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Anne McMullin, CEO of the Urban Development Institute (UDI), said the development community is supportive of the new fee because it recognizes the need to improve the transportation system to help ease housing affordability for people.

However, “the timing isn’t great,” she said. “It comes on the heels of a huge number of taxes that the provincial government has imposed on development and development land.”

Between 2008 and 2018 development fees for an average 900-square-foot downtown Vancouver unit has increased from $43,000 to $343,000, according to UDI figures.

The fees include other DCCs — which are already used by municipalities to cover capital costs of infrastructure associated with growth, such as roads, water and sewer networks — community-amenity contribution (CAC) fees, public-art fees, and permits and inspection fees. It doesn’t include the new transit DCC and taxes.

In earlier discussions, the UDI had asked the B.C. government to cap the transit DCCs at $20 million. It didn’t get the cap.

McMullin said the organization is also disappointed to learn that the government isn’t going to introduce legislation that would tie transit investments to density and supply targets. Failing to require municipalities to build up density around transit hubs wouldn’t be effective in improving affordability, she said.

The federal and provincial governments have each committed to fund 40 per cent of the plan, with TransLink responsible for the remaining 20 per cent, plus operating costs.

The transit DCC is one of several fees or tax hikes TransLink has proposed in order to raise money to pay for its share, including a two-per-cent increase to transit fares beginning in 2020; an increase in the sales tax for off-street parking within Metro; and a property-tax hike starting in 2019.

The province will require TransLink to list the revenue it anticipates it will collect from transit DCCs every year, and to report them as part of its annual reporting process in order to ensure equitable rates and transparency.

If passed, the legislation would allow TransLink to waive or reduce the DCC for developments that provide affordable rental housing so as “to ensure housing affordability in the region is not affected by the new charges,” said the province.

The legislation has to pass in the spring for revenue collection to begin in 2020.

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