The Khalsa Darbar Society has submitted a non-conforming use application to the City of Pitt Meadows to utilize part of a property in the Agricultural Land Reserve for religious purposes and community gatherings.
City staff have recommended not forwarding the application, but Mayor John Becker supports it.
The application concerns a portion of the 8.38 hectares at 18701 Lougheed Hwy., just west of Meadows Gardens Golf Course.
Currently, the property is located within the reserve and would require permission from the Agricultural Land Commission for the non-farm use of a building and adjacent land for parking.
The property would require rezoning to be approved for such use, according the staff report submitted to council.
The Khalsa society has owned the property since 1991 and submitted applications to the city and the ALC in 1991 and 1995 to build a Sikh Temple on the property. However, both applications were turned down by the council of the day.
A majority of the property is now blueberry crops.
In 2011, a building permit was granted for a 5,000 square foot agricultural building, to include a caretaker suite, processing area, equipment storage and employee lunch room. It is the existing building that the society would like to convert to non-agricultural use.
The society is allowed now to use the space for non-conforming use up to 10 times a year, with a maximum of 150 people, without special approval.
But it would like to use it more frequently for religious purposes, including weddings, said Gurdial Singh Dulay, president of the Khalsa Darbar Society in Pitt Meadows.
The owners have also proposed a 0.5 acre community garden to be managed by the society with free plots available to residents of Pitt Meadows. Community garden members would also be permitted to use the building for processing produce from the garden plots.
A non-farm use application only proceeds to the ALC for review if it receives approval from local government. If the application, which was before council Tuesday, is forwarded and approved by the ALC, the Khalsa society would be required to obtain rezoning to permit the use of a place of worship in addition to agricultural use.
In 2016, a similar application was considered by the city’s Agricultural Advisory Committee, which did not support the proposal, wanting instead to preserve farm land and avoid setting a precedent.
City staff do not support the proposal, saying this particular application raises concerns about increased traffic and slowing down vehicles on Lougheed Highway to access the site, and additional agricultural land being used for parking and lack of landscape buffering to adjacent agricultural properties.
Based on the size of the building, a minimum of 47 parking spaces would be required under the city’s zoning bylaw.
“With the building and parking areas, a large area of agricultural land will be impacted,” says the staff report, adding that a relatively small community garden does not appear to offset the loss of good, productive agricultural land.
Becker, however, said he will be supporting the non-conforming use application.
“Frankly, I’ve been watching this evolve for the better part of 20 years and it’s something that I support the discussion,” he added.
“Right now, I think that on the balance of values, I would support the Sikh community having their place of congregation and celebration just like any other religious community here in Pitt Meadows.”
Dulay confirmed that there is a building on the property that is used for farming purposes, but the society would like to use if for gatherings, with the addition of the community gardens for everyone in Pitt Meadows.
“The city is gong to let us know what to do,” he said. “Whatever the plan, whatever they say, OK you’ve got to upgrade, then we have to upgrade for those kind of things,” he said.
The Khalsa society already advertises on Facebook the use of the building as a Gurdwara, a place of worship for Sikhs, with daily program at the Pitt Meadows site, as of Sept. 9.
Becker noted that the application is not for removal, that the land would stay in the ALR, with permission to use the building for non-agriculture purposes.
He is hoping to have a discussion on values and accommodation.
“I would like to think that the vast majority of our residents are not going to have some knee jerk, sort of racist or stereotypical reaction to this,” said Becker, adding that the building is not a large temple that’s being contemplated.
“It’s an existing building that they would just like to convert the interior over and I would hope that the vast majority of our residents would support that just as easily if it was the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Anglicans, the Baptists, the Jewish community, the Ismaili community, whatever.”