Port Moody Council and Developer Watch Update #4

The Tangled Web: Port Moody Politicians and the Local Development Community.

Developer Watch Update

Just how extensive and intertwined is the relationship between the development community and the Mayor and the majority of the newly elected council? Excluding the obvious examples of one councillor working directly for the Homebuilder’s Association Vancouver and another councillor working in the development industry, let’s just say a lot. That said, another example has recently come to light.

It has come to the attention of the Watch that Sebastian Zein, who was present at the Lahti Campaign Celebration on Election night, has according to his Linkedin account, recently taken on the position as Development Manager with the AP Group of Companies, the proponents for the Flavelle Oceanfront Development at the old Flavelle Mill Site, potentially one of Port Moody’s largest developments. According to his Lindedin account, Mr. Zein took the position in November 2022, just after the Port Moody Civic Election.

Mr. Zein came onto the Council and Developer Watch’s radar on election night when he posted a tweet (see below) from the Lahti Campaign Celebration at Fraser Mills celebrating Mayor Lahti and the new Council’s win as “time to build”.  Give that Mayor Lahti was perceived as the developers’ preferred mayoral choice, his enthusiastic endorsement is hardly surprising.

Since election night, Zein has since been observed at a number of recent Tri-City Chamber events in the company of Dave Teixeira, Mayor Lahti’s Campaign Manager, as well as with as with other politically engaged generally right-leaning local pro-development YIMBY residents (see also here). Zein’s association with Dave Teixeira, the Campaign Manager for Mayor Lahti, likely extends well back to the Christy Clark days of the BC Liberals, when both were invited to then Premier Clark’s swearing-in in back in 2013. 

Mr. Zein was also tagged as being present at the swearing in of the new Port Moody Council and Mayor according to a Facebook Post by Jim McIntyre’s wife. Jim being the Manager development planning interim at the City of Port Moody and the Former General Manager, Planning and Development at City of Coquitlam – Municipality, a municipality well known as being developer-friendly under Mayor Richard Stewart. 

As a background, prior to assuming his current position, Mr. Zein was an advisor on Ellis Ross’s BC Liberal Leadership Campaign, a consultant with Urbanics Consultants, the design folks behind Port Moody’s Westport Development on the former Andres Wine Site, the former President of the BC Young Liberals, special assistant on digital projects with the BC Liberals, as well as a constituency assistant to Andrew Wilkinson. 

Mr. Zein is well-known in centre right circles for his involvement with the BC Liberals (now BC United) and in centre right City of Vancouver politics with the NPA, Hector Bremner and Yes Vancouver. According to the Breaker News’s Bob Mackin, Zein has also been involved behind the scenes in AstroTurf pro-development campaigns in the past.

Zein was/is also a member of Abundant Housing Vancouver, a Yes in My Backyard (YIMBY) pro-density and development group and is well-known as an advocate for dense development particularly near transit hubs. His views on municipal politics can be found here (definitely worth a listen). For those interested, Zein’s views on urban development can be found here released as part of an FOI to Vancouver City Council and within his Twitter feed.  Let’s just say that advocating for moderate development doesn’t seem to be Zein’s preference and his choice of discourse concerning his perceived political opponents can be at times be rather coarse (see examples below).

I share all this as Port Moody residents might be interested to know who literally and figuratively appears to now have a seat at the table with the Mayor these days (see here and here on the left side of the pictures).  Unfortunately, it now appears that the keys to the largely progressive City of Port Moody have just been handed over to those on the centre right and we will have to deal with the consequences of that for some time to come. One wonders given his apparent vast political experience and his extensive participation in the political process, whether or not Mr. Zein was just a passive observer during the recent Port Moody Civic Election or if he took a more active role.

As an aside, it should also be noted that certain members of Port Moody Council have been receiving campaign donations from various entities and individuals associated with the Flavelle Oceanfront Development for quite some time now (see here, here, and here) and we are very interested so see if that pattern continued in the most recent election. The Watch will be closely looking at the candidate campaign financial disclosures to be released soon.

Rumours at Developers Watch

Lastly, a couple of rumours to share.

A source has suggested that certain members of senior management associated with the Flavelle Oceanfront Development were present at the hearing and the recount concerning the close election result between Dave Stuart and Amy Lubik.  It is interesting and perhaps a bit concerning that representatives of the local developer community would be so engaged and involved in the local Port Moody political scene and political process.

Lastly, rumour has it that a senior management representative of a certain local developer paid for the ticket(s) for at least one Port Moody councillor candidate to attend the Grow Local Society’s Long Table Dinner in Port Moody on August 31, 2022. This has been corroborated by three separate individuals familiar with the matter. The Watch will be following up further on this matter. Given that the alleged gift(s) occurred prior to the candidate nominations being closed, it appears that the alleged gift of ticket(s) to the event would not need to have been declared as a campaign donation to Elections B.C. but that doesn’t negate the perception of an attempt to gain influence on the part of the member of the development community and the willingness of the individual(s) to accept the gifts directly from the developer without considering how that may be perceived.

The Watch is in the process of filing a number of FOIP requests and researching a number of issues that have come up since the past election. Stay tuned for further updates.  Actual moderate growth everyone!

Got any tips that we should know about? Send us an email at tips@portmoodycouncilwatch.ca