The Strathcona Regional District Board passed the Cortes Island Zoning Bylaw. 

Regional Director Mark Vonesch gave an overview of the process at the Wednesday, November 19, 2025, board meeting:

“We’re at the last stage of potentially passing the Cortes Island zoning bylaw. It’s been almost a two year process of community consultation, both online and in person. It’s gone to the Advisory Planning Commission on Cortes, and it’s gone through a public hearing at the beginning of September. We had 140 plus folks attend that hearing, which is amazing. The reason I deferred it a month was that you have 200 pages of comments on this, and I wanted to take the time to read them all and to really assess what people’s challenges and also what they like about the bylaw before making my own personal recommendation.”

“I want to address some of the things that folks have brought up. Just to be clear and transparent for the public one of the biggest issues that came up was aquaculture zoning. There was concern on Cortes that this bylaw is creating new zones and changing the aquaculture zoning on Cortes. I just want to reiterate what staff have said that. This is really just falling in line with the provincial zoning and that there are no new changes to it. It’s just updated maps.”

“Another challenge that folks had was the agricultural one zoning. Again, this is a zoning from the province. It was established in the 1970s. Some of the lines, when you look at the map, they seem a bit arbitrary and when folks look at it, they’re like, why is there this circle line on my map.”

“Staff, feel free to correct me if I’m saying anything wrong here.”

“Another big issue were folks on the original version that went to public hearing. There was concern around private moorage on boats, a lot of folks concerned that they would lose their liveaboard situation or they weren’t allowed to have private moorage. I appreciate staff adjusting the definitions and making it clear the long-term moorage is allowed.”

“Like a lot of things in government, there were folks in this zoning bylaw who said, we don’t want any more density on Cortes. There were also people who said, this isn’t enough. I appreciate both sides and I think the moderate increase in density here is wanted by the majority of the community and is fitting of the consultation process that’s been gone through.”

“Big notable changes I think are on properties that are eligible to have a second cottage.”

“That cottage size is being increased from 600 square feet to 1200 square feet, so that allows some more family housing. Like all housing in the private sector, some of that housing will end up being holiday housing. Some of that housing might turn into Airbnb. Some of that housing might turn into to long-term rentals, and I think it’ll probably end up being a mix, but I think there’s strong support on Cortes to allow more family type housing.”

“There’s a lot of conversation around aquifers. Can we on Cortes even increase density? What’s our aquifer situation? Knowing this was an issue, about a year ago we wrote a grant and, and did an aquifer study had GWS solutions come in from Nanaimo and assess our, our watersheds and assess our our aquifers. That report came back in the summer. Think was a big decision for folks around whether they could support more density. I was happy to see that overall we’re sitting pretty good on Cortes with our water. There are a few problem areas that were noted in the report, but I think that it provided a lot of relief to, uh, to, to residents. That’s a report that I’ll be bringing to the board to, to have on record here.”

“Another thing that folks brought up was 2002 was our last OCP (Official Commnity Plan). So we’re 23 years into our OCP. In a lot of ways, our 2002 OCP was more more in line with the community than our zoning, which was even older. So there’s a, there was a call in the public hearing from a lot of folks to update our OCP. I think that’s on the books for 2026. I’m glad that’s going to be happening because there’s certainly been a call for that.”

“There were some folks who wanted noise control in the bylaw, and in the original bylaw, there were some language around nuisance noise, but if we wanted to pursue a noise boilerplate, we’d have to create a separate bylaw, we’d have to create a separate bylaw. I don’t think there’s a will on co, on Cortes at this moment to do that, but noted that some folks would’ve liked to see that.”

“I think overall, people appreciate that there will be increased density allowed for the Cortes Housing Society on their Rainbow Ridge property.”

“Again, not everyone’s in complete agreement, but I’m really excited about that part of the housing needs on Cortes is increasing our nonprofit housing. I’m excited that they’re moving forward with 24 units on part of their property. I think that’s obviously doesn’t cover every concern or every comment that everyone had, but it covers a lot of the bigger comments.”

“I just want to give staff an opportunity to correct me if there’s anything that I got wrong or, or add to anything that I’ve said. I am seeing a shaking of heads.”

Chief Administrative Officer, David Leitch, shook his head, “Silence is golden.” 

Campbell River Director Ben Lanyon asked “Could you recap your comments on the level of support or opposition that you’ve had on the short term rentals aspect of this. I saw there’s a fair number of comments in the emails about that, and one in particular on page 24 from Deanna Collins, where she makes some great arguments about the need for their availability for tradespeople and things coming over to the island.”

Director Vonesch: There is a diversity of opinions on short-term rentals on Cortes. This new zoning, zoning bylaw allows air short-term rentals in all zones and the primary residential requirement for short-term rentals has nothing to do with this bylaw. It’s a separate issue. I acknowledge there’s differing opinions on that, but as far as this bylaws concerned, it’s not relevant. 

Director Lanyon: “So this doesn’t change the original implementation of the provincial rules on short-term rentals in any way.” 

Director Vonesch: “The primary residence requirement that Cortes has opted into is separate.”

This is a rural matter and only the four Regional Directors took part in the final vote. The Cortes Zoning Bylaw update passed with no opposition.

Links of Interest

• Cortes Island Zoning Bylaw (Bylaw 598)
• Written submissions for Bylaw 598
• Draft Map for Bylaw 598
• Articles about, or mentioning, the Cortes Island Zoning Bylaw

Top image credit: September 8, 2025 Public meeting on Cortes Island – Roy L Hales photo; Screenshots from Map for Bylaw 598 on SRD website

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