Editor:
Re: Craft brewery brings a community together, letter to the editor, May 30
Kevin Klassen's mini-thesis on both the viability and desirability of having Four Winds drop its oversized structure onto the Southlands is, as Mayor George Harvie noted during the Delta council vote on the proposal, "...in conflict with the commitment council made to the community on the approval of the Southlands in 2016.”
Council’s commitment to the community was for village-commercial. I cannot find anywhere in the current lawful bylaw that would support consideration of an amendment of the intended change in size and use.
While I am all in favour of having such an enterprise at the Southlands, let's not overstate the case and attempt to elicit emotion to evade the bylaws which everyone else is subject to and which everyone else has to abide by.
Klassen's epistle was long on belief, overly long on hyperbole and eventually wandered off into that last bastion of the lost cause - sentimentality. Had there been sugary music to accompany his paean it would have been worthy of a well-crafted commercial for Four Winds, such was the obvious partiality in his piece.
When a Four Winds or similar does appear at the Southlands - and it will happen; we, whether in favour or against, all know this - I will be happy to see it and will take the time to wander from my home in Boundary Bay to enjoy the "best beer in the world" (according to Klassen) but I hope this will only happen if Four Winds, or its competition, ends up in that space and abides by the laws and bylaws that all others have to comply with.
B. McKenna
