Please read below, this Vancouver Sun article from Auguest 25, 2021. This is a victory for the advocates who launched the “Take Back the Mountain” campaign (takebackthemountain.com) with the call to reveal the contents of the secret document signed by the (then) Liberal Government of BC and Holborn Properties in 2008.
We have won. Now our job is to encourage provincial and civic governments to get together to take back Little Mountain, and build social and affordable housing for the people of this city. We ask you to join us in order to amplify the message…
Little Mountain developer quits fight to keep 2008 sales documents hidden
“People started asking for this contract in 2008,” retired MLA David Chudnovsky said. “And finally, it’s going to see the light of day.”
Aug 25, 2021 by Dan Fumano
The developer behind the controversial Little Mountain housing project has abruptly thrown in the towel on efforts to keep hidden the documents surrounding its 2008 purchase of the property from the B.C. government.
David Chudnovsky, the retired NDP MLA who has been fighting for years to get more information about Little Mountain, said he was glad the people of B.C. would soon be able to see details of the contentious deal that led to the demolition of 224 affordable homes on a prime piece of Vancouver real estate, which then sat mostly empty for more than a decade.
“It’s a good thing for transparency in the province. It’s a good thing for people who care about social housing,” Chudnovsky said. “People started asking for this contract in 2008. And finally, it’s going to see the light of day.”
Holborn Properties, the company that bought the six-hectare Little Mountain social housing property from the provincial government, had been fighting a September 2020 order from B.C.’s Office of Information and Privacy Commissioner that full details of the province’s sale to Holborn be released to Chudnovsky, who had filed a freedom of information request with B.C. Housing.
Holborn had previously opposed the release of the unredacted documents, with their lawyers arguing that public disclosure of the financial details, including timing of payment and commercial details regarding rezoning, could harm the company. But an adjudicator ruled in September 2020 that Holborn had failed to prove a reasonable expectation of harm if the information was disclosed, and ordered B.C. Housing to send Chudnovsky the documents.
Chudnovsky had earlier received a heavily redacted version of the sales contract and subsequent
amendments, where entire pages were blacked out.
That order was put on hold, though, when Holborn filed in the B.C. Supreme Court seeking a judicial review of the decision. But then last month, while the parties were awaiting court dates to hear the matter, Chudnovsky was surprised to hear from Holborn’s lawyers indicating they intended to abandon their fight to keep the full records hidden from public. That became official Friday, when lawyers acting for Holborn filed the notice of discontinuance in B.C. Supreme Court.
Asked why the development company discontinued the legal fight against disclosure of the sale
documents, Holborn spokeswoman Megan Schrader said in an email that the decision “was made in the interest of moving ahead with the redevelopment of the site.”
“While the agreement was always confidential in nature, Holborn bid for and was awarded the sale on a fair, open basis,” Schrader said. She added that proceeds from the Little Mountain redevelopment were reinvested by the province to build 2,100 units of supportive housing around B.C., including 1,500 homes in Vancouver, most of which are now open or are in development.
Chudnovsky said: “I think Holborn knew that they were going to lose badly in court, and they decided they’d rather give up quietly on a Friday afternoon in the middle of the summer, than lose in a humiliating way, in public, in court.”
David Eby, the B.C. NDP MLA who is now B.C.’s minister responsible for housing, told The Globe and Mail in March of this year that he had reviewed the contract B.C.’s then-Liberal government signed with Holborn, calling it a “sweetheart deal” and adding he looked forward to the B.C. Supreme Court hearing on the question of its release.
Holborn bought the Little Mountain property, near East 33rd Avenue and Main Street in Vancouver, from the B.C. government in 2008, and soon demolished the existing 224 units of social housing with a plan to replace them with new affordable homes, along with as many as 1,400 market condos and commercial and community space.
Over the 13 years that followed, only 53 units of permanent social housing have been built, when the first of five planned social housing buildings at Little Mountain was completed in 2015. A 46-unit temporary modular housing project was also completed on the property in 2018.
Since that time, none of the other social housing buildings have been built and only one is currently under construction, a City of Vancouver representative said Monday, adding that: “No other buildings on the Little Mountain site will be in development until the social housing buildings are completed.”
dfumano@postmedia.com