Election questionnaire: Rajan Hans

Name:

Rajan Hans

How many years have you lived in Squamish?

21

How many council or committee meetings have you attended since Sept. 1, 2017?

Watched 70 online, Went to 4 in person.

What do you love most about Squamish? (150 word limit)

The lifestyle.

There isn't many places on earth as beautiful as our town. Beauty not only in the way of our scenery, but access to our outdoors. It provides residents, with a unique lifestyle I have become quite fond of. Having iconic views and world renowned outdoor recreation activities all in our back yard, is hard to come by. Within minutes, you can be in complete serenity surrounded by quiet nature, or full of adrenaline racing down your favorite trails. I love living the Squamish lifestyle, and having the ability to work, live, play and learn in this town.

Are you endorsing a particular candidate for mayor? (question for councilor candidates)

No/Not at this time

What do you think is the biggest single issue facing Squamish? (150 words limit)

What I've heard almost every constituent talk about, is housing. It doesn't matter which age demographic you fit in, the housing problems are affecting everyone. Renters are increasingly finding it harder to rent a place, competing with lucrative services such as Air B&B. If you have a pet you're in bigger trouble, as it is even harder. With affordable housing plans slowly progressing, I can only see this issue getting worse.

In the last term, what was council's single greatest accomplishment? What was council's biggest failure? (150 character limit)

Residents often complain about traffic (speeding, parking etc.) What would you do to improve traffic and parking in Squamish? (150 words limit)

Trying to find parking downtown is very difficult. Parking problems are best fixed through stronger policy. Working with developers to provide public parking in their projects, is really going to make a difference. For us, as a district, to take in money and fund our own parking complex is a waste of resources (land). Downtown, along with a lot of Squamish is in the flood plain. Meaning, deep underground parking is essentially impossible. That leaves us to build upward, wasting limited public land on parking.

The Cash in Lieu parking fund, was at roughly $445,000 by the end of 2017. With no public parking in sight, I can only infer this method to improve the problem is not working. Again, a stronger policy enforcing stricter parking requirements is needed to fix this problem. Currently, developers are not pushed to provide public parking.

Squamish has a housing affordability crisis. What would you do to improve affordability? (150 words limit)

Ensuring we do our part at the municipal level to increase and mandate affordable and subsidized rental housing is key. We have to have a stronger policy in place to control new development in Squamish. However, we alone as a district cannot bring real housing affordability to our community. This is best done through collaboration of different levels of government and private partnerships with developers and organizations like BC Housing. We need to lobby provincial and federal governments to help fund affordable housing projects in this district. Realizing the demand, they have started to roll out programs to mitigate our housing crisis. Another way is to use municipal owned land for the purpose of constructing affordable housing. Creating a housing authority, much like whistlers, is more beneficial when we have some units to manage.

Do you support stronger regulation of AirBNB?

Yes

How would you attract new businesses and employers to Squamish? (150 words limit)

As a small community we need to focus on retaining businesses which are already here, while doing our part as members of council to attract new business to Squamish. Having better communication channels with the Chamber of Commerce and Squamish BIA, will provide a better network for attraction. Having strong policy and strategic plans in place will shape our community to better support businesses.

Zoning plays a very important role in where businesses can operate, it is impossible to have “high paying‰Û jobs if we have nowhere to place them . With strong policy will come more employment spaces as opposed to residences, providing a much need opportunity to establish higher paying jobs. Not to mention the horrible tax deal we give ourselves, by not incentivizing employment space development. It can also be good way to expand our tax base and lower residential taxes.

Do you have a strategy to implement regional transit? (150 word limit)

To truly achieve a great regional transportation model, we must critically asses each opportunity.

My strategy for regional transit, is a balanced model between public and private. For connecting Squamish to Vancouver, a private transportation model would more beneficial to our residents. This would enable a bus going  directly into the Downtown “HUB”giving riders access to the TransLink system. The Squamish connector is a perfect example, within an hour getting rider into Downtown Vancouver. A public bus would more than likely stop in towns such lions bay, slowing down the service for our residents, therefore making it unlikely to be used.

For connecting Whistler, Squamish and possibly Pemberton, a public model may be best. BC Transit, currently already services Whistler and Squamish separately. I think we should start the conversation in looking to add a bus connecting the 2 towns.

Given limited financial resources, what do you think is the single highest priority for Brennan Park? (150 word limit)

Do you support cannabis retail shops in Squamish?

Yes

Would you consider yourself pro-WLNG or anti-WLNG?

Neutral (3)

Are you supportive of the Garibaldi At Squamish project?

Somewhat supportive (2)

Do you support development of the Cheema Lands (Lot 509/510)?

Somewhat supportive (2)