Review of city’s official community plan exciting process that allows us to think big

COLUMN (FROM CITY HALL)— Coun. Donovan Cavers writes as part of a series of alternating columns by Kamloops City councillors.

By COUN. DONOVAN CAVERS

The renewal of our city’s OCP is underway. For those wondering what I’m talking about, the OCP (or Official Community Plan) is the city’s overarching plan that sets long-term, high-level priorities. Every B.C. municipality is required to complete and renew their OCP on a regular basis.

An OCP committee was established earlier this year representing a variety of interests and expertise from across the city. By the time this column is published, the committee will have had three preliminary meetings in what will be a two-year process.

These meetings are open to the public and dates are posted at http://www.kamloops.ca. I am honoured to be one of two councillors sitting on the OCP committee. The committee members are a great group of people; all of whom are very excited about the process ahead of us.

The B.C. Local Government Act is a bit dry, so I’ll use the definition found on Wikipedia which is a bit more inspired…

“In Canada, an official community plan is a comprehensive plan created by an incorporated municipality which dictates public policy in terms of transportation, utilities, land use, recreation, and housing.

“OCPs typically encompass large geographical areas, a broad range of topics, and cover a long-term time horizon. The process of creating an OCP is today often referred to as a Community Visioning.”

So far, the OCP committee has focused on background information and studying how high-level plans like this are refined by urban planners. One of the first tasks of this committee will be developing a public engagement strategy to gather input, general ideas and vision from the wider community.

This City council term has been quite an amazing one so far: we’ve replaced long standing Chief Administrative Officer, Randy Diehl, with our new CAO, David Trawin; we’ve secured bids for the B.C. Seniors Games and Brier Curling Championship; and we’ve ratified a myriad of plans including the Transit Future Plan, Parks Master Plan, Pedestrian Master Plan, Trails Master Plan, Airshed Management Plan, Commercial Agriculture Plan, and the Public Engagement Plan.

Despite all of this, in my mind, the renewal of the Official Community Plan is the most exciting endeavour.

In 2010, the city completed the Sustainable Kamloops Plan which contains a significant number of goals to increase our community’s resilience. A significant exercise of this OCP renewal process will be integrating goals of the Sustainable Kamloops Plan into the OCP.

The OCP renewal is an opportunity for us all to think big. No idea will be ridiculed and “blue sky thinking” will be encouraged throughout the process. The input sessions will be established soon and I highly recommend taking advantage of the opportunity to let the committee know what will make Kamloops even better than it is today.

Some examples of big questions one might consider:

• What aspects of the community make our lives most enjoyable and fulfilling? How can we ensure they are maintained and/or increased?

• What factors beyond our city’s borders must we consider over the next 10 years? 100 years?

• Is “Canada’s Tournament Capital” still the best slogan to represent our city? Why? Why not? Is there a better option?

• How can the city’s transportation systems be improved?

• Should we continue our enhanced focus on parks and recreation?

• What economic factors do we need to focus our attention on?

When the first OCP input sessions are scheduled over the next few months, I would very much recommend making the time to attend.

Coun. Donovan Cavers can be contacted at decavers@kamloops.ca or 250-852-2264.