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January 17, 2019 – 10:21 am
OPINION
Editor,
RE: Kelowna spends millions keeping development off landfills
Kelowna often claims the city is underfunded. Hence the sharp increases in property taxes and the enormous backlog of urban projects that have not yet started or have not been completed.
It seems strange that the city is spending $ 11.9 million of our money on land we don’t need, that it doesn’t even allow citizens to do.
Renee Wasylyk, CEO of Troika Developments, is a close personal friend of our Mayor Colin Basran. The Troika planned to convert low value land next to our urban landfill into much more valuable land by building a large subdivision on it. The city council rejected this program last year because it feared future homeowners would complain about landfills that are set to last for several decades.
Following that decision by the city, Troika announced that they would instead proceed with an already approved plan for residential homes on this Diamond Mountain property. Months later, after a slowdown in real estate sales in Kelowna, Troika changed their minds and asked the city to buy their land instead.
Now a huge pile of tight taxpayers’ money is being spent to buy the Troika Consortium’s land for more than its estimated value. Kelowna didn’t need this land in the 53 years the landfill existed. Now that the mayor’s friend is about to dump it, we apparently need it and we have to pay more than it’s worth!
The next time the city refuses to build a promised community project in your neighborhood because it claims “lack of money”, think of this travesty.
Al Janusas
Kelowna
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