City Hall is exploring the implementation of a Community Benefits Charges By-Law that would see developers in Thorold pay an extra fee—of four percent of the value of land—if their proposed projects have five storeys or more and a minimum of 10 units.
The proposal was launched by councillor Fred Neale at Tuesday’s city council meeting.
“St. Catharines has already done this,” he told fellow councillors. “They have a whole list of new charges for developers to help build complete communities.”
Councillor Carmen DeRose applauded the idea but had some questions concerning the size of the buildings that the by-law would apply to.
“I don’t think there’s many developments of this nature so I’m just wondering if it could be reduced in the expectation of the size of it,” he said. “If you think about it, how many new developments in Thorold are going to be five storeys or more?”
Maria Mauro, the city’s Director of Finance, clarified that the Community Benefit Charge is a provincially legislated item, and therefore the size of the buildings it applies to can not be changed.
“We have had this on the radar for a number of years,” she told council members. “We have not brought it forward because of the fact that perhaps these type of developments may be a few years away. Staff’s plan is to include the study in the 2023 budget in anticipation of these types of buildings going forward in the next few years.”
The proposed 16 Ormond St S development was given as an example by councillor Neale of a building that would fall under the by-law. That project entails a six-storey building with 40 units.
Councillor Neale warned that many more buildings of this size could be coming to Thorold.
“The legislation from the province on the affordable housing side of things, according to Ford, is that he wants these types of buildings built in all the different neighbourhoods in Thorold and elsewhere,” he said. “I think we need to have this in place and I agree maybe we could change the legislation and drop it down a story or whatever, that would be great. But at the moment this is the legislation and I like to see it put in place.”
A report on the matter will be brought forward to council at a later date.
