The chair of TransLinks' Mayors' Council is hopeful the province will delay an upcoming transit referendum following comments made by Premier Christy Clark January 27.
Following an address to a mining conference, Clark told reporters she would be willing to speak to Metro Vancouver mayors about delaying the referendum, which was expected to be held this November alongside municipal elections.
"It would certainly be positive," Richard Walton, mayor of the District of North Vancouver, told Business in Vancouver.
"The position we've always had is that a referendum is a tool, and it needs to be used with careful thought and careful planning."
Walton said Minister of Transportation Todd Stone, who has been tasked with overseeing the referendum, left a voice message for him over the weekend indicating the province was prepared to do "a bit of a rethink, a regroup and stepping back until things cool down."
Metro Vancouver mayors have been unified in their opposition to the transit referendum, which Clark first announced during the 2013 provincial election.
Over the past month, calls for the province to release the referendum question have grown, not only from the mayors but also from business groups like the Surrey Board of Trade (SBOT).
"We've been waiting for the question since the provincial election," SBOT CEO Anita Huberman told the Surrey Now on January 22. "We'd heard that it would be ready by the end of October [2013], and now it's almost the end of January and we need time to educate our business community, as well as the population, about something so significant that will affect our economy today and tomorrow."
While the Mayors' Council supports road pricing as the preferred funding model, Walton said that since there is still no information about the referendum question, it's been impossible to formulate an education campaign.
"At this point we have no idea what the province will allow or not allow on the ballot," Walton said. "If the province is going to come forward and say, 'Well, you can do this but put the gas tax or something on the ballot,' it puts us in a difficult spot because gas tax, for example, isn't one we suggest continuing with because it's already tapped out."
Walton said he hoped to get more details from Stone later today.
@jenstden
