A former Vernon city councillor wants answers why publicly owned land in Coldstream has been turned into what he calls "a swamp."
Barry Beardsell appeared before the Greater Vernon Advisory Committee today, to voice concerns about a lack of leadership and accountability with the parks function. He says land behind the regional district office was once worth a million dollars which he says Coldstream is now ready to give to a developer for a road. "Why it happened is because there was no real leadership within Greater Vernon Parks. This never got approved by the board of Greater Vernon. It was discussions between the manager and developers and the developer's consultants." Beardsell also feels the board's focus on a parks service review has stalled progress on other important issues. "This board has got to stop their fussing about the service review and put this into a workable operation for the benefit of Greater Vernon taxpayers. Everything is going unattended." Coldstream mayor Jim Garlick disputes Beardsell's claims about the park land, calling it "misinformation that just muddies the water." Garlick says it's a very complex issue that involves land swaps for a water treatment centre. He tells Kiss FM, "It involves park land that did exist on Middleton Mountain and then was removed from there which upset a lot of residents and a developer there because they all of a sudden had no park land, and I had to go through a process to develop a park up there in agreement with the school district." The retired accountant raised several other concerns and says he has documentation to back up his claims. GVAC received his comments for information. RDNO administrator Trafford Hall told the committee, the issues will be addressed. "We're not going to write a report on all these things, but we will talk about them. People come here and they have a lot on their chest and they want to get it out and that's good, but but that doesn't mean for every lament we are going to put a staffer on it, writing a response. That would be very expensive." Hall also said earlier: "If we we're to put somebody on all the litany of complaints from Mr. Beardsell, we would have to hire a number of consultants for years."
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