Parry Sound Council asked for rate options when it comes to Development Charges (DC) at their March 7 meeting and the town delivered three.
Clayton Harris, Chief Administrative Officer for the Town of Parry Sound, gave his DC Update Report to council on May 2 and presented them with an indication of what the rates could look like.
Harris says the first option reflects the rates that were presented at the March 7 meeting and were the rates he thinks the industry probably collectively said are too high.
Harris says for option two, town staff and the consultants have spent a lot of time going over the town’s planned projects lists. Projects the municipality, whether it’s public works or engineers and others, felt would be able to be charged, or collected through DCs and would support growth.
“But recognizing that we wanted to reduce the charge, we took a hard look at those projects and prioritized. Ones that created capacity, ie. water and sewer projects were a priority. A sidewalk on both sides of the street wasn’t a priority. And the list of projects that we suggest come out to get the rate down includes things like bike lanes,” he says.
Harris says staff has taken out a list of projects totalling around $30 million that would get the DCs’ rate down.
“I’ll use single-family homes as the reference point. At the March 7 meeting, the rate for single-family homes was $45,000. As a result of removing those projects that I just mentioned that charge is $31,000. Now in comparison, Huntsville [charges for a single-family home] $25,000, Gravenhurst and Bracebridge $23,000 and Orillia is $25,000,” he says.
As for the third option, Harris says it’s one that continues to collect fees and charges for water and sewer and charges DCs for anything else like roads, recreation, library and a few other services.
He says the third option’s rate for a single-family home is $22,000, lower than Huntsville, Gravenhurst, Bracebridge, and Orillia. Harris says a significant amount of effort has gone into trying to meet the development industries’ concerns while balancing the need to undertake some significant projects.
He says one of the priority projects the town has is a $7.2 million upgrade to pump station 2, which services the South side of the harbour, and all the way to the apartments being built on George St.
“We need to rebuild that pump station and put a force main to the waste treatment plant and we’re seeing development anxious to start today. So, the urgency to be able to commit and spend this money is today,” he says.
Harris says the town is also planning to meet again with the development industry to have those conversations further before the final report in June.