Gellatly Bay Boat Launch.
Image Credit: Submitted/City of West Kelowna
March 12, 2024 - 2:22 PM
Commercial boat companies using West Kelowna boat launches for free can breathe a sigh of relief.
While West Kelowna city council unanimously passed a motion today, March 12, to investigate fees for their two boat launches, there are no plans to do that any time soon.
“I’m not looking to burden staff with too much workload, or more workload than they need,” councillor Garrett Millsap, who made the motion, told council despite having told iNFOnews.ca earlier that he was going to push to have fees put in place by this summer.
READ MORE: West Kelowna may join Kelowna and charge commercial boat launch fees
Coun. Millsap made the comments after other councillors and city staff questioned whether staff have the time needed to research the idea.
“I think it would be really difficult to implement right now,” interim CAO Ron Mattiussi told council. “I’ll be taking a report forward to council by the next meeting outlining all the things that are on the plate at this point in time. Getting it done right now would be very very difficult."
Mattiussi took on the job last month.
He pointed out that council sets the city’s priorities and it could always shift those around if they wanted action on boat launch fees right away.
No one on council, not even Millsap, was inclined to do that.
“It can be a priority when it needs to be a priority, but I would like to see it put somewhere in the queue because right now we do have commercial users using our boat launches illegally, which is in our bylaws," he says.
"We do need at some point to have a report come back so we can actually address this concern."
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