Video: Kareem Allam says city must tackle crime, cost of living, to stop flight of young people

Kareem Allam, mayoral candidate for the Vancouver Liberals. Photo by Stuart McNish /Special to the Sun

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These are excerpts from Stuart McNish’s interview with Kareem Allam, the Vancouver Liberals’ mayoral candidate. You can watch the entire interview online at vancouversun.com/conversations. We’ll be reporting on interviews with the other candidates in the coming weeks.

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McNish:Let’s project. You’ve been mayor for four years. How does Vancouver look differently after your term in office than it does today?

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Allam: It’s younger.

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McNish:What do you mean, younger?

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Allam: I’m running for one reason alone. And that’s to bring young people back to this city. Vancouver, amongst North American cities, is now one of the oldest cities on the continent. Young people are leaving the city because we’re not creating the jobs. We’re not creating the housing. We’re not creating a safe city. We’re not swinging big to bring them back.

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I believe in the social contract in this country that my generation is supposed to create the winning conditions for the next generation. That way, in turn, when they’re my age and I retire, there’s someone to pay for the social programs that I’m going to need.

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McNish:What can you say to young people?

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Allam: Let’s talk about housing. Vancouver is the slowest place on planet Earth to get housing approved. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy said he was going to put a man on the moon. And eight years later, the Americans put a man on the moon. Eight years is about how long it takes to build a highrise in the city of Vancouver.

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To me, that’s unacceptable. On Day 1 of a Vancouver Liberal government, we’re getting rid of the Vancouver Building Code. We are the only jurisdiction in Western Canada that has its own building code. I don’t know what this extra 3,000 pages of building code actually does to make life more affordable for Vancouverites. The tallest and most complex buildings in the province are being built in Burnaby and Surrey with the B.C. Building Code.

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The B.C. Building Code is just good enough for me.

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McNish:What are you going to do about all the amenity fees (development cost charges)?

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Allam: The amenity fees are a huge problem. The City of Vancouver has become addicted to these … to maintain and keep its infrastructure going. The challenge the City of Vancouver has that it’s broke.

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McNish: But the city has relied heavily on those fees.

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Allam: But let’s pull back and understand why those fees are so high. The City of Vancouver currently has an internal inflation rate that ranges between 8½ and 11 per cent a year. That means every year that we’re not raising property taxes by 8½ and 11 per cent, it means that we’re cutting services somewhere.

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What’s driving that internal inflation rate is this massive, massive growth in white collar, exempt staff jobs. Vancouver and Surrey are about the same size. Vancouver has 9,600 civil servants. Surrey, which is the same size, has 4,500. I don’t know what these extra 5,100 people do to deliver services.

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And when you talk to parents and Vancouverites at the door, kids don’t play tournaments in Vancouver anymore in terms of sports … They go to a Softball City in Surrey. They go to the Langley Events Centre in Langley. They go to Burnaby Eight Rinks. We’re not even keeping up with the infrastructure.