Surrey council is attempting to kick-start a developer that it believes is slow to invest in an expected redevelopment project. But the municipality might not have the legal clout to pack the punch it wants.
Councillors asked staff earlier this month to write a report for the March 31 council meeting and detail what council’s expectations were 17 months ago when it authorized Gateway Casinos & Entertainment Ltd. to temporarily install 150 slot machines.
The contentious 6-3 vote in 2012 to allow Gateway to operate the temporary slot machines included an option to install them permanently if the company’s $22 million redevelopment of its bingo hall went smoothly.
Gateway quickly installed the temporary slot machines but has yet to redevelop its community gaming centre in Newton near 72nd Avenue and King George Boulevard.
“It’s going extremely slowly,” Coun. Bruce Hayne told Business in Vancouver. “They have had several building permits approved for some time. The project was supposed to start in May 2013 and was to be completed in June 2014.”
The only visible sign of work thus far is some temporary fencing.
Hayne said all but one permit has been granted to Gateway and he doesn’t think the outstanding permit is important enough for the company to hold off on its work.
But Gateway director of public relations Tanya Gabara maintains that her company has been working as fast as possible given the long waits for city staff to process development and building permit applications.
In addition to permits, she said Gateway needed an approval to amend an agreement with the city so it could relocate entrances to the gaming centre during construction – otherwise road construction would block the entrances.
Gateway only received that amended agreement on March 4, according to Gabara.
Nonetheless, Surrey mayor Dianne Watts hinted that tough action could be in the cards when she brought a motion that passed unanimously at the March 10 council meeting.
Council authorized the city to ask the British Columbia Lottery Corp. (BCLC) to yank Gateway’s 150 temporary slot machine licences if the staff report confirmed that the casino operator was missing city-set deadlines.
However, BCLC spokeswoman Sarah Morris said BCLC, not the city, has the final say on the licences.So it’s unclear how effective the city will be at removing the licences.
The tiff between Gateway and the city comes a few months after the tragic beating death of hockey mom Julie Paskall at a nearby arena parking lot in the Newton neighbourhood.
That event led residents to protest the city’s inability to fight Newton’s escalating level of crime.
Hayne stressed that his concern with the Gateway project is that it’s behind schedule and not that it causes addictive behaviour and poverty that in turn leads to crime.
He has high hopes for revitalization of the entire area in part because council has announced that it will soon review its Newton town centre plan.
“There’s a lot of development and redevelopment that could occur in Newton that is positive for the whole community,” he said.
Surrey aims to create more of a mixed-use area with a public park and improved streetscape. Much of that work, however, hinges on a new TransLink bus loop that in turn relies on a revised city road plan.
One recently completed project is Value Property Group’s Centre of Newton Phase 2 – a 43,000-square-foot, four-storey office and mixed-use building built to the LEED Platinum standard.
