Published on: Tuesday, October 11, 2011

At the upcoming October 20^th, 2011 Chapter Breakfast, NAIOP Vancouver will launch its 2011 edition of its Commercial Development Report Card.  This is NAIOP Vancouver's 12^th annual "municipal report card," and the sixth edition which is focused on Industrial development.  The Survey which is distributed to 20 municipalities within the Lower Mainland, requires each municipality to identify the costs and processing times associated with the parameters of a particular case study. For 2011, the development project was the construction of a two-storey, 100,000 square foot industrial warehouse distribution building on a 6.0 acre, residentially zoned lot. The development scenario required both subdivision and rezoning.

As part of the launch of the annual development cost survey, NAIOP Vancouver will present awards to four outstanding municipalities.  These are the first such annual awards granted by NAIOP Vancouver and they will be known as the NAME Awards (NAIOP Award for Municipal Excellence).

In 2011, the awards go to:

• The Cities of North Vancouver and Chilliwack for Most Improved Municipality. Both of these cities achieved the most improvement compared to previous survey results and recorded an overall drop in costs of 6% from the previous industrial survey results in 2009.
• The City of Delta, for Most Fiscally Responsible. Delta has kept cost increases in line with overall inflation and has managed to limit cost increases over the 10-year time frame of the survey to just over the average rate of inflation.
• The City of Abbotsford for Most Business Friendly. Abbotsford has implemented five-year staggered tax incentive programs for commercial and industrial development, and these have encouraged new investment.

Representatives from these municipalities will be on hand on October 20^th to receive these awards.