Southlands Community Planning Team

The Southlands Community Planning Team evolved out of a process launched by Century Group President Sean Hodgins in October 2006 (yes, it was that long ago!) to engage South Delta citizens in a discussion about the role Southlands will have in the future of the community. This was in the form of a “Planning Workshop” at the Southlands Barn where over 300 local residents attended.

At this workshop, Sean shared a broad vision he has for how the Southlands can be integrated into the South Delta community in a way that provides net community gains. He stressed that his vision was just that – a vision consisting of some broad ideas - but that no plan had been formulated. Sean asked those in attendance to participate in further discussion and working toward developing a plan collaboratively, reflecting community needs and realities. He propoed the establishment of a citizen-driven planning committee.

At that meeting and in response to community advertising, 24 citizens volunteered to actively participate. The group held its first meeting at he beginning of February 2007 and began formulating their own terms of reference and settled on a name for their group - the Southlands Community Planning Team (SCPT).

Over the following 15 months, through the end of April 2008, the SCPT tackled a number of important questions relating to South Delta generally and specifically Tsawwassen. These questions included:

• What is missing in Tsawwassen?
• What is the future of farming in Tsawwassen?
• How can we improve mobility locally?
• The future of housing in Tsawwassen - what forms, density and character?
• What kind of education would we want locally?
• How do we protect our quality of life when developing Southlands? What are the important goals/rules to follow?