ABSTRACT
Council’s second reading for Bylaw 24/2024, the Town’s new Municipal Development Plan (MDP), branded as Envision Cochrane 2050, which took place on December 9th, 2024, unexpectedly turned out to be a rather interesting and revealing meeting.
Of interest was that some of the Council members picked up from some of the concerns with respect to the references to “climate change” and “infill” in the MDP that I had raised at the public hearing for the MDP on November 25th, and provided some push back on these items much to the chagrin of the town Administration, who presumably had hoped for prompt unanimous approval.
Ultimately, after following several procedural irregularities, Bylaw 24/2024 passed with little meaningful change. However, seeing the Administration desperately striving to stave off any modification to the MDP revealed that the Administration was the primary influencer and architect of the new MDP, this high-level planning document which will have long-term consequences for how Cochrane will develop going forward.
FULL BLOG
Council’s second reading for Bylaw 24/2024, the Town’s new Municipal Development Plan (MDP), branded as Envision Cochrane 2050, which took place at the Regular Town Meeting on December 9th, 2024, unexpectedly turned out to be a rather interesting and revealing meeting. I was pleased to see that some members picked up from some of the concerns that I had raised at the public hearing for the MDP, and had actually listened and gave them serious consideration. My presentation at the public hearing on November 25, 2024 is summarized in a DWAB blog post entitled, “Envision Cochrane 2050 or the UN’s Agenda 2030, in Disguise“.
The video recording for the the discussion related to Bylaw 24/2024 occurs between 10:40 and 48:59 minutes.
After a brief presentation by Mark Krysinski, Director, Community Growth, accompanied by Rachelle Dillon and Shawn Small, two members of O2 Planning + Design (O2), the lead consultant retained for the development the MDP, Councillor, Morgan Nagel lead off the discussion asking that the reference to “infill” be removed from the MDP. He correctly wondered where such language came from, feeling that it didn’t come from conversation with Council or through the public consultation. I had done likewise in my presentation at the public hearing, pointing out that “infill” was not mentioned in the public surveys that had been distributed by the Administration. After Mark Krysinski, Director, Community Growth and the consultant, Rachelle Dillon, had responded to Councillor Nagel, two members of the Senior Management team, CAO Mike Derrricott and Drew Hyndman, Executive Director, Development & Infrastructure Services, in tandem also jumped in to express support for retaining the “infill” language in the MDP. The CAO expressed the opinion that “it is important to recognize the realty of redevelopment”. Given the full-court pushback by Administration to the removal of the reference to “infill” in the MDP, it was making it very clear that such language in the MDP came not from the public, as Councillor Nagel had noted, but, rather, from the Administration.
I was surprised that Councillor Alex Reed then followed up raising a concern about the reference to “climate change” in the MDP. The consultant, Rachel Dillion, explained that such language was there because the CMRB Growth Plan, an over-arching plan as far as land development in Cochrane, requires it! In my many presentations on Cochrane’s Road to Agenda 2030, my first one going back to March 2023, I had pointed out such a requirement as per the CMRB Growth Plan, which had been adopted in August 2022.
As explained by the consultant, Ms. Dillon, the inclusion of “climate change resiliency, adaptation, mitigation policies” within the MDP is required “to align with the regional growth plan” and that the policies in the MDP were in alignment with that. Thankfully this discussion initiated by Councillor Reed, succeeded in flushing out the truth as to why such language was contained in the MDP; not because of the public consultations.
Again, the CAO Mike Derricott felt the need to chirp in with respect to my presentation at the public hearing.
Wow, he was basically arguing, cautioning Council, not to pay much attention to my single individual’s opinion, which I had expressed at the public hearing on November 25, 2024, essentially going along with the Cochrane Eagle’s biased account of my presentation. However, despite all those supposed “hundreds or thousands of touch points with the community”, the community was never specifically asked if the plan should include fighting climate change. Nonetheless, Councillor Reed responded, that he felt that there was some merit to be concerned about the reference to climate change in the MDP and that I had prompted such consideration. Later, in the evening, Councillor Nagel complained that he didn’t appreciate being told that he was only responding to a single resident’s concerns.
While the consultants scrambled to find the pages where “climate change” had been mentioned, Drew Hyndman, Executive Director, Development & Infrastructure Services, jumped in, having found the two locations where references to “climate change” were found in the MDP and read them out:
Mitigate climate change by locating the highest densities close to services and accessible with a variety of transportation modes, encouraging sustainable building and public space design, protecting and increasing natural vegetation and supporting renewable and efficient energy systems (page 137), and
Design Town facilities, amenities and assets to be resilient and responsive to climate change, population growth and changing demographics(page 138).
He made light of these citations, suggesting that they were “fairly generic” statements. Hardly the case when it calls for actions “to mitigate climate change”. As well, they had overlooked other language in the MDP, which I had referenced in my public hearing presentation, which were related to climate change. For example, on page 101, it was stated that the objective with respect to mobility was to “support sustainable and low-carbon travel options and emerging transportation technologies”. Similarly, on page 104, there was a call out to “advance low-carbon mobility options”. It was even more specific on page 41, where it specified “reducing greenhouse gas emissions”, precisely the language found on page 67 of the CMRB Growth Plan (see image above). I had also mentioned in my public hearing that the first draft of the MDP made reference to “promoting net-zero development”, which was removed from the final draft, presumably as it would have been too transparent as to intentions.
Interestingly, when it comes to a “commitment to reduce municipal greenhouse gas emissions’ to address climate change” as per section 3.3.3 (above) of the CMRB Growth Plan, I had asked Mayor Genung about this at the Mayor’s State of Cochrane address on February 9th, 2023. My question was in two parts. In the first part, I asked him if he agreed with Calgary Mayor, Jyoti Gondek, that there’s a “climate emergency”. Perhaps, not unexpectedly, he ducked giving a direct answer, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, responding “We have not declared any emergency here. (Which was not my question.) We obviously are concerned about the environment”.The second part of my question was to ask him if the Town of Cochrane was committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions to which he replied, “Not officially in any regard. Are we aware of it, yes. Do we make decisions where we can, yes”. So, either the mayor was unaware of this requirement in the CMRB Growth Plan, which he pushed to have adopted by Council, or he was conveniently lying.
Councillor Patrick Wilson voiced that he shared some of the concerns that Councillor Reed had brought up and indicated that he wouldn’t vote in favour of the MDP due to the climate change references contained within it. Although my comments at the public hearing had swayed his concern, he explained that he thought about this before. He acknowledged that just heard that “climate change” must be in the document because it must be aligned with the CMRB. Several councillors at the time of the debate with respect to going along with the CMRB took place, rejected the idea that joining the CMRB would lead to a loss of autonomy. Now the chickens had come to roost. Surprising to find Councillor Wilson saying that he had “just heard that it (climate change) must be in the document because we must align with uh Calgary Regional planning documents”, when if he had read the CMRB Growth Plan, which came before the Council at their May 21, 2023 meeting, he would have known so, according to what is found on page 67, as shown above.
Concerned about the direction that the conversation was heading, Mark Krysinski stepped forward and whined that if they amended those clauses referencing climate change, it could “jeopardize” the ability of the town receiving endorsement from the CMRB and thereby cause further delay of the approval of the MDP.
During the proceedings the Administration’s Director, Community Growth, Mark Krysinski, and his consultant, Rachelle Dillon, looked a little distraught by the pushback they were receiving from some of the Council members. Such pushback by some of the councillors debunked the spin by the Cochrane Eagle that my solitary presence at the public hearing was indicative that Council was “on the right track” with the MDP as is.
Not unexpected, Councillor Flowers was generally okay with the NDP, having no concern. Likewise Councillor McFadden indicated that she was comfortable with the MDP as it stands, especially with respect to the two areas under discussion, infills and climate change. With respect to infills, she pointed out that redevelopment and infill were “primarily…the same thing”. She was quite adamant that the reference to climate change be retained in the MDP. With respect to the issues, namely, climate change and infills, that were drawing attention at the meeting, Councillor McFaddfen expressed the view, “I think by and large the fact that the feedback on those is coming from a very um…….well let’s rephrase it the other way I think broadly there’s a lot of support for the document as it is.” Note that she stopped herself short from completing the first part of her sentence which was clearly directed at the feedback that was received from me at the public hearing!
While Councillor Wilson referred to his objections with respect to “climate change” and “infills” as being “small things” that were keeping him from voting for the MDP as is, they are anything but small things that will shape the future development of Cochrane.
Still insisting that he was uncomfortable with the reference to “infills” in the MDP, Councillor Nagel brought forward a compromise motion calling for the reference to “infills” in the MDP be replaced with the word “redevelopment”. Procedural irregularities followed as the mayor being into his seventh year as mayor still was inept at chairing a meeting. After the presentation of Councillor Nagel’s motion to amend the. MDP, the mayor decided to give his general comments about the MDP, including his satisfaction with the reference to climate change, saying that he didn’t have the same aversion to the climate change reference and saw it as “really just acknowledging that there is a climate”. Here he wasn’t following proper rules of order whereby debate must be germane to the pending motion. Things got complicated with Councillor Wilson saying that he still was not satisfied with the inclusion of “climate change”, which lead to a friendly amendment to Councillor Nagel’s motion that “climate change” would be replaced by compromised wording of “environmental pressure” in order for Councillor Nagel to get his vote. That should have been ruled out of order as amendments should be relevant and not be a radical departure from the original motion, that is, should be germane. As well, before inviting a vote, the mayor had asked Administration if they would be comfortable with replacing “climate change” with “redevelopment”, thus improperly bringing them into the debate. However, at that point Councillor McFadden indicated that she would vote against the motion if the amendment to replace “climate change” was included. Councillor Flowers expressed agreement with Councillor McFadden, “climate change is used all over the place”. At that point, the mayor consulted with Administration about the procedure and this led to the complicated motion being rescinded by Councillor Nagel and his original motion being brought back, “To approve bylaw 24/2024 with the amendment to remove the word ‘infill’ and replacing it with ‘redevelopment’ or strategic redevelopment’.” The mayor had prompted Councillor Nagel to include the last portion, namely, “and replacing it with ‘redevelopment’ or strategic redevelopment’.” That motion passed 5-1 with Councillor Wilson voting opposed (Councillor Fedeyko was excused from the debate and vote as she was absent from the public hearing.) That change of wording changes nothing as earlier in response to Councillor Nagel’s concern about the reference to “infill” in the MDP, the consultant Rachelle Dillon described “infill or redevelopment as being an opportunity to increase density”. In other words those two words are interchangeable as far as meaning. No wonder, that she and Mr. Krysinski happily agreed that such a change was acceptable, when the mayor asked for such clarification in order to be satisfied in voting yes for the amendment, thereby serving the Administration’s interests.
The mayor promptly ended that part of the agenda taking that as the passage of the amended Bylaw 24/2024, thereby Councillor Wilson’s ability to bring an amendment forward regarding exclusion of reference to climate change being lost in the shuffle. Councillor Nagel’s motion should only have been a vote on the amendment to the MDP, then to be followed by a vote on the full amended Bylaw 24/ 2024.
The mayor’s strong endorsement of including the reference to climate change policies in the MDP comes as no surprise given that he was a strong advocate, essentially Calgary Mayor Nenshi’s right-hand man, in bringing Cochrane into the CMRB fold, where the City of Calgary, a member of ICLEI (Local Governments for Sustainability) and a strong adherent of Agenda 2030, with its dominant role and veto position in the CMRB, is essentially driving the bus with our associated municipal government as a willing passenger on the road to fulfilling the UN’s Agenda 2030. As well as previously reported in a DWAB post, “Cochrane’s EV Chargers and the Politics of Funding“. Mayor Genung was responsible for the installation, at taxpayer’s expense in December 2020 of four electric vehicle (EV) chargers in the parking lot across from the Station, for which one of the identified “potential drivers” for the EV chargers was “to reduce green house gases” (that is, to go along with the globalist United Nation’s agenda). Those chargers will remain as a monument to the Mayor’s embrace of the UN’s climate change agenda.
Apparent from the evening’s proceedings, seeing the Administration desperately striving to stave off any modification to the MDP, was how much this MDP was driven by the influence of the Administration. They are running the show and are not to be questioned. In my presentation at the public hearing, I had pointed out that while a pie chart showing the engagement by the three parties, Administration, Council and Public, was shown as each having equal size, I wondered how those slices might look if they were weighted according to their influence on the development of the plan. I would suggest that that would look somewhat as follows:
As I see the unelected Administration as being responsible for the execution of public affairs as distinguished from policymaking, which should be the responsibility of the elected Council, I see this as an inversion of the power structure.
On December 11, 2024, I subsequently followed up with a email to Council re second reading of Bylaw 24:2024 with my perspective on what had transpired at the second reading.
Noteworthy that the Cochrane Eagle, in its report, “Public Hearing on How Cochrane Will Grow Sparsely Attended”, on my appearance at the statutory public hearing for the town’s draft Municipal Development Plan (MDP) used the report to frame the sparse attendance by one individual, me, as indicating a strong endorsement of the plan by the Cochrane community, claiming that it showed that the “Council is on the right track” with respect to the draft MDP. Also of interest that this article is not available as a URL link (thus not easily found) and that in his summary of my presentation the Cochrane Eagle journalist avoided pointing out two of my main concerns with respect to the content of the MDP, namely, the inclusion of a reference to “infills” and “climate change”, which several of the councillors likewise expressed concern about (see above) at Council’s subsequent second reading for Bylaw 24/2024, the Town’s new Municipal Development Plan (MDP), which took place on December 9th, 2024.
Also noteworthy that neither the Cochrane Eagle or Cochrane Now reported on the outcome of Council’s second reading held on December 9th, 2024. Makes one wonder if such silence was intentional so as not to draw public attention to the reference to “infills” and “climate change” in the MDP.
Breaking News
Given that Rocky View County at its Regular Council meeting on December 10th Rocky View County voted to withdraw from the CMRB, in my note to the Council, I suggest that before the Town forwards its MDP on to the CMRB for review and approval that it sort this out first.