Charges bylaw becoming ‘Frankenstein’
ALLAN BENNER
Niagara councillors continue to struggle with adopting new development charges for the Region, concerned that the bylaw still has too many flaws to implement.
“We’ve taking something that should be very simple for any developer … and we’re making it much more complicated,” said Fort Erie Mayor Wayne Redekop at Thursday night’s council meeting. “We’re turning this into a Frankenstein.”
Although a new development charges bylaw was previously approved in July, councillors were asked at the Oct. 5 meeting to repeal that bylaw and replace it with a new one, after an Ontario Municipal Board appeal launched by the City of Welland pointed out that the Region failed to provide written notice of the passing the bylaw within the 20-day time period required under the Ontario Development Charges Act.
Although Welland claimed that the error rendered the previously approved bylaw unenforceable, Niagara senior staff at the time said that would be up to the OMB to determine.
Councillors at the Oct. 5 meeting instead referred the report to the corporate services committee for discussion.
Thursday night, councillors again referred the bylaw back to the committee level — this time to the planning and development services committee for more information and debate.
Councillors also referred an amendment to the proposed bylaw to the planning committee, that would establish an incentive program for hotel developers, who would see their charges triple to more than $11 per square foot under the new bylaw.
Redekop said the need for amendments of that nature “points to the frailty of this whole process with respect to this DC bylaw change.”
“That doesn’t seem to me to be a sound policy approach to something of this significance. When you add on concerns of some of the mayors about whether or not this will have an impact on the momentum of development in Niagara, I think we should be concerned about whether this is in fact the right bylaw and the right changes, and whether the increases aren’t going to create long-term problems.”
“We’re going to push this thing through and I don’t think we’re going to be happy once we’re done with it,” Redekop said.
“I think we’re getting ourselves into very dangerous waters here.”
While St. Catharines Mayor Walter Sendzik said he supports amendments to the bylaw to address concerns with hotels planned for Niagara Falls and across the region, he also said “I am concerned about how we’re going about this process.”
For instance, he said a number of apartment building developments planned for downtown St. Catharines will be subject to regional development charges.
“Can I ask for a development charges credit reserve for apartment buildings in downtown because we don’t have green space to grow on anymore?” he asked.
Welland Mayor Frank Campion, who has repeatedly raised concerns about the impact development charges would have on economic development initiatives in south Niagara, said the proposed amendments were an indication that the bylaw itself was flawed.
“We’re going to keep amending and amending instead of going back to the fundamentals and finding out what’s wrong with it and fixing it, instead of … sticking BandAids all over this thing,” Campion said. “We have to fix it. This is not right.”
Welland Coun. Paul Grenier said he shares the same concerns about the bylaw, and “I’m glad other people have started to join the choir here.”
Although Grenier said he agrees with development charges, he said the overwhelming majority of construction taking place in the region is residential.
And there’s ample revenue from those residential projects to pay for the infrastructure to facilitate growth.
His concern is about employment lands,” he said.
“These developments are the ones that create jobs.”
If planned developments like hotels or apartment buildings are being assessed more than $1 million in development charges, “they’re not going to be built.”