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The NDP government appears to have slowed the sale of public lands since its election in 2017, and said it will consider subdividing and rezoning any properties before selling them in the future, on a case-by-case basis, “in order to maximize revenue.”

Assessing market potential of health-care sites

Derek Holloway, who is retired after working for 28 years as an appraiser at B.C. Assessment, said the Crown corporation often “lags well behind” on the potential market value of a property like Pearson-Dogwood. That’s because until the owner gets rezoning approved by the city, the property remains assessed for low-density health facilities, rather than for the future potential of thousands of upscale condos.

He cited two recent sales of health-care facilities by private companies — not by the provincial government — that showed the buyer paid far above the assessed value, presumably because of the possibility of developing those sites: A seniors facility in Vancouver had an assessed value of $32 million in 2017 and sold for $115 million; and a West Vancouver care centre had an assessed value of $14 million in 2018 and sold for $32 million.

But Holloway questions why governments are selling land at all, or at least why they don’t wait to sell until after rezoning of the property has been approved by the municipality.

“Why would you not subdivide it, rezone it, service it and then sell off the parcels? And get all that value uplift? Because it is just insane that the public purse takes $85 million (for the Dogwood sale), and then shares the value uplift with a private developer. There’s no need for that,” said Holloway.

“You don’t need to throw away an asset like that. That’s a trophy trophy trophy” property.

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