Clearwater's green space and distinct neighbourhoods are part of what makes this such a great place to live. But, we are so spread out that the infrastructure requirements of our community place a huge burden on our population. At 31 metres of road per person, we are maintaining one of the highest ratio's of roads to taxpayers among comparable BC communities. 

Clearwater needs growth. New residents and investment can strengthen our tax base and help us address infrastructure and service needs without constantly raising taxes on our existing residents.

Some of my specific goals on council in the next 4 years are:

• Finance the water and sewer infrastructure needed to build 200-300 new homes on development ready parcels in medium and high density neighbourhoods in Clearwater. This will need to involve debt, investment and grants. 

• Pursue infrastructure investment from major industrial and resource projects like TMX and the Trekor mine. These projects bring tremendous economic benefits, but they also rely on Clearwater's infrastructure, housing and services.

• Continue to fight to reduce development cost charges (DCCs). Work with council to pass a DCC bylaw that incentivizes growth, rather than punishes it. The province has used the federal government's 1.6 billion dollar DCC offset only to benefit large communities, we need to advocate that Clearwater gets its share. 

•  Prioritize the development of diverse housing stock. With our local economy poised for a change we need more of all types of housing stock. We need single family homes, row housing and modular housing options.

• Amend the 2026 OCP to remove the “fourth downtown” concept and let market forces direct growth to where it is financially and geographically realistic. 

• Stop adopting 1-size-fits-all plans from big city consultants. Ensure municipal planning reflects Clearwater’s actual size, population, infrastructure capacity and rural character. 

• Continue partnering with neighbouring communities to share services and reduce duplication.

• Ask Provincial and Federal granting agencies to foot the bill for the infrastructure their projects require. I strongly support the creation of low-income housing. When local non-profits get grants to build their projects we should support them in pursuing associated infrastructure costs from their federal and provincial granting agencies rather than downloading them on Clearwater. These large projects require significant infrastructure, granting them an exemption to taxes and DCCs means local single family home owners and builders have to shoulder a greater share of the  infrastructure burden.

Clearwater is not Kamloops. We are not Kelowna. We are not Vancouver. Sometimes council needs to remind our planners and consultants. 

We need to stop enacting big city zoning and subdivision regulations. Why limit short term rentals to certain neighborhoods, and certain types of structures? The currently proposed zoning bylaws include limits on the use of RVs on your property. Is Grandma staying in the RV for the summer to help with the kids? Too bad, if the bylaw passes as proposed, that won't be allowed. The only way to stay in the RV on your own property would be with a municipal building permit. The bylaw also contains limits to where you can store your boats, tractors and  where you can place a fabric storage building. It limits the number of shipping containers on a large acreage to 1. Does that sound like a bylaw that matches the way you want to use your property? 

Clearwater continues to create a regulatory environment that stifles innovation and eliminates the rural advantages that have created this community. If you look around town, what percentage of buildings do you think meet the building code and adhere to current subdivision, building and zoning bylaws? I don't know about you, but If I had to bring my own home up to those standards, I couldn't afford to live in it. We see consistently low permit numbers, but at the hardware store there is always someone loading lumber. What does that say about our building bylaws? To me, It looks like they are in the way and people are finding ways around them because they don't match the local reality. 

Some of my specific goals for the next 4 years on council are:

• Zone for diverse housing options. Rather than restrictive neighbourhood zoning found in large cities, allow a wide range of uses, make zoning flexible and less limiting.

• Advocate to the province for changes to the BC building code. Including increasing the size of outbuildings that can be built without permits, making the code more prescriptive and less reliant on engineers and professional plans, and eliminating the step code regulations which have added tremendous costs to new builds. 

• Stop slowing down your projects with bureaucracy. Minor variances and zoning changes should not have you giving up your entire Tuesday afternoon to sit through 2 hours of unrelated meeting agenda items before council votes to decide if you can put your shed 2 feet closer to the property line. That's after you've waited several weeks until your request could be included in the next council meeting schedule. Requests like this should be able to be approved by staff so it doesn't slow your project down. This is already being done in many other municipalities.

• Push to Adopt a 1 in 2 out regulatory strategy. For every new regulation a bylaw introduces, two outdated or redundant requirements should be eliminated. This policy has been used provincially, lets apply it locally. 

• Establish a shot clock service standard. Designate a guaranteed maximum turnaround time for complete building and development permits. 

• Establish clear measures for building permits and subdivision timelines and discuss them on a set schedule. This way,  Council and the public can see how progress in Clearwater compares with other municipalities. We can also see if our planning processes are taking more or less time.

• Change building inspection standards to allow remote inspections. You should be able to walk around with the inspector on a video call and show how your structure meets code, rather than being held up until the following week just because you didn't get the rebar tied in time to book an inspection for Thursday. 

For every dollar of taxes collected in Canada, municipalities only collect 8-12 cents. However, municipalities manage nearly 60% of all public infrastructure in Canada. Provinical downloading is non-stop. New provincial planning rules, new housing needs assessments, new emergency planning requirments, asks to support healthcare recruitment...the list goes on.  We are being asked to the table over and over again. The problem is, we don't get to upload. Provincial and Federal governments are not volunteering to maintain local roads, they are not funding our arena and the grants for large scale infrastructure are a drop in the bucket compared to the needs. 

We need to be able to maintain the core services of government that keep our community safe, healthy, and fun. This means staying focused on our core mandate and being thoughtful about acting outside our mandate. 

Some of my specific goals in the next 4 years on council are:

• Support our emergency services. Plan for a new firehall and continue to support the replacement of key fire department equipment. Continue to support firesmarting and other emergency mitigation strategies like dike repairs and hazard mapping. Continue to evaluate our emergency planning capabilities, and reduce our reliance on TNRD emergency management where possible. The TNRD does a great job, but it is a vast geographical area and there are very few summers without multiple concurrent emergency events. We need to be prepared to stand on our own as much as possible. 

• Reduce reliance on outside consultants for key plans and needs assessments - wherever possible meet provincial requirements by developing "lite" plans and do so in house. Take our housing needs report  for example, its a document required by the province to get grants, but has shown limited practical application for us as a municipality. In my opinion, its better to employ a local and develop their skills, than to pay overhead for a consulting company that provides the same template plan for every rural community. In some cases, the price of one of these plans could cover a year's salary. 

• Take a cautious and measured approach to providing provincial services. Sometimes provincial services are absolutley critical to the  existence of our community. Health is a provincial mandate, but a shortage of healthcare workers threatens the viability of our community. Many people could not live here without a fully functioning hospital and a clinic. This means, despite being out of our normal scope, we need to come to the table to help.  But, when we step in, we should do so thoughtfully. We should identify our role clearly, communicate to the public if and when we are planning to use their property taxes to provide provincial services, and wherever possible lean towards advocacy rather than direct service provision. 

• Work on our roads. We have created a roads inventory and identified the gap in funding. It's massive. We need to double our annual investment in roads, but we can't do that without expanding the tax base. That doesn't mean nothing can be done in the meantime. Every year during budget planning we need to carve out space to continue to build road reserves to make critical repairs. We need to continue to find efficiencies and partner with neighboring communities to reduce costs of paving projects. Its also important to continue to push for the province to take back roads that don't make sense for us to own/maintain. 

• Seek public input on public spaces. I will advocate for the return of the trails task force and include public voices in our parks and trails planning process. Continue to support the work and input of the public art committee. We need to continue to support the community organization-led events that have been so successful like the Music in the Park, Candle Creek Half-Marathon, Rotary parades, car shows, etc. 

• Look for low-cost wins in public recreation. Continue to support clubs and sports with in-kind donations of space and equipment. Look for ways to use exisitng park spaces for wider range of uses. Dog parks don't all need to be fenced and developed, they can be as simple as putting up a sign with some ground-rules on spaces already used this way (I'm looking at you former CTP site!).  Improvements to support sports like pickleball can go a long way to building community, with relatively low costs. I still want a pool, but unfortunately, until we can add a significant tax base, we can't support the operational costs. In the meantime, lets do what we can with the money we have. 

Did you know that Clearwater's median household income is $14,000 lower than the median household income in the TNRD? Economic growth is required for us to share the standard of living enjoyed by other communities and rural areas across the interior. We need to catch up. 

I beleive that you, as the people who live and work in Clearwater, are best positioned to grow the local economy. Your ideas, skills and talents will shape the Clearwater that is to come. Council should make it as easy as possible to start a business, improve a building frontage, and grow an idea. 

Attracting businesses and industries in key sectors is also very important to the future of the valley. Its not just about creating wayfinding signs, business surveys and placemaking (although those are all very important!), its about directly courting businesses and industries that make sense in our economy. If we want small scale industries using forest products, then we need to approach those businesses and find out what draws them to a community. What do we have, that they need? 

Some of my specific goals for the next 4 years on council are:

• Continue to support community assets and tourism products that make our community attractive to visitors, professionals and businesses. We need to protect and enhance the municipal assets we own, like Dutch Lake beach or the curling rink, with upgrades to bring them up to a reasonable standard. When we can, we should also help promote and support assets owned by community groups like the bike and ski trails at Candle Creek and the ski-hill. It also important to find opportunities to grow 4 season tourism through supporting our shoulder season and winter-time recreational activities. 

• Help  increase the availability of small scale, affordable commercial spaces. Creating a new business is risky, and expensive. Making sure we have well maintained and affordable commercial spaces helps to support local entrepreneurs. Many communities have been supporting this through marketplaces built of shipping containers, year round indoor markets, or offering incentives for buildings offering low rent commercial spaces.

• Help existing commercial spaces upgrade their facades. Offer tax incentives for owners of commercial buildings to upgrade their appearance to make them more appealing to new businesses without increasing the cost of rent in these spaces. For most small businesses building a new space is out of reach, at least initially. Helping to ease the costs of improving an existing building can help to get someone started.