People in growing communities need schools, hospitals, amenities, and more to thrive, and British Columbians rightly hold the provincial government accountable for the delivery of the critical infrastructure that they need, with urgency. At its core, Bill 15: The Infrastructure Projects Act is about just that. However, I have heard that some people have questions about the tools that Bill 15 does or does not provide to government to move projects along, which I am happy to walk through in more detail here.

First off, Bill 15 formally establishes the new Ministry of Infrastructure and provides it with the authority to conduct its business, which is to deliver vertical provincial projects (meaning buildings like schools and hospitals, as opposed to transportation or utilities) for British Columbians. It also includes a new tool that allows the Ministry of Infrastructure to manage the construction of projects on behalf of school districts, post-secondary institutions, and health authorities on a case-by-case basis when it makes sense to do so.

Example A: This would allow the Ministry of Infrastructure to do a coordinated procurement for multiple projects at the same time to achieve cost savings per project. For instance, the ministry could buy multiple project components for multiple health authorities’ projects together, or buy multiple modular classrooms for multiple school districts at one time. Without Bill 15, each school district must undertake their own procurement process.

Example B: The Ministry of Infrastructure could directly project manage the construction of a school for a school district in situations where a school district is very small and inexperienced with building a school on their own. Without Bill 15, the school district must fully lead their own project.

Bill 15 also gives government access to six project streamlining tools. These tools do not guarantee an outcome of a decision, nor do they allow for a project proponent to sidestep environmental standards or First Nations rights. Instead, they help a project receive a decision (yes or no) sooner, so it’s not languishing in uncertainty. If the decision is yes, then shovels can get in the ground faster.

The tools are as follows:

1. Bill 15 allows us to bring a project to the front of the line for a provincial permit review. This does not reduce or eliminate the need for the project to go through the permitting process or meet the existing criteria, like environmental reviews or First Nations consultations, it simply means that it is seen by a reviewer earlier.

Example: We had a school in recent years where a provincial permit was required very late in its development process because the school district’s team had not realized that what they thought was a ditch in the corner of the property met the statutory definition of a stream under provincial law. The entire school ended up being delayed for two years while they waited for their permit to be processed. With Bill 15, the permit could be brought forward for immediate review. It would still need to meet all the environmental standards of the permit, but it would be seen much more quickly.

2. Bill 15 gives government the ability to develop a Qualified Professional Reliance model for some types of provincial decisions. This would be developed on a permit-by-permit or decision-by-decision basis, and would only be used where it makes sense. Government would have to set standards and circumstances under which such a process would be allowed, and a clear decision-making process will be developed. This model would not be appropriate for all decisions, but it could be appropriate for some. Keep in mind that a major project has many decisions and permits it must achieve success on to move forward, so this is not a “one and done” sort of situation for project approvals. Major decisions would still be left with the statutory decision maker within government.

Example: A provincially significant private sector project receives permission to access the Qualified Professional Reliance route on some provincial decisions. Per the set-out process, the proponent retains two professional engineers independent of each other who have been pre-qualified by government as being trustworthy and experienced enough to provide a professional certification for a certain permit. The project goes through the rigour of the provincial standard via those two professional engineers, who independently assess the project and provide their certifications to the BC Government public service as to whether the criteria has been met for the particular decision.

3. Bill 15 allows government to create a streamlined environmental assessment process. Projects that meet the criteria for an environmental assessment process can take 3 years, 4 years, or even 5 or more years to receive their certificates. It is an extremely rigorous process that considers every aspect of a project and involves extensive consultations with First Nations and other partners and stakeholders. This process is incredibly important, and this tool is about putting projects through the same rigour of an EA process, but in ways that allow it to be done more quickly for some key projects that will provide significant benefits to people and communities. Bill 15 does NOT bypass the environmental assessment process. What Bill 15 does is provide the ability to develop a streamlined process that might take 2 years instead of 3,4,5+ for use in circumstances where a streamlined process might be appropriate. A streamlined process would still need to meet our duty to consult with First Nations and will be created in consultation with First Nations.

Example: A project comes forward that is a collaboration between First Nations and the private sector. It has broad support to proceed, but does have potential impacts on the environment that need to be assessed. The Environmental Assessment Office does a preliminary review of the project and speaks with all partners and stakeholders involved. The EAO determines that based on its broad support and low-to-moderate levels of complexity, it is a good candidate for a streamlined process. The proponents appeal to the BC Government for designation as a Provincially Significant Project on the basis of its economic impact on communities and contributions to a critical mineral that is needed to replace US imports, and the project receives permission to access a streamlined EA process as a Provincially Significant project. The project does not get access to any other streamlining tools – only the one they have been granted permission to access.

4. Where a full Environmental Assessment Certificate has been achieved, Bill 15 allows for lower risk duplicative or redundant provincial permits to be automatically issued. Bill 15 allows for government to recognize that once a project receives an Environmental Assessment Certificate after a rigorous assessment, the need to go through more minor provincial permits can be redundant in many cases.

Example: A project that has successfully completed a 5-year environmental assessment that included a rigorous assessment of the impact of the project on the trees and biodiversity of the area would currently have to subsequently apply to the Ministry of Forests for a separate tree-cutting permit for the trees that have already been assessed through the environmental assessment. This tool in Bill 15 would allow for that tree-cutting permit to be automatically issued following the Environmental Assessment Certificate due to the impacts of the removal of those trees having already been assessed by a more rigorous process through the Environmental Assessment Office.

5. Bill 15 allows local governments to ask the provincial government to waive certain requirements placed on them that are holding up the issuance of development permits (and therefore building permits). This is another tool that can be used to ensure that duplicative regulators or approval processes won’t hold up critically needed infrastructure. This tool cannot be used to waive any requirements related to life safety.

Example: A school is desperately needed in a growing community. After many months of trying to secure land in a hot real estate market, the school district is finally able to purchase a plot of land for it. Unfortunately, that plot of land is not zoned for a school and the community’s Official Community Plan did not anticipate a school in that particular spot. Still, the local government agrees that a school is needed and that this new location works well. Without Bill 15, the local government would have to first update their OCP to allow for the development permits to be issued for the school. This can take a year or more and delay the entire school construction. Instead, Bill 15 would allow them to ask the province to support them in not updating the OCP right away so they can get the school built more quickly. The local government would then update their OCP at the next regularly scheduled update of the OCP instead.

6. The three step process for alternative authorizations to local government decisions. This allows for the provincial government and the municipality to work collaboratively on alternative ways to deal with permitting processes when existing processes don’t meet the needs of the moment. This is an escalating tool, which does ultimately allow the provincial government to take responsibility for a decision if an agreement with the local government cannot be achieved. However, it is very important to note that this is not a an entirely new tool and these authorities already exist for the provincial government even without Bill 15. It’s being updated and brought into Bill 15 because we are repealing the previous legislation which contains these tools, as that legislation needs to be modernized and updated to include our obligations under the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act.

Example: A town devastated by a natural disaster wants to rebuild quickly in a way that is more resilient than before. Their usual planning, development, and permitting processes were not set up to support a speedy post-disaster recovery scenario and are too bureaucratic and inflexible for the challenges they’re facing. Through Bill 15, they ask the province for help with this, and the provincial government and local government work together to come up with a plan that allows for multiple processes and steps to be done all at once across the entire disaster zone instead of doing it step-by-step, which would take much longer.

At Royal Assent, only provincial government projects like schools, hospitals, long-term care homes, post-secondary institutions, and other provincial infrastructure projects will have access to the permit streamlining tools. However, because we acknowledge that provincial governments are not the only entities that deliver critical infrastructure projects for communities, Bill 15 also makes space for provincially significant projects delivered by other proponents, including local governments, First Nations, crown corporations, the federal government, and private sector projects to go through approval processes faster. Provincially Significant projects would be designated by the BC Government through a mechanism known as an “Order-in-Council”, which is the same mechanism (and the same decision-makers) by which all provincial regulations are set. All Orders-in-Council are publicly posted online at BCLaws.ca.

For a project to be considered for designation as Provincially Significant, it would have to have First Nations support and provide significant environmental, social, or economic benefit to British Columbians. It would also need to significantly contribute to key priorities of British Columbians such as public infrastructure, food and water security, post-disaster recovery, access to critical minerals, energy security, or replacement of US imports. The decision-making criteria will be publicly released, and will be explicitly excluding LNG and pipelines, as well as overdose prevention sites and low-barrier housing.

These Provincially Significant projects will not get access to all the streamlining tools automatically – it will depend on the circumstances on a case-by-case basis. Ultimately, however, none of the tools above allow a project to skip over environmental standards or provincial obligations to First Nations. The tools simply allow for decisions to be reached more quickly, be they yes or no.

At the end of the day, British Columbians expect our government to deliver the critical infrastructure that people in growing communities need. The Infrastructure Projects Act is an important part of our work to do this work better, faster, and more economically for the people of BC.