Corporate sponsorship of city assets on the agenda at Vancouver council

Vancouver City Hall is seen in Vancouver, on Saturday, Jan. 9, 2021. (Darryl Dyck / THE CANADIAN PRESS)

A plan to allow corporations and other "commercial entities" to pay to sponsor civic assets, projects and programs is coming to Vancouver council next week.

City staff have recommended introducing a new policy in order to "maximize the opportunity to generate non-tax revenue to address the city’s growing infrastructure deficit and other council priorities, thereby reducing pressure on property taxes and user fees," according to a report that will be considered Tuesday.

The report defines sponsorship as payment for the "right to be associated" with a project or program.

This is distinct from naming rights, defined as "a specific type of relationship in which a commercial entity pays a fee to the city to have their name associated with a specific city venue, building, event, or public space."

Policies on sponsorship and naming rights already exist, but the report says no significant sponsorship opportunities have been advanced since 2019.

The new policy, according to the report, will increase the range of city-owned assets that are up for sponsorship, allowing for "sponsorship solicitation" and speeding up the approval process.

City Hall, assets managed by the Vancouver Police Department and the Vancouver Public Library are all off the table for sponsorship. Also prohibited is renaming streets or parks. What is allowed is not precisely defined, but includes " vehicles, equipment, publications, websites and digital applications, buildings, plazas and other city-owned real property."

Council will have to approve sponsorship and naming rights, but the authority to negotiate contracts of $3 million or less would be delegated to the city manager's office.

The potential for controversy is acknowledged in the report, which proposes a policy that would exclude political parties and potentially "divisive" messaging, as well as corporations or groups that "reflect negatively on the city’s public image or prove detrimental to the city’s integrity and/or reputation."

The idea of ramping up corporate sponsorship was a recommendation of the mayor's budget task force, it was also alluded to in discussions of how to fund the replacement of the aging Kitsilano Pool.

No estimate of how much revenue this policy could generate is included in the report and the cost of implementing it is also absent.