Calgary councillors got a rezoning reminder in their email inboxes this week, letting them know citizens are watching how they handle an upcoming repeal.

The group Calgarians For Thoughtful Growth (CFTG) sent a letter to Mayor Jeromy Farkas, along with the rest of council, urging them to support a Dec. 15 Notice of Motion to begin the repeal process for citywide rezoning.

The controversial housing policy was an important election issue in some wards during the recent Calgary municipal election, and one of the group’s spokespeople said that this is a gentle reminder for councillors to keep their word.

“We’re saying you ran on a platform that would revisit the question of blanket rezoning and open up a new discussion with respect to planning,” said Scott Rusty Miller of CFTG.

“What we’re looking for is a follow-through on that with real community engagement to plan and work with communities on densification and how we can deal with new housing, plus a real plan to tackle the question of affordable housing.”

In the letter, the group said that Calgarians are not opposed to increased housing, nor affordability, nor gentle density “where it makes sense.”

“We are opposed to a one-size-fits-all decree that overwrote local plans, ignored neighbourhood context, and treated every street as if it were the same street,” the letter reads.

Recent data included on the Infrastructure and Planning Committee agenda showed that an increasing number of development permits have been enabled due to citywide rezoning. A report presented that day showed little to no infrastructure upgrades were triggered by the development that has taken place thus far.

Mayor Farkas said they’re going to continue addressing concerns Calgarians have around citywide rezoning. He’s been touting a repeal and replace approach.

“What we heard through the election is that rather than take a blanket approach, we need to be more thoughtful. We need to be targeted. We need to be strategic,” Farkas said earlier this month.

Swaying council

Miller said he thinks that a recent “purposely leaked” email from the City of Calgary’s Chief Operating Officer on Housing Accelerator Fund (HAF) cash being at risk, along with the recent infrastructure report, is city administration trying to sway a new council.

“We see this constant creep from administration, who’s invested heavily in blanket up zoning, trying to, in my view, inappropriately influence the process,” he said.

“So, we want to make sure that the new council is aware of these concerns and that they’re going to work with the electorate, who recently put them in to try and resolve some of these issues.

While the email from COO Stuart Dalgleish eventually surfaced, the contents reiterated a long-held stance from city administration that there was some risk to the final instalments of the HAF money.

Still, even Ward 10 Coun. Andre Chabot, who put forward the repeal motion, was concerned about admin meddling.

“It certainly does seem that way. Certainly, some of the communications that we received kind of was leading council into not reversing its previous decision,” Chabot told reporters on Dec. 3.

“There’s a lot of implications that we shouldn’t do this because of this. So, yeah, it does seem like admin is trying to influence council’s decision.”

Miller said that the last city council lost trust with citizens because of decisions like citywide rezoning. He believes that will change with this repeal decision. They would like to see discussion and negotiation to come up with better ways to handle densification.

“What I do hope is this council, with this background, understanding the need to try and find an appropriate approach, will do much better than the last council,” Miller said.

“The last council ignored what the people said. They ignored the (public) hearing, and they ignored the polls that were telling them that blanket zoning wasn’t appropriate. When you do that, you lose trust with the electorate, and all you do is promote delay.”

Though the item comes to city council on Dec. 15, it only begins the process. There is an advertisement period for a proposed change to the Land Use Bylaw, then there will be another public hearing, and then a debate and potential vote.

The last public hearing on this item lasted roughly one month.