BC Assessment Denied that it is a Paying Member of the BC Lobbyists Registry - Evidence Shows Otherwise

BC Assessment denied that it is a paying member of a registered organization (the UDI) on the BC Lobbyists Registry. However, the evidence shows otherwise.

The UDI represents the interests of its corporate members that profit from development and real estate.

In November of 2023, the Urban Development Institute (UDI), a registered organization on the BC Lobbyists Registry, that offers political influence to its paying corporate member companies that profit from development and real estate – took to hiding its members directory from the general public, after issues involving public perceptions of conflict of interest had led to more than one local government withdrawing their memberships in the organization that year.

Listed on the UDI’s members directory were not only hundreds of corporate members involved in development and real estate, but also branches of government including Local and Regional Governments, Crown Corporations, and Provincial statutory entities – something that had raised numerous eyebrows in the public and led to pushback from them.

The Federal Crown Corporation the CMHC pulled its UDI membership, as well in 2023.

Although the UDI pulled down its members directory and took to hiding it from the public, a backed-up copy of the directory had already been made, as to some it had become apparent that a pull-down was not only likely, but imminent.

The initial pull-down of the directory took place in November by the UDI taking their branch websites down and not reposting the directory on their new website UDI.org. A secondary pull-down of the directory took place in January almost immediately after it was revealed on the radio that the members directory could still be viewed through a third party website that collated membership data for the UDI.

At the time of the initial pull-down, the Provincial Housing Bills (44-47) were being pushed through the BC Legislature in late November 2023. The relation between its contents and what the UDI had lobbied the Province on was being exposed.

Also, at the same time, yet another municipality: the Township of View Royal saw elected officials unanimously deciding to withdraw their District’s paid membership with the UDI, after it became apparent that their district had joined it not only without a vote by elected officials, but without elected officials even having been informed of the decision to join. To the UDI their members directory had become a liability. It disappeared from public view and has not returned since.

Since then, more branches of government have discontinued their paid memberships from the lobbyist organization, but still many also continue their paid memberships with it, almost always not informing the public of that status.

To find what branches of government are still members of the lobby takes a bit of cat and mouse to determine.

Nothing better has demonstrated that so far, than the case of the Provincial Crown Corporation BC Assessment.

On August 29, I sent the following question to BC Assessment:

“Hello BC, Assessment, I would like to know if BC Assessment is still a paying member of the Urban Development Institute (UDI).

Thank you, Sasha”

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2 days later on August 19, I received a response from an Assessment Administrator from BC Assessment:

“Hello Sasha,

Thank you for contacting BC Assessment.

I have confirmed that we are currently not a member of the Urban Development Institute.

If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Thank you,”

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I responded: ” Hi,

Thank you for letting me know.

At what date did BC Assessment’s membership with the Urban Development Institute expire?

Thank you again,
Sasha”

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I received a prompt response from the administrator:

“Hi Sasha,

I was not given further detail other than BC Assessment is not currently a member with UDI.

We have created a request for the appropriate staff to contact you and discuss this further.

Thank you,”

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I then received a response from a Deputy Assessor from BC Assessment the next day:

“Hello Sasha,

If you have any further questions regarding your inquiry, they can be directed to me.

Regards,”
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I responded:

“Hello,

Thank you for contacting me.
My question is:

At what date did BC Assessment’s membership with the Urban Development Institute expire?

Thank you,
Sasha”

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The Deputy Assessor responded:

“Hi Sasha,

Can I ask what the relevance of your question is?”

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Asking for the relevance of my question is something that I have seen many times from government staff through email inquiries and often indicates that I will not receive a further response from the government staffer. It appears to me to be a screening question. If I said that I worked for development and real estate or for the UDI, would I have received a similar response?

I responded: It is a question from a member of the public to a public institution and as a question it is relevant.

Thank you,
Sasha

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No response was forthcoming as expected. I was not expecting a response, having experienced previously what seems to be standard government operating procedure toward the public when relevant questions are asked. I quickly made an FOI request to BC Assessment (registered on Aug 23) for the following information:

1. Date at which the decision was made to discontinue, or
terminate BC Assessment’s membership with the Urban
Development Institute (UDI).

2. Any communications at BC Assessment that shows how
and why this decision was made and who was responsible
for the decision and how that decision was made.

3. The date at which the membership was ended.

4. The year that BC Assessment began to pay the UDI for membership and also communications, or other data showing the reasons and those responsible for that initial decision.”

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On September 27, 2024, I received the FOI response.

The FOI response included a number of annual renewal invoices and a single receipt. It also contained a few brief emails about payment.

The text that accompanied the response however, reminded me of the malfunctioning computer HAL in 2001: A Space Odyssey. HAL-like responses are not unusual for responses to inquiries made to government in general, but this one seemed to take the cake in the strangeness department, already an area for stiff competition:

“To further assist with the Request, we provide the below noted information:

“BC Assessment reimburses employees for their membership with the Urban
Development Institute (UDI)

BC Assessment has not made a decision to discontinue or terminate
reimbursing employees for UDI memberships

We were unable to locate the “year” that BC Assessment began to reimburse
employees for UDI memberships

The oldest invoice BC Assessment has in relation to reimbursing a UDI
membership is from 2018, however, we understand BC Assessment
reimbursed employees for UDI memberships prior to 2018″

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I responded:

“Hi,

I have difficulty understanding this. Do you mind explaining it?”

and: “In the FOI package it gives a receipt for an invoice # DUES000452 2024-04-02 Membership Renewal”, however the invoice is not included in the FOI.

Why is that?
Thank you,
Sasha Izard”

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What they were telling me made no sense to me. I have never heard of employee memberships in the UDI, much less so: reimbursements for them. Memberships for the UDI are corporate rather than personal, and the attached invoices confirmed that these were corporate membership renewals.

If BC Assessment employees were being reimbursed for memberships in the UDI, why did this not show up on the invoices and/or receipt?

“BC Assessment has not made a decision to discontinue or terminate
reimbursing employees for UDI memberships”

This did not answer my question. I had requested to know if BC Assessment discontinued its membership with the UDI. There was no indication of this in the FOI. The receipt of payment for their latest renewal was dated to April 2, 2024, thus indicating that BC Assessment is currently still a member of the UDI.

The following was just puzzling, if not alarming to read:

“We were unable to locate the “year” that BC Assessment began to reimburse
employees for UDI memberships”

The oldest invoice BC Assessment has in relation to reimbursing a UDI
membership is from 2018, however, we understand BC Assessment
reimbursed employees for UDI memberships prior to 2018″

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I emailed again to the Assessment Administrator from BC Assessment that I had initially conversed with through email:

Hello,

I have documentation from Freedom of Information that shows that BC Assessment is indeed a current paying member of the UDI.

Where did you get your information that BC Assessment is “currently not a member of the Urban Development Institute.”?

Thank you,
Sasha Izard

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So there it stands. While BC Assessment had previously informed me that they are not currently a member of the UDI, the receipt from this year revealed otherwise.

Nothing in the FOI showed that BC Assessment had discontinued its membership with the UDI, directly contradicting what it had told me previously about its membership status.

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Conclusion: BC Assessment is still a member of the Urban Development Institute, despite it’s claims that it is not.

Why is the Provincial Crown Corporation so reticent to come clean on the issue of its membership with the UDI?

Without an answer, one is only left to speculate. I think that the answer might have to do with BC Assessment’s policy of what it calls “highest and best use“.

The policy of highest and best use could be seen to have the effect of nudging property owners to maximize the density on their properties, including through subdivisions, or perhaps more likely to sell their lots, as their taxes are raised based on land-lift, or even the potential for land-lift, and the gentrification it brings.

Thus, this process offers in addition the potential of a feedback loop pushing the densification of communities further and further; as densification, upzoning and gentrification induces even more densification, and gentrification. To see a similar arc of development historically, compare what happened to the City of Vancouver over the last half century.

With such low density properties e.g. single family homes coming up for sale, the properties can then be purchased on the market by developers and speculators, including investment pools such as Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) further driving the financialization of the housing stock and continuously driving upzoning and land prices in the process, making housing less and less affordable in terms of square meter cost to those who need it.

The developers/investors with their purchased housing stock could then merge properties, upzone, and develop to higher densities and heights, which while providing them with potentially astronomical profits, make the housing for the community-already-there, less and less affordable with the once again increasing land-lift and increased property taxes.

With an increasing ownership of the share of housing stock, REITs, various corporations and other big holders of the housing stock, can then apply a cartel-like hold on housing prices and rental prices, something that has been observed, including in the form of “rent-fixing” including involving the use of algorithm-based/artificial intelligence software to do so.

For BC Assessment to be a paying member of an organization that has consistently lobbied the same government on behalf of its paying corporate members that profit from development and real estate – for government policies that push upzoning and increasing densification, then the policy of “highest and best use” that has an effect of driving these, at the expense of individual property owners and through passing added costs on to renters; could be seen as a clear conflict of interest.

It could be seen as the Provincial Crown Corporation operating against the public interest by advancing specific corporate profit-driven interests, while in addition refusing to tell the same public the truth about its membership status with a registered organization on the BC Lobbyists Registry that advances to government those same corporate interests.

It could be seen as regulatory capture.

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This story will continue to evolve as more information is revealed.

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The following are screenshots of the contents of the FOI response: