2015
Proposed revision of the Local Government Act
The proposed revision of the Local Government Act is being made available to the public on various websites. If the drafters of the revised Act have done their work properly, local government officials searching for substantive changes in the law will be disappointed. As with local government bylaw revisions prepared under the Bylaw Revision Regulation B.C. Reg. 367/2003, a statute revision cannot include any substantive changes in the law. The Local Government Act has been renumbered (the last section is numbered 783 in the revision, instead of 1040 in Chapter 290 of the Revised Statutes of B.C.) and within the various Parts some material has been reorganized. There will be 19 Parts rather than 30. Most of this is a consequence of the enactment of the Community Charter in 2003.
The proposed revision is on the December 15 agenda of the Select Standing Committee on Parliamentary Reform, Ethical Conduct, Standing Orders and Private Bills and can be viewed at http://www.cscd.gov.bc.ca/lgd/policy_research/revised_lga.htm. It is not likely to come into force until sometime in 2016.