Wilfried Vicktor will be seeking another term as Mayor of the District of Hope.
A three-time mayor, former district councillor and school board trustee, Vicktor said he loves the town he’s lived in since his first day of fourth grade at Coquihalla Elementary School. The mayor and six councillors’ seats will be contested in October: so far two candidates have thrown their hat into the ring for the position of mayor—Vicktor and three-time councillor Peter Robb.
SUCCESSES OVER THE PAST FOUR YEARS
When he got into office in 2014, Vicktor said he wanted to have a functional council working towards clear and realistic goals. Nearing the end of his term, he said has enjoyed his time leading a diverse council who has worked well together.
Vicktor said the projects he’s most proud of from this term are the less obvious and less flashy, yet vital to the community.
He identified keeping tax increases small and predictable as a priority when he gained the mayor’s seat in 2014.
“We’ve kept the budget increase to about two per cent every year, so that’s a good accomplishment, and still getting things done. Obviously the higher taxes, the more you can get done, but when people have a limited threshold for property tax levels, you have to be very cautious,” he said.
Building an asset management program has been another success, according to Vicktor, with a focus on maintaining what the district has and avoiding the replacement of assets and equipment.
The sewage treatment plant, as Vicktor said it is “probably the most politically unflashy” project but also a very important one.
The plant was previously not up to provincial standards of sewage treatment, this was allowed as the district was operating under a “grandfathered environmental agreement.” The province could have, at any moment, requested the district to conform to the new rules, something which could have cost several million dollars.
Instead, the district received a grant allowing the $2.93-million construction to go ahead, with Hope paying only $498,695 or 17 cents on each dollar. The project, to be finished in March 2019, is one which Vicktor said secures this infrastructure into the future and allows for more housing and commercial development.
STATION HOUSE AND VISITOR SERVICES
One project which doesn’t have a clear outcome at this point is the restoration of Station House.
Vicktor said council chose to investigate all options to develop Station House as the most prudent thing to do, adding the original $200,000 bare-bones estimate put forth by AdvantageHOPE was never realistic.
For the 2018 budget, there is no line item dealing with Station House, the visitor centre or museum. These projects took a back seat to district infrastructure, Vicktor explained.
“The reality is we can live in a community that is populated with an unlimited number of potholes and we can have a new flashy info centre, or we can deal with our infrastructure issues,” he said.
“There are no magic pots of money out there, we don’t have a million sitting in the bank somewhere, we just don’t. So any money we spend on one function we can’t spend elsewhere.”
Ensuring staff safety was paramount, Vicktor added, after mould was discovered at the building housing the museum and visitor centre.
The visitor centre is now housed in a modular trailer at the corner of Water Avenue and Hudson Bay Street. Permanent plans for the museum haven’t been determined.
THE ‘HOUSING CRISIS’
Vicktor has on numerous occasions said Hope is facing a housing crisis.
“When you have people that are making decent money in local jobs and they can’t find housing and they’re living in campsites and in RVs, and they don’t want to live in campsites and RVs, I think that’s a clear indication we have to provide more housing units in the community,” he said.
Money for housing cannot come from the District of Hope, Vicktor said, as housing is a provincial mandate. However, he added, mayor and council can be open to developers and people who come to them with innovative solutions such as the recent proposal for a 40-unit affordable housing complex from Anhart Community Housing Society.
“Anytime a proposal has come forward, we have kept an open mind to what the landowners and what the developers have stated and we’ve tried to be very respectful of existing neighbours and the community as a whole,” he said.
One project Vicktor said he wants to bring to “the point of no return” before the end of his next term, if elected, is a housing complex for residents with special needs.
“It would be awesome to have Tillicum-specific housing so that all of these clients, who have been life-long residents, have a proper place and a safe place to live. So that their parents, as they get older, have peace of mind,” he said.
Tillicum, a project of the Hope Association for Community Living, supports mentally and physically challenged adults in Hope and surrounding areas.
HOMELESSNESS IN HOPE
The Horgan government has said housing is important, and while Vicktor said talk is the cheapest commodity around, he will be looking to the province to step in with money for housing projects and all the issues surrounding homelessness.
The district’s role, according to Vicktor, would be to clearly identify the need: drilling down to the specific needs together with community agencies.
Providing services is the right thing to do morally and financially, he said, but those being helped also need to take control of their own lives.
“Under the heading of tough love, some of these folks have to pull up their socks a little bit too,” he said.
As for the issue of panhandling, there are no easy answers to it and he can’t promise it won’t happen this summer.
KIDS ASK THE BEST QUESTIONS
The most fun Vicktor has had as mayor is getting grilled by elementary students, whose questions often surprise and delight him.
“They ask sort of the raw questions, and sometimes the questions are the ones they hear at the family dinner table,” he said.
Read more election 2018 coverage:
Race for Hope mayor starts early
Is there more to this story?
emelie.peacock@hopestandard.com
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