Linley Valley Drive Questions

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Blog reader raises questions and offers his opinion about a land deal between the city of Nanaimo, School District 68 and Insight Holdings.

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Letter to the Editor
Nanaimo Info-Blog

March 20,2014

Dear Sir,

In-Camera deals: Linley Valley Drive

In my opinion the following is an explanation of one instance, of how the City of Nanaimo
tax payers are being cut out of Millions of dollars, due to the use of in-camera meetings and  vague and incomplete information provided by City senior staff and the Mayor, to city council and the tax payers of Nanaimo.

As per the  proposed agreement of December 3,2012, between the City of Nanaimo and the School Board, regarding an exchange of properties, and the plan presented by  the D68 School Board on behalf of Insight Holdings, at an in camera meeting of the city council.

As per the agreement, part of the City, school board property exchange:

5101 Rutherford Road

The City is required to design and build a road, Linley Valley Drive, to its ultimate standard, complete with curbs, gutters, sidewalks, bike lanes, street lights, water, sewer, and gas lines, storm drains, buried hydro power, telephone and cable service lines, constructed and installed by the city, at  the city's expense.

This road will run from Turner Road to 6033 Nelson road, and will provide access lanes, and turn around points to all properties along the route, also at city expense, 

The city agreed to put the street in, as Mr. Swaybe says, as an inducement to Insight Holdings to purchase from the school board, the six acre portion of 5101 Rutherford Rd. in order to develop a 34 lot, R2 sub-division on it,

The property at 5101 Rutherford road, now belongs to Insight holdings.  This property was purchased from the District 68 school board for $1.2 million, by Insight Holdings. Thanks to the city providing access, at the city's expense, to it, the 34 lot sub-division cost Insight Holdings $35,300.00 per lot.

Insight Holdings stands to make over $3 million dollars on the subdivision deal without putting a stake in the ground.

There is also another aspect to the transaction, that being, the agreement made between Insight and the City.

In exchange for 2 lots down town, on Selby Street, Credited  value to Insight, $500,000.00, (market value, $300,000, as per RE-Max realty), which the City plans to use as a 40 stall parking lot in the down town area, plus a bond, valued at $395,000, total value of $695,000, the City will provide the possible, but not probable, development of a 100 line road extension to Linley Valley drive, from the northern boundary of 5101 Rutherford Rd, to the southern boundary of the park on Rutherford Rd. To this point, Insight has $0 invested in the project.

There are no plans to build or use the dedicated road in the fore seeable future and in my opinion, will probably end up being used as a parking lot for owners and visitors of the 34 lot sub-division, and a nice inexpensive play area for the kids and a pathway for the shoppers at the retail outlets of the Insight development on Linley Valley Drive.

What else does Insight Holdings stand to gain from the City/District 68 land exchange, a lot.


As well as access to the 34 lot sub-division, Insight holdings will get access to 5 un-accessible commercial-retail, and high density residential lots, as well as good access to the other lots that they own, and good frontage for street parking and access to their parking lots.

I find this whole issue to be extremely beneficial and profitable for Insight Holdings, especially when compared to what the City and the tax payers will get out of it.

What is the City getting out of it?

Well there is a piece of land down town worth $300,000 dollars and another piece of expensive to develop, unusable swampland, and steep cliffs that will soon be ripped apart by the heavy use of the residents of the 34 unit subdivision and, a very large bill for a fully developed road from a round about on Turner Rd, also being constructed at City expense, to the 5101 Rutherford northern property line.

I think we would have been much better off, if we, the City, had purchased the SB68 portion of the property  for the 1.2 million, and developed it ourselves.

It seems to me, after  reviewing the plan, that there is no need for the 100 line road.

Instead of running a connector through the 5101 property, the Linley Valley drive connection should connect at 6033 McIntosh road, as per the plan and carry along McIntosh to Rutherford RD, connecting as it does, on the City map, at Rutherford Rd.

The sewer right of way, could follow the McIntosh Rd route, as well, reducing a lot of environmental impact, and expense for the project.

The city is currently in the process of un-necessarily removing a large amount of forested area from the proposed park, for a right of way for a sewer line, which will divide the park in two, from McIntosh to Rutherford road. The McIntosh Rd route should be taken.

Taking the route along McIntosh would also make the intersection, connecting to Rutherford Rd, much safer, as it would not be on a blind hill, as it would be, as shown on the proposed plan.

With the use of either route, the need for a cul-de-sac on the Insight property has been eliminated, resulting in more useable land, and a major cost saving to Insight, while providing an unnecessary expense for the taxpayer.

The property that the school board retained was subdivided, at least on paper, into 33+or- R2 lots, this survey was commissioned by Insight Holdings, prior to any public agreements being made, and making this property very valuable, net value upon development will be at minimum $3.5 million, based on $150,000 selling price per lot.

I have heard several variations, vague, incorrect, incomplete, misleading, undisclosed information, untruths and  omissions of the facts about how Insight Holdings got involved, in the exchange of the property between the city and the school board, and how they, amazingly, are the ones to get the profits of this development, while the city is paying all of the expenses.

The city is paying for the road and services, Insight paid for the design of the subdivision, and purchased the property at 5101, at a raw land value of 1.2 million, as per Jamie Brennon. All of this was done before going to council for approval.

Thanks to watching the March 3 council meeting one more time, and the questions of Jim Kip, and his previously undisclosed information about the origin of the  Insight development, I have finally, completed the puzzle.

The long and short of it is, the city received a small piece of property on the out skirts of town, in exchange for paying undisclosed millions, for the development of an access road and services for property belonging to Insight Holdings, allowing them to develop a variety of properties for multiple commercial and high density residential uses, giving them easy, economical access points to all of their properties, for basically nothing.

As the owner, planner and developer of these properties, it seems to me that
Insight should be the one to pay for the development of the property, the access road, Linley Valley Drive, and services to the whole Insight subdivision, south of Turner Road to the property line of their development and 5101 Rutherford Rd.

An access road to the school board property could have been easily, and inexpensive been provided from McIntosh road, along the northern property line of 5101 Rutherford Rd, eliminating the extreme expense of developing the Insight property, at the City's expense, and avoiding extensive environmental damage to the 5101 Rutherford Rd. property.`

Given the opportunity, I could have put together a deal that would have been better and more beneficial to the City of Nanaimo, than the one that the City of Nanaimo accepted.

Why wasn't the school board property sold on the open market, instead of in secret, under the guise of a In-Camera meeting.

Why weren't our local developers given a chance to use City assets and money, as Insight was, to make a profit, instead of the City giving the opportunity away behind closed doors.

I believe that the administration of Nanaimo deserves some hard nosed, independent, scrutiny, not the blind faith, it has enjoyed for far too long.

We have seen too much poorly thought out planning and needless destruction of our environmental resources here in Nanaimo.

The Linley Valley developments, are a prime example of the degradation of prime, protected habitat for all manner of wild life, which had existed there for thousands of years, until the City, for the sake of greed, re-zoned it

What other surprise's does the City have in store, there is still a lot of ground available between Turner, Rock City, and Hammond Bay Roads. Who holds the titles to the property along McIntosh Rd?

Ron Stead