The draft community sustainability plan lays the groundwork for the town of Jasper to assume land use planning powers from Parks Canada.

While there is no detailed description of those powers, the draft document, which was released to the public on Oct. 14, puts into place the mechanisms necessary to help transform Jasper into a full fledged municipality.

“It enables the discussion on what could be involved in that transfer to take place,” said Jasper National Park superintendent Fenton. “It sets out what might trigger those events.”

Fenton said the draft plan represents a commitment to devolve powers to the municipality and begins to explore what that might look like. While the call for increased land use powers for the municipality are in the plan, what those powers might be has not been articulated in the plan. Hence, what level of land use planning the town could achieve is not in the draft plan.

Jasper Mayor Richard Ireland said the lack of detail on land use is on purpose.

“We haven’t had the opportunities to flush them out. And that happens at levels outside of the municipality,” Mayor Ireland said.

On top of land use planning, the draft sustainability plan outlines 159 actions for Parks Canada and the municipality. Some of the ideas include ensuring all public buildings are built to a build green standard, exploring the possibility of a green transit system, develop a perpetually affordable housing strategy, create a cultural heritage board, develop unreleased land and reduce human/wildlife encounters.

One suggestion in the draft plan is the transfer of several reserve lands from Parks Canada to the Town of Jasper, that in turn could be used for housing projects. The proposal would ensure higher density homes, that could be used for affordable housing projects. A housing deficit of 153 units exists in Jasper, according to the draft plan.

The town is only expected to grow to a population size of 4900 by 2040, so no provisions are made to widen the actual footprint of the town. That will result in higher house prices, but Fenton said that’s a reality of living in a community with a confined footprint.

“There is an agreement that there is a need for more affordable housing. This addresses some of that,” Fenton said. “The government is not willing to allow the footprint of the community to change.”

Mayor Ireland is confident given the projections, if the reserve land is used for high density homes, the town’s housing needs could be met.

The plan was delayed by a month for editing.

“We wanted to ensure the plan was as clear as we could make it. We also had to start grappling with the financial implications of what was in the plan,” Mayor Ireland said.

Todd Noble, president of Jasper Tourism and Commerce, said the sustainability plan’s focus on green business is in line with the chamber’s own goals. 

“I understand tourism is recognized as a main driver in the plan,” Noble said.

The plan recognizes the town as a tourism resort community, and promotes sustainable tourism as a viable future for the town.

As for the lack of change to the town’s commercial cap, Noble said he still needs to examine that further. 

“It could be worse,” Noble said.

As for the proposal to look at paid parking in town, Noble said that hasn’t been discussed with his board.

There is a suggestion that parks do away with the lottery system it currently uses to award commercial space.

Art Jackson is looking at the plan from an environmental perspective. He says there needs to be more action items to detail how the community will achieve many of the broad reaching statements included in the document. Other communities such as Prince George managed to pass their sustainability plans in the matter of a year.

He’d like to see less reliance on natural gas, and a plan for a new school to be off the grid, which could serve as an emergency centre in case of a power outage. The draft plan includes a statement that all public buildings will be required to be built to a LEED build green silver standard, and includes plans to reduce the town’s energy usage.

While the plan is ambitious, Fenton said some of the action items may need to be cut back.

“It’s not a realistic number of actions over five years. We don’t have unlimited resources. Some items, we’ll have to revisit.

Mayor Ireland said the proposed plan now sits in the public’s hands, and he’s anxious to see how the public reacts to the document.

“It’s all a matter for the public to discuss. The working group has put in a tremendous effort in putting together the document,” Mayor Ireland said. He praised the efforts of those who recorded every piece of data received through the community involvement plan into the appendix.

The public is invited to comment on the plan at a public meeting and open house on Oct. 28 at the Jasper Activity Centre. The open house begins at 4 p.m. And the public meeting begins at 7 p.m.

So is the plan strong enough to lead Jasper into a sustainable future for the next 30 years?

“It depends on the type of plan we get,” Mayor Ireland said.