Official Community Plan

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MEETING OUR GOALS THROUGH INFRASTRUCTURE

Decisions made today about Courtenay’s growth, its infrastructure and the levels of service from that infrastructure will affect Courtenay’s future fiscal performance. Because higher density, better connected neighbourhoods are less costly to service over the long term, the City will embrace a holistic approach to land use management and associated infrastructure planning, accounting for long-term lifecycle costs associated with development. Recognizing that the City’s investments have far reaching impacts on the well-being of people and the environment, the City will also apply a full-cost accounting approach to infrastructure planning and management. This means that external costs associated with climate change impacts, air pollution, motor vehicle collisions, and other health and sustainability impacts will be better accounted for in decision-making. Courtenay will also integrate natural assets into core asset management practice and financial decision-making process, with the goal of understanding, managing, and valuing natural assets equally to more traditional grey or “hard” built infrastructure. Particularly for rainwater management, the City will shift focus to treating rain and stormwater as a resource rather than as a waste product. This means expanding the services of rainwater management from solely drainage and flood prevention, toward green infrastructure and regenerative

development practices that contribute to Courtenay’s ecosystems. Letting nature “do the work” is not only ecologically beneficial, it offers financial benefits in the long run. This will require attention to the scale of nature-based solutions , from entire watersheds to property-specific opportunities. Such approaches may not be suitable in all locations, but opportunities for nature-based solutions will first be considered before being dismissed. MODELLING ASSUMPTIONS Because pumping and treating water and waste water as well as moving and treating solid waste is a source of GHG emissions, the following targets are important to contribute to the community wide 2050 net-zero GHG emission target. • End-of-life pumps in the water distribution system are replaced with more efficient versions, reducing energy use by 30% by 2050 and increased use of remote monitoring technology limit staff manual inspection frequencies; • Non-agricultural water use across Courtenay is reduced 50% by 2050; and • 90% of residential and industrial, commercial

and institutional (ICI) waste, including 100% of organic waste, is diverted from the landfill by 2050.

City of Courtenay Official Community Plan