Great “Sounding Off” piece by Jerry Heed in the May 16 Vancouver Sun!
In “A call to defend the Garden City lands,” Jerry consisely shows why citizens of Metro Vancouver, and in fact all British Columbians, should contact the Agricultural Land Commission, ALCBurnaby@Victoria1.gov.bc.ca, to express their opinion about the application to remove the lands from B.C.’s Agricultural Land Reserve.
In passing, Jerry makes clear one point that is often missed: the City of Richmond does not own the Garden City lands or any part of them. Probably most Richmondites don’t realize that. Probably even fewer realize that there is no guarantee the city ever will own any part of the lands even if they get excluded from the ALR. The possibility of the city obtaining some land, perhaps in early 2013, is subject to several conditions that are in the hands of Canada Lands Company and the Musqueam Indian Band.
A long-time resident of Richmond, Jerry is a successful realtor. As such, he has a had a front-row seat observing the ongoing problem: “Converting agricultural land into urban uses has been a get-rich-quick scheme in North America for the past 50 years.”
