City of Vancouver Naming Rights Policy

The City of Vancouver has recently created policy mechanisms that will allow for the sale of naming rights on public facilities.

In early November, the City's approved two policies concerning Naming Rights - Naming Rights Policy for Civic Community Facilities and Commemorative Naming Policy for Civic Community Facilities.  In doing so, the City was looking to codify its current ad-hoc naming practices with a more coherent and consistent set of guidelines.  Under the new guidelines, the sale of corporate naming rights will be permitted for interior and exterior components of all new sports and cultural facilities, and interior components of all Parks Board, Community, Social Services and Childcare facilities owned by the City.

In response to the draft policies, the VPSN wrote to Council expressing its concern.  Our letter suggested that there was more at play with naming rights than good corporate citizenship and requested that Councillors be wary of adopting the draft policies.   Our position on this issue is that businesses large and small can and should be encouraged to be donors to all sorts of cultural, sporting and civic activities, but that donor-status should not be premised on branding activity.  Good corporate citizens, after all, shouldn't need to see their name in lights in order to play a role. 

On April 30 of this year the City's Park Board will be considering their own Naming Rights Policy - one that will allow for the corporate naming of interior facility components (e.g. gyms, change-rooms, pools, etc.) and individual naming of the interior and exterior components of new and existing facilities.  The VPSN has again reiterated its concerns on the issue via a letter to Parks Board Commissioners. 

For more information, check out the following links: