We do not aspire to move away from our rural, small town community vibes as we grow, so let's look at the composition of the Langford council and the state of an OCP that allowed for the suburban density that is Langford.
The biggest time frame for development started back in the 2010’s with the 2011 municipal election being one of the first with easily accessible online data.
- In 2011, Stew Young and all six of his endorsed councilors were elected, though they were not an official slate/electoral organization.
- From 2011 to 2014, 67 council meetings were held. Those meetings ran an average of 26 minutes each.
- 2014 to 2018 was still a Stew Young led council with endorsed councilors, with 88 meetings averaging 41 minutes each.
- 2018 to 2022 meetings were longer, averaging 93 minutes. It was also during this period that meetings were livestreamed and video archived for the first time after public backlash regarding lack of transparency.
Source archive for the meeting-count and meeting-length calculations: S028
A council that moved quickly
As a result of fully aligned councilors, decisions were often unanimous and meetings moved quickly. For example, one meeting on April 22, 2014 managed to squeeze in 1 development variance permit, 3 committee resolutions, 4 staff reports, 4 bylaws and an in-camera session… into four minutes. That’s the power you have with a controlling majority on council. The public record shows no deliberation during that four-minute meeting, because it simply wasn't necessary. There’s money in development, and more money when it is in conjunction with power in the council.
And beyond the composition of the council Langford had just a few other things that allowed for deep development. Developers, or people associated with development adjacent companies that were benefiting from the seemingly unchecked growth, were appointed to committees by councilors. So now unelected people were able to have say in policy.
Committees and development policy
These were committees that made recommendations to staff, sometimes on mundane policies, but sometimes on policies with far-reaching development implications. For example, in 2016 the Transportation and Public Works committee reviewed an amendment to Langford's policy governing Road and Storm Drainage Development Cost Charges (DCCs). S005
It’s a mouthful, but bear with me. The policy dealt with how developer-built road projects were valued, how DCC credits could be carried across phased developments, and other details related to the economics of subdivision development and what developers had to do.
There were a few interesting names on that Committee over the years. Some of them you might remember from Part 1.
Mike Wignall, president of Westbrook Consulting and Les Bjola, owner of Turner Lane Development (both firms that worked on multiple Keycorp developments over the years) sat on that committee in 2016. S006 Bjola sat on that committee from 2006 until 2018, and Wignall was there from 2010 to 2016, during which time their companies were actively developing multiple projects in Langford.
Some, including me, might call that a conflict of interest.
The Board of Variance
Another example is the composition of Langford’s Board of Variance. A Board of Variance’s purpose is to address minor changes to zoning rules when strict compliance might cause hardship. S008
However, let’s take a look at the Board’s members: Jim Hartshorne (owner of Keycorp) sat on the Board of Variance from 2015 until Stew Young and the slate he ran with, Community First, were voted out in 2022. During that time the Board also had, in various stints, Cliff Curtis (owner of TBJ Properties), Rachael Sansom (consultant with Turner Lane Development) and Ron Couture (owner of SouthPoint Partners Ltd. and then-president of the Westshore Developers Association). S006S007
Once again, a committee staffed with individuals who I think it’s fair to say had vested interests in outcomes that benefited them. A variance committee that is not impartial is not a variance committee at all, but rather a loophole to bypass a system of checks and balances.
The OCP
The newest OCP of Langford was only adopted in 2025. S010S011 Prior to that the OCP that existed from 2008 to 2025 was the one that had space for growth with a lot of ambiguity around land use. The City of Langford described it as “”. The new version tightened up language around geographical land use and stronger environmental considerations had to be taken into account before developing a piece of land. It allowed for checks and balances to maintain natural elements in Langford. It seems to me that in Langford’s case, the ambiguity and relaxed perspective toward having environmental reports done tended to benefit developers and those companies adjacent to developers.
One final example: dust control
I’ll leave one final example about the interplay between developers and councilors and how they both scratched each other's back.
On December 5, 2016, Langford’s Dust Control Bylaw No. 1666 was on the Council agenda for first, second and third readings. It was prepared because of public complaints about dust from development blasting affecting nearby residences. If passed it would have established regulations around dust control in regards to construction. Those regulations would have cost developers time and money in mitigation and prevention.
Les Bjola appeared at the meeting representing the West Shore Developers Association. The official minutes say he opposed the proposed bylaw and asked Council to defeat its first three readings and instead allow developers to work with staff on ways to control dust. S009
Langford Council then did exactly what he requested. It passed a motion to:
- Refer dust management to the West Shore Developers Association, which would work with City staff to develop dust-control strategies; and
- Remove Dust Control Bylaw No. 1666 from the agenda.
The motion carried. The dust control bylaw was dead. S009 Compliance to dust control measures was now in the hands of the developers causing it.
Follow the donations
Finally, let’s look at the financial donations that helped to create this, in my opinion, development-friendly council. Again, I want to stress that this information is not comprehensive, as my lens is how we can avoid some of the pitfalls of potentially harmful development here in Sooke, and not a deep dive in the wildness that is and was Langford politics.
I pulled the financial donations from individuals supporting the Stew Young led councils from 2014 to 2022, and here are some of the highlights.
- Jim Hartshorne (Keycorp): The Westshore Developers Association (with Hartshorne and Les Bjola listed as Directors) donated to all six successful councillors in 2014 (prior to corporate and union donations being banned in 2017), then Hartshorne donated personally to each of them in 2018, and again the maximum allowable amount to the Community First slate in 2022.
- Mike Wignall (Westbrook Consulting): donated to all six of the 2018 Langford councillor group, and to Community First in 2022.
- Richard Rebneris (OnPoint Engineering): donated maximum allowable amount to Community First in 2022.
- Various other development-related individuals, including the two directors of Southpoint Partners, two representatives of Turner Lane Development, and three representatives of Seacliff Properties all donated to the six successful candidates in 2014 and 2018 and to Community First in 2022.
Donations, committees, a completely aligned council with ties to developers... To me it paints a picture of a council that was able to get a lot done, at least for developers, in a short amount of time.
While quick council meetings sound dreamy, ours in Sooke last hours and can become overwhelmingly tedious, the flip side to those quick council meetings is the lack of representative interest. If everyone elected has the same values, the same lens, the same goals, then the result is often unanimous council voting. And then of course if everyone elected has completely different views the council often becomes ineffective. There must be a happy medium to unchecked power in a council and completely disparate views in a council, as we look at Sooke in this upcoming election.