When the time came to renew the lease on Amber’s Brewing, we
were unable to come to an agreement with the landlord, so we were forced to move.
We found a number of buildings but none of them had exactly
the zoning required. Councillor Ben Henderson was of enormous assistance,
trying to help us cut through the red tape. We finally decided upon one building,
which, frankly appeared to have the correct zoning. It turns out that it did
not – in fact there are no zones in the city that even mention “Microbreweries”.
So we met with a number of city officials who proudly announced that, although
it would normally take 24 months to rezone, they could rezone the building in
18 months. We had 18 days.
We were unable to move within city limits.
You can’t blame city staff. They have to follow the rules.
You can’t blame council, Ben Henderson tried. So what is the problem? One
hundred years of “tweeks” to zoning rules. We need to simplify those and all of
the cities other rules. Here is a section of the cities zoning map so you can
see how convoluted it is.
I want to simplify this map, and all our other laws. Life
should be simple and it is council’s job to simplify, not make life more
difficult.
If we make the city simpler, we save time and we save money.
More jobs, more local content, more money in the pockets of our citizens, lower
taxes, better roads. It is actually rather simple.
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