws specific to helping those projects succeed. The laws of this province should not be used to help specific projects succeed or fail.”
Media contact
Mat Wright, Press Secretary
Office of Andrew Weaver, MLA
1 250 216 3382
[email protected]