Last week, Whistler council got a look at a newly proposed fee structure for groups running programs in municipal parks and outdoor facilities—and at least some elected officials want one particular user group to pay its fair share.
“The 5,000-plus user group dramatically underpays and I would suggest that Vail Resorts makes a contribution that is commensurate with the use and impact that they have on the community,” said Councillor Ralph Forsyth at the Feb. 8 council meeting.
The Resort Municipality of Whistler (RMOW) does not currently have a policy in place addressing the use of its outdoor facilities by groups like bike day camps, and in light of the pandemic-fuelled boom in demand for outdoor recreation, staff developed a non-exclusive use permit that will be trialed this summer with the intent of promoting more equitable access and dispersing users in peak periods from busy areas like Lost Lake and Rainbow parks.
“We’re seeing … growth in the number of commercial groups that are using municipal property as outdoor spaces. Some do not have a facility use permit. Some do, which is great,” explained Bob Andrea, the RMOW’s manager of village animation and events. “This can present a risk to taxpayers wherever we don’t have a permit for these groups. They might not have our guidelines, policies and practices, and they may not have appropriate insurance in the municipality to protect the Whistler taxpayer.”
Andrea added that, with an uptick in anecdotal reports of user conflicts—“so similar groups showing up looking to use one of the popular locations at the same time”— there is also a need for the RMOW to take a more “active role” in managing outdoor facility bookings.
The proposed fee structure is based on several criteria, such as number of users, frequency of use, whether a group is commercial or non-profit, locally based or from out of town, or servicing adults or youth.
In the Feb. 8 presentation to council, RMOW staff offered several examples breaking down the fee structure further. A 20-child camp operating five days a week for five months a year, for instance, would pay a $750 permit fee, plus the $50 application fee. That amounts to a per-person, per-day rate of 36 cents. Another example of a hiking tour operating one day a week for four months a year would range from 28 to 69 cents per day, depending on the number of users.
The RMOW will review the fees following the 2022 summer season for any potential changes.
The 5,000-plus user group Forsyth mentioned refers to Whistler Blackcomb’s (WB) popular DFX cross-country and downhill bike camps, which regularly make use of the Lost Lake trail system in the summer months. Forsyth originally made a motion asking WB to pay $250,000 annually, but that was shot down in favour of an amendment asking staff to come back with its own proposed fee structure for the mountain operator ahead of the upcoming summer booking period.
Councillors Cathy Jewett and Jen Ford opposed the amended motion, with Jewett preferring to hold off on implementing a WB-specific fee until after the pilot program is concluded. Jewett said she believes it’s one way to potentially incentivise WB to build its own facilities.
“I think perhaps one of the things that this should accomplish is to stimulate or … provide a reason for a large commercial operation to create their own facility, their own trails,” she said. “They have a lot of land, and it’s quite possible. I think that that is the carrot that could be used to lead them up that way.”
In an email, a spokesperson for WB said the company is “proud of our youth bike programs that offer tremendous benefits for the community. We want to better understand the city’s plan to adopt a fee structure for community groups’ access to RMOW’s parks.”
This process will also facilitate data collection on user demand for certain areas, which will assist RMOW staff in determining overall capacity limits. The proposed fee structure would also come with a new code of conduct for user groups. User groups’ permit applications will be reassessed annually and will be based on several performance and compliance criteria.
“We don’t expect any challenges there. Our experience is most of the user groups are quite good,” Andrea noted.
