Developer, residents in Randwood debate far apart

A meeting held on Good Friday between a Niagara-on-the-Lake citizens group and the developer who wants to build a hotel complex on the Randwood Estate property failed to bring the two sides any closer together.

The meeting was set up by town council after much opposition was expressed by the SORE group, Save Our Randwood Estate, to plans by Two Sisters Resort Corp. for redevelopment of the historic 5.6-hectare property on John St.

SORE representative Duff Roman repeatedly asked councillors at committee-of-the-whole this Monday to watch the video of the meeting with developer Benny Marotta and his architect that is posted to the group’s website. He reiterated the group’s stand that a six-storey hotel is “utterly and completely inappropriate” for this site.

“You can’t get a Big Mac on Queen Street,” said Roman, “and there shouldn’t be an oversized Holiday Inn knock-off on the most important heritage property in town.”

He said Marotta provided the group with some preliminary plans for revisions to the proposal, but he was not willing to lower the height of the hotel or the number of rooms. Roman questioned Marotta’s opinion that he needed 145 rooms to make the development viable.

“That’s about 50 per cent bigger than the 106 rooms contemplated by the Romance proposal,” he said, referring to an application by Trisha Romance in 2011 for a three-storey hotel complex.

“If Mr. Marotta was correct, then the Romance group didn’t know what it was doing,” he said.

He also told council that the town needs to hire an experienced heritage planner to deal with this type of application.

“None of the planning staff … are qualified heritage planners,” Roman said. “How can Niagaraon-the-Lake possibly operate without (one)?”

Another concern he said that was raised by the group at the meeting was the condition of a boxwood hedge on the property that is protected by the town’s official plan.

“That’s the mess of the boxwood hedge that is supposed to be intact,” said Roman, showing slides that he said were taken recently of the hedge.

Coun. Terry Flynn asked Roman to confirm if the meeting resulted in the two sides being unable to move forward or build rapport.

“To take 30 days out to develop something called rapport was just not understandable to us,” Roman replied.

The group had objected to council deferring the recommendations from the municipal heritage committee for heritage designations for the property and its structures to allow time for a meeting between the two sides to address concerns.

Maurizio Rogato, the planner for the developer, attended the committee-of-the-whole meeting, but did not address councillors. In an interview after the meeting, he said Two Sisters has already started the process for a heritage designation and is doing an interior analysis of the building.

Rogato said the company has spent almost $100,000 on landscaping and “the boxwood hedge is fine,” calling SORE’s claim that it is damaged another example of “alternative facts” put forward by the group.

He said Two Sisters is also working on responding to the hundreds of comments received about the proposal from the public.

The recommendations from the heritage committee will be back before council next Monday. In anticipation of another large turnout for the issue, the council meeting has been moved to the community centre.