Grey County is considering a major road swap and download arrangement with its member municipalities.
At its meeting on Oct. 10, council received a staff report from the county’s Urban Road and Road Exchange Task Force. The report recommends the county begin negotiations on a multi-million dollar download and swap of roads across the local region.
A download would involve the county handing over responsibility for ownership, road maintenance, repairs, and rebuilding to a municipality for select roads currently owned and maintained by the county.
Should the plan proceed, 51.23 kilometres of county roads in urban centres would be downloaded to eight of the nine municipalities in Grey. Only the Township of Georgian Bluffs would not receive any county road under the move.
The report also recommends a swap of several county and lower-tier municipal roads in rural areas.
County staff also recommend that lower-tier municipalities receiving county roads back under the plan get financial support from the county for road maintenance over a 10-year period.
Staff emphasized that the road downloads would require new agreements with each lower-tier municipality to proceed.
Staff explained that the purpose of the urban road download is to get county roads that have local water and sewage infrastructure underneath them back into the control of local municipalities. Staff noted that this has been a point of frustration over the years with the public and local municipalities.
The county has been looking at its road system for more than a decade, although little has changed in that time.
“This has been going on for quite a long time,” said Pat Hoy, the county’s director of transportation.
Under the proposal these municipalities would receive the following number of kilometres of road from the county:
- The Blue Mountains - 5.65 km
- Chatsworth - 0.37 km
- Grey Highlands - 4.15 km
- Hanover - 10.44 km
- Meaford - 3.62 km
- Owen Sound - 14.94 km
- Southgate - 2.73 km
- West Grey - 9.33 km
The report projects that the county would send $23,252,741 in support to the municipalities over ten years to assist with the costs of assuming the roads. Including (the figures vary by year and would gradually go down over the ten years):
- The Blue Mountains - $2,598,661
- Chatsworth - $154,647
- Grey Highlands - $2,000,212
- Hanover - $4,715,999
- Meaford - $1,438,045
- Owen Sound - $7,260,040
- Southgate - $1,328,144
- West Grey - $3,756,994
Hoy said the financial numbers were projections and could change depending on the agreements between the individual municipality and the county.
In addition to the downloading of the urban roads, the report also recommends a road swap between the county and multiple local municipalities for roads in the rural areas. The road swap would see the county assume sections of local roads that would better integrate into the county system. Local municipalities would then take on sections of county roads in the swap.
The swap would impact Southgate (side road 11 for a portion of Grey Road 14), West Grey (concession 12 for portions of Grey Road 9), Chatsworth/West Grey (Bentick-Sullivan townline for a portion of Grey Road 25) and Georgian Bluffs and Chatsworth (the county would take over Georgian Bluffs concession 5 and Chatsworth concession 6).
The report estimates that the urban downloads would save the county $1,007,607 per year in operating costs. On the other side of the ledger, the rural swap would cost the county $2,155,880 in annual operating and capital costs annually.
Overall, the plan would cost the county $1,148,273 per year.
“That’s kind of our starting point. We feel like it’s a relatively reasonable number,” said Hoy.
Grey Highlands Deputy Mayor Dane Nielsen asked why the urban download included county financial support over a period of 10 years to assist with the transition, while the rural swap of roads did not.
Deputy CAO Randy Scherzer explained that in the rural areas, the county is proposing a swap of roads, while in the urban areas it’s a straight download of responsibilities.
Grey Highlands Mayor Paul McQueen said figuring out the financial details was the key to moving the project forward.
“The bottom line is the budget. It comes down to the bottom line of what our taxpayers can afford,” he said.
Owen Sound Mayor Ian Boddy said the county has been looking at the issue for many years and it was time to get something done on the file.
“None of us are going to be 100 per cent happy, ever,” said Boddy. “You’ve got to think about the whole picture. It’s been 12 years, it’s time to move it forward.”
Council ultimately voted to accept and receive the report, however a clause in the resolution directing staff to include the $1.1 million estimated cost increase for the plan in the draft 2025 budget was removed and councillors felt it was premature, considering the discussions and negotiations that must happen with local municipalities.
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