The Squamish Nation plans to build a massive development on the band’s traditional land underneath the south end of the Burrard Bridge.
Chief Gibby Jacob said the residential and commercial development will stretch over eight acres and cost “in the hundreds of millions of dollars.”
“It’s not a small project,” said Jacob, noting more details will be made public in 10 months to a year. “We’ve got a long way to go yet. We still have to go back to our membership with a business plan.”
The land is adjacent to the Molson Brewery on Burrard Street. It is bordered on the west side by blackberry bushes and woodlands, and on the east by condominiums.
The band, which has 3,600 members, hasn’t determined whether it will be an investor in the development or sell the lease rights. But Jacob has made his mind up on that question.
“From my perspective, I’d like to maintain the majority of it for our own development,” he said. “It’s time that we move from leasing land to becoming a developer.”
Jacob spoke to the Courier Monday after signing a memorandum of understanding and protocol agreement with the city, whose signing representative was Mayor Gregor Robertson.
The memorandum calls for the band and the city to form a steering committee and bring their respective councils together at least once a year to discuss economic development, tourism and environmental issues.
The memorandum is not connected to the band’s plans for development under the Burrard Bridge. As Jacob pointed out, the band has its own zoning authority and doesn’t need the city’s approval to proceed with the project, although it will need city services such as water and sewer.
Monday’s signing of the memorandum was in the works for several years, said Jacob, noting the band approached the city about the agreement when Sam Sullivan was mayor between 2005 and 2008.
Vancouver was last on the list of municipalities to sign memoranda with the Squamish Nation. Others include North Vancouver, West Vancouver, Squamish, Gibsons and the Sunshine Coast regional district.
In his speech Monday at city hall, Jacob described the signing as “historic” considering the previous relations with government. The reclaimed land under the Burrard Bridge was once the ancestral village of the Squamish Nation.
In 1913, band members were loaded onto a scow and transported to the North Shore and Squamish Valley. Their homes were burned, wiping out a rich history.
“I don’t say this in an angry way or a bad way, I just say we know that history,” Jacob told the crowd, which included Squamish representatives and city councillors. “Today we must carve out a new path, create some new history. For those things in the past, they should remain there but never forgotten.”
The Squamish Nation reclaimed the land after the B.C. Court of Appeal ruled in 2002 the Canadian Pacific Railway should return the land to the band. The CPR had expropriated it in 1886 and 1902 for the railway.
The mayor acknowledged the city has no significant role in shaping the Squamish Nation’s future development under the Burrard Bridge.
But Robertson said the creation of a steering committee with the band and future meetings between councils would benefit both sides when considering the development.
“It serves all our best interests to integrate services and ensure that the development fits in well with the city,” he said “So there’s a really good reason to consider the project through this [memorandum] and the steering committee and make sure we can get the best of all worlds. But ultimately, they decide what they want to do there.”
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