In September 2023, Jenna Phipps and her partner bought a house in West Vancouver for $2.1 million. The 2,757 sq ft property sits on rocky bluffs overlooking Howe Sound — and it was going to be the subject of a major DIY renovation series for Phipps’ YouTube channel, which had 1.5 million subscribers.
In February 2024, they applied for a renovation permit. By May, they’d been waiting three months with no decision. The house was sitting there. They had contractors ready. The content plan was built around the renovation.
So they started. They stripped drywall. They tore up flooring. They did landscaping work.
On May 17, 2024, the District of West Vancouver issued a stop-work order.
Six days later, an emergency permit was granted — but only for the specific purpose of removing part of the roof. Everything else remained stopped.
In an interview, Phipps described the situation: “We’ve been going back and forth for like three months with the city.”
What the law says about starting work before a permit
The Vancouver Building By-law 2025 is unambiguous on this point. The By-law requires that a building permit be issued before any regulated work begins. This is not a technicality or a grey area — it is the foundational operating principle of the permit system.
The rationale is practical: permits trigger inspections. Inspections happen at specific stages of construction. If work happens before the permit is issued, the inspection stages that should occur before walls are closed, before structural elements are covered, before plumbing is enclosed — those inspections cannot happen. The inspector arrives at a finished wall and cannot see what’s inside it.
This is why the stop-work order was issued even though Phipps had a pending permit application. The issue wasn’t that they didn’t intend to get a permit — it was that regulated work was happening before the permit was in hand.
When a 3-month wait entitles you to act
Phipps’ frustration — waiting three months with no decision — is understandable and common. But the remedy available under the law is not “start the work anyway.” The remedy is a deemed refusal.
Under Section 4.2.3 of the Zoning and Development By-law:
“If no development permit has been issued to the applicant within 30 days from the date on which the applicant has furnished all the information and material required… then the development permit must be deemed to have been refused, so as to enable the applicant to exercise their right to appeal.”
After 30 days from submitting a complete application with no decision, you have the right to treat the application as refused and appeal to the Development Permit Board. This is the legal mechanism for forcing action when the city is unresponsive.
The appeal process doesn’t resolve overnight — but it creates formal pressure on the city to act, and it preserves your legal rights. Starting construction without a permit does not preserve your rights. It creates new violations.
Note: This 30-day clock applies to development permits. Building permit processing timelines have separate provisions under the Building By-law.
What work is and isn’t permitted before permit issuance
Not all pre-permit work triggers a stop-work order. The thresholds matter.
Generally permitted before a building permit (not regulated work):
- Planning, measuring, and design work
- Demolition of non-structural interior elements in some circumstances (check locally)
- Site preparation work that doesn’t involve excavation or structural elements
- Ordering materials
Requires permit before starting:
- Stripping drywall where structural elements may be exposed or altered
- Any work to structural elements (walls, floors, roof framing)
- Plumbing disconnection or reconnection
- Electrical disconnection or reconnection
- Any excavation
In Phipps’ case, stripping drywall and removing flooring were treated as regulated work triggering the stop-work order. This is consistent with the standard interpretation: even if the work appears cosmetic, exposing structural elements or modifying systems without a permit in place creates an uninspected condition.
The landscaping question
Phipps’ team also did landscaping work while waiting for the permit. This is a frequently misunderstood area. In West Vancouver and Vancouver, landscaping on a residential property does not typically require a building permit for straightforward planting and garden work. However:
- Significant grading or regrading of a site (changing the level of the ground by more than specified amounts) typically requires a permit
- Retaining wall construction over specified heights requires a permit
- Work within tree protection zones or near watercourses requires separate permits
- Impermeable surface coverage changes may trigger RS-1 district schedule limitations
Whether the landscaping triggered part of the stop-work order was not reported. But it illustrates that “landscaping” is not uniformly permit-exempt.
The practical lesson
Phipps documented the experience publicly to her 1.5 million subscribers. Her transparency was valuable precisely because this situation is so common: homeowner applies, waits, gets frustrated, starts work, gets a stop-work order.
The legal path when you’re waiting too long:
- Confirm your application is complete (missing information resets the 30-day clock)
- Once 30 days have passed from the date your complete application was acknowledged, contact the city in writing and note the deemed-refusal provision
- If still no response, file an appeal to the Development Permit Board
- Do not start regulated work until the permit is in hand
The emergency permit issued to Phipps six days after the stop-work order covered only the roof removal — suggesting the city was willing to move on specific elements once formally pressed. That’s the leverage the deemed-refusal mechanism gives you. Use it.