Mayne Island: the bylaw audit

8 findings: 8 in bylaws in force. Read on 2026-10-03. Every quotation is a link to the words themselves.

Bylaw 197 was adopted August 31, 2026. Its cottage, flexible housing and accessory residence permissions are welcome. The Trust now publishes the adoption minutes, full agenda and a September 2026 Land Use Bylaw 146 consolidation that includes 197. Three drafting issues remain visible in that consolidation and merit correction or explanation.

The bylaws, and where each one stands

  • Bylaw 197 (in force). Adopted August 31, 2026 under resolution MA-2026-060, as the published minutes record. The September 2026 consolidated Land Use Bylaw 146 includes it.
  • Mayne Island Official Community Plan Bylaw No. 144 (in force). In force. The Trust's consolidation is dated September 2026 and includes Bylaw 196 (the Housing Options Project plan amendment: third reading 26 January 2026, approved by the Executive Committee and the Minister, adopted 31 August 2026) and Bylaw 194 (St. John Point park designation, adopted 23 February 2026).
  • Mayne Island Land Use Bylaw No. 146 (in force). In force. The September 2026 consolidation now includes Bylaw 197, which the August 31 minutes record as adopted.

Correspondence Tony Aly reported sending

Tony confirmed sending the following letter on 3 October 2026. The text shown is the version we supplied for sending, with URLs written out for plain-text email. We have not independently verified the exact transmitted copy or received a response to this letter.

Adopted Mayne Bylaw 197 – clarify and correct three operative rules

Reported sent:
To: southinfo@islandstrust.bc.ca

Read the prepared letter
Dear Mayne Island planning staff,

The August 31 minutes record that Mayne Land Use Bylaw 197 was adopted (resolution MA-2026-060). I welcome its new cottage, flexible housing, and accessory residence permissions. The Trust now publishes the August 31 minutes and a September consolidation of Land Use Bylaw 146 that includes it.

Our audit (https://abolishislandstrust.org/bylaw-audit/mayne) identifies three concerns that remain in the September consolidation. An 18,000-litre cistern is described as both 3,959 imperial gallons and 4,755 US gallons without distinguishing the units, although staff intended imperial units throughout. The amending instruction for a flexible-housing density exception appears not to parse, and the Upland suite rule appears to be inserted a second time. Please clarify the operative meaning of each provision and identify a corrective amendment or interpretation. I am asking for clear, usable housing rules, not repeal of the new permissions.

Sincerely,
Tony Aly

A letter you can send

The published adoption minutes and consolidated Land Use Bylaw 146 now include Bylaw 197. The consolidation makes three drafting issues visible in operative text. This asks staff for clarification or a corrective amendment, not a late submission on a closed hearing.

To: the Islands Trust
Subject: Mayne adopted Bylaw 197: correct three operative zoning provisions

To the Islands Trust,

I am writing about three provisions in the September 2026 consolidated Mayne Land Use Bylaw 146, including Bylaw 197 adopted on August 31. [Say here whether you own, rent or live on Mayne Island, and where.]

These are the points that concern me:

- The adopted consolidation calls the same 18,000-litre cistern 3,959 gallons in one rule and 4,755 gallons in another, without identifying imperial versus US units.
- The adopted consolidation reads “Despite 5.1(2), 2.1, and (3)” in the flexible-housing density rule.
- The adopted Upland zone repeats the same secondary-suite permission in subsections 5.6(3.1) and 5.6(6).

The words of the bylaw behind each point are quoted, with a link to the place they can be read, at https://abolishislandstrust.org/bylaw-audit/mayne

Please clarify or correct the two unlabelled gallon conversions for 18,000 litres, the phrase “Despite 5.1(2), 2.1, and (3)” in section 5.1(3.1), and the duplicate Upland secondary-suite rule in sections 5.6(3.1) and (6). Please preserve the new cottage and accessory housing permissions.

Yours respectfully,
[Your name]
[Your address on Mayne Island, or your interest in the trust area]

Open an email to southinfo@islandstrust.bc.ca

Change anything you do not agree with, and say who you are and where you live or own land. A few sentences in your own words are worth more than ours.

In bylaws in force

Something left out · in a bylaw in force

The new small-unit cluster housing policy applies within one kilometre of Miners Bay or in an area designated on Schedule to this Plan. It does not say which schedule, and the plan's list of schedules has none for that use.

Policy 2.1.6.4(h) is one of the tests a rezoning application must meet. The plan has Schedules AA and A to J. None is a map of areas for cluster housing, and Bylaw 196 added none.

Two rules that cannot both be obeyed · in a bylaw in force

The new flexible housing policy lists the areas that flexible housing should exclude, and the last item on the list is the instruction exclude water services areas.

Items a) to e) are places (waterfront lots, sensitive ecosystems). Item f) was moved from the table after the public hearing and was pasted in with its verb. Read literally, flexible housing areas should exclude the exclusion of water service areas. It appears twice, in policies 2.1.1.3 and 2.1.4.3. Whether lots on a community water system may be given flexible housing zoning is a question about what people may build, and the plan's answer does not parse.

Two rules that cannot both be obeyed · in a bylaw in force

The adopted consolidation calls the same 18,000-litre cistern 3,959 gallons in one rule and 4,755 gallons in another, without identifying imperial versus US units.

The metric volume is the same. 3,959 is approximately imperial gallons; 4,755 is approximately US gallons. Staff said imperial conversions were intended. Both parentheticals remain in the September 2026 consolidation; a builder reading the gallon figure needs the unit stated consistently.

A term used and never defined · in a bylaw in force

Bylaw 195 permits a resource conservation use at St. John Point. The bylaw does not define that use, and uses the words nowhere else.

The Resource Conservation zone itself permits conservation areas and ecological reserves, in those words. The site-specific rule adopted on 23 February 2026 invents a third term for the same thing.

How it was done · in a bylaw in force

The third-reading plan text said Gabriola; the adopted consolidation says Mayne. Ask for the signed amendment and correction record.

The Housing Needs passage was not in the bylaw given first reading. Staff proposed it in the report for 26 January 2026 and the committee inserted it after the public hearing that day. It carries another island's name. That is the text the committee read a second and third time and sent to the Executive Committee and the Minister. The consolidation differs from it in at least three more places in the same passage (is based for in based, its’ for its, in 2021 Census for Statistics Canada 2021 census report). The August 31 adoption minutes and full agenda are now published. Compare the signed adopted amendment with the consolidation to establish which wording was enacted.

Numbering and proofreading · in a bylaw in force

The adopted Upland zone repeats the same secondary-suite permission in subsections 5.6(3.1) and 5.6(6).

Both provisions permit one secondary suite per lot subject to section 3.13. The duplication appears harmless to density but should be cleaned up for readers.

Numbering and proofreading · in a bylaw in force

The adopted consolidation reads “Despite 5.1(2), 2.1, and (3)” in the flexible-housing density rule.

The wording appears to intend “Despite 5.1(2), (2.1) and (3)”, but leaves 2.1 as a bare number. This is the operative sentence that lets flexible housing lots exceed ordinary density in the Settlement Residential zone.

Numbering and proofreading · in a bylaw in force

Smaller slips in the housing bylaws: principle dwelling for principal dwelling in the adopted plan, the Minister's title misspelt on the signing page, and a plan with no section 2.1.2.

None changes a right. They sit beside the larger findings above as evidence of how closely the text was read before adoption.

What we checked and found sound

  • Re-downloaded both listings on 19 September 2026: land use bylaw and community plan addresses both return 6,201,135 bytes, SHA-256 f60cf63ee6809efc…, 110 pages. Tried five other addresses for the land use bylaw: one redirects to the same file, one (mayne-ltc-bylaw-no-146) serves the October 2019 consolidation, three are 404.
  • Our library copy of Bylaw 146 (2,030,734 bytes, consolidated July 2026, amendments to Bylaw 200) is the real bylaw and the most recent text we can find.
  • All 58 internal references in Bylaw 146 and all 21 in plan Bylaw 144 were listed beside their targets (audit-bylaw-crossrefs --all). Every target exists and is about the right subject.
  • Read Bylaws 194, 195, 196, 197 and 200 in full from the agenda packages, and the minutes of 26 January, 23 February, 27 April, 29 June and 20 July 2026. Rendered the tracked-changes pages of Bylaws 196 and 197 (package pages 41, 46, 47) as images before quoting.
  • Bylaw 197's new secondary suite sentences for the RR1, RR2 and Miners Bay zones are consistent with s. 3.13 (suites only in the Schedule D area). Its references inside new s. 8.11 to subsections (4), (5)(d), (6), (7) and (8) land on the right provisions, unlike Galiano's copy of the same text.
  • Bylaws 194 and 195 (St. John Point) went through first reading 28 April 2025, second reading 28 July 2025, public hearing and third reading 29 September 2025, Executive Committee November 2025, Minister January 2026, adoption 23 February 2026. Nothing irregular found.
  • We did not read plan Bylaw 144 or Bylaw 146 from beginning to end for stale Acts or plan and bylaw disagreements beyond the housing amendments.
  • October 3: August 31 minutes record Bylaw 197 adoption under MA-2026-060; full agenda and correct land use bylaw listing are now published, but the listed consolidation omits 197.
  • October 3: downloaded current official August 31 minutes and September 2026 Land Use Bylaw 146 consolidation. The latter includes amendment 197 and retains the three drafting issues cited above.

Open questions

Things that looked worth a second reading and that we could not prove. They are not findings.

  • The August 31 minutes confirm Bylaw 197 adoption, and the September consolidation includes it. Will staff correct the gallon units, malformed flexible-housing reference, and duplicate Upland suite permission?
  • How did the third-reading plan text of Bylaw 196 become the adopted text? Compare the now-published August 31 agenda and adoption minutes with the signed amendment and consolidation.
  • On 26 January 2026, after the public hearing closed, the committee removed the words 'for a lot outside a community water system' from the new cistern rule, so the rule now reaches every new dwelling on the island, and added the water service area exclusion to the plan. The staff report says changes after a hearing may not alter use or density. We did not fetch Local Government Act s. 470 from BC Laws, so we make no finding on whether these two changes are within it.
  • Does the Schedule E map in Bylaw 197 (flexible housing areas, drawn before the hearing) leave out the water service areas that the plan policy added after the hearing says to exclude? If not, the land use bylaw and the plan adopted the same day disagree (Local Government Act s. 478(2)). This needs the maps side by side; we did not do it.
  • New s. 8.11(9) of Bylaw 197 speaks of water that 'cannot be supplied in accordance with Subsection 8.11(1)' and of 'a certification made under Subsections 8.11(1)'. Subsection (1) is a confirmation letter from a community water system and certifies nothing. Galiano's copy of the same model text has the same oddity, so it may come from the Trust's model bylaw. Not proven to be an error.
  • The plan's enacting clause cites 'Part 26, except sections 932 to 937 and 939, of the Local Government Act'. We believe that numbering predates the 2015 revision of the Act but did not confirm it on BC Laws.
  • Plan policies 2.1.1.2 and 2.1.4.2 as rewritten by Bylaw 196 join their parts with 'or', 'and', 'or', 'or' in a way that can be read more than one way (is a cottage allowed in a flexible housing area in addition to three dwellings?). Worth a planner's reading.