The Cowichan Valley Regional District will be honing its advocacy skills after receiving what many on the board consider a disappointing letter from the province regarding a call for infrastructure upgrades and improvements on rural roads.
The CVRD board was successful in presenting a resolution at last year’s Union of B.C. Municipalities meeting calling on the province to direct enhanced investment into improvements for rural roads, particularly those with poor road surfaces and drainage, that are within the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure.
RELATED STORY: FINANCES AND POLITICAL INFLUENCE PLAY PART ON ROAD WORK DECISIONS, MOTI OFFICIAL TELLS CVRD
In its response, MoTI acknowledged that maintaining B.C.’s vast network of rural highways and side roads is a priority for the ministry, and that it recognizes that rural roads provide a critical lifeline to rural and remote communities, including many B.C. First Nations and Indigenous communities.
MoTI said the ministry completes road-surface condition analysis on main highway corridors annually, and side roads semi-annually, to help prioritize road-surface rehabilitation in the province, and it supports this work with dedicated annual funding.
“This fiscal year, the ministry will spend an estimated $176 million on side roads and improvements, and this is an increase of approximately 70 per cent since 2019/20 when the budget was $104 million,” MoTI said.
“This funds side-road resurfacing projects as well as road repairs and stabilization, surface gravelling, culvert replacements, ditching-drainage improvements, brushing, shouldering, guard-rail replacement, paint and durable pavement markings. The ministry’s development services staff continue to work with developers, local governments and community groups to ensure development-related impacts to the highway network are identified and improvements are completed when required.”
CVRD Chair Aaron Stone said he’s getting used to well-worded but disappointing responses from the province when it comes to local government priorities.
RELATED STORY: STILL NO SIGN WHEN ALLENBY ROAD WILL REOPEN
CAO Danielle Myles Wilson said the letter is a standard response from the province , and she’s sees no surprises there.
She reminded the board that it does have an advocacy section in its strategic plan and suggested that the board could have more discussions around some of the topics relating to rural roads and how to best advocate to the province for local improvements.
Stone said a meeting of the Association of Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities will be held in Victoria later this month, and it will offer opportunities for board members to meet with some provincial ministers and senior provincial staff to lobby and advocate for a number of local issues, including the upkeep of rural roads.
Alison Nicholson, director for Cowichan Station/Sahtlam/Glenora, made a successful motion to have the district’s electoral area services committee discuss issues around rural roadways at the next committee meeting, and have broader advocacy issues discussed at the next committee of the whole meeting, both of which will be held before the AVICC meeting.
“[The province] said they’re going to work with us, so it would be worthwhile to talk about setting up something that we can hold them to, sooner rather than later,” she said.