The series consists of records regarding the review and approval by the minister of bylaws concerning land use and planning, amendments to official community plans and their related amending bylaws and changes of zoning. These include case files for individual localities, in particular regional districts. The records were used for legal purposes, research and reference.
The records include a coded subseries, known as the "36 series," which documents planning bylaw review and approval, planning grant review and approval, and ministerial authorizations related to land use planning and management bylaws.
Planning bylaw review and approval involves planning bylaws that require ministerial approval (e.g., regional district, the Islands Trust, and the Resort Municipality of Whistler planning bylaws). Planning staff reviewed those bylaws in order to ensure that they did not conflict with provincial government interests.
Record types include correspondence, forms, briefing notes, bylaws, minutes, studies and reports, official community plans and their supporting documents, records regarding local committee meetings (agendas etc.) public hearings and workshops (public posting of notices, minutes from public hearings), responses from referral agencies (comments on bylaws by government agencies), documents regarding rezoning applications, petitions from the public and news clippings. Intermingled in the predominantly textual records are maps and engineering plans and some photographs. Records also include bylaw submission forms submitted with bylaws requiring approval of the minister.
The creator of the records used a coding system that assigned a code to each local government. For example, the regional district codes consisted of the two-digit alphabetic prefix “RD” for regional district followed by the alphanumeric coding system in use in the ministry responsible for municipal affairs at the time. In many cases the files would be labeled in such a way as to abbreviate the code. While the filing systems initially appear to be aimed at an alphabetical order, by locality, that order is often broken. Local government codes used in this record series can be found in Appendix D of the Administrative Records Classification System 1993 Edition. Some of the codes on files are extended with dashes or decimal numbers which represent subject categories.
The records were created by several ministries which carried out the functions and activities of provincial responsibility for local governments; in addition to the Ministry of Municipal Affairs (the name used at different times), the creators included: the Department of Municipal Affairs; the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing; the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Transit; the Ministry of Municipal Affairs, Recreation and Culture; and the Ministry of Municipal Affairs, Recreation and Housing.
British Columbia. Ministry of Municipal Affairs (1993-1996)