The Blue Mountains council has given a significant discount on town parkland dedication fees to a local couple trying to build their dream home.
At its meeting on April 15, council voted 6-0 in favour of reducing the parkland fee Ben and Sydney Carleton would have had to pay to build their new home on Highway 26. Council agreed to reduce the fee from an estimated $50,000 to $650.
The results of the vote were much different than the committee of the whole vote on the same matter just a week earlier. Seven days prior, as committee of the whole, council narrowly voted 3-2 to approve the fee reduction. When it came time to ratify that decision at council’s regular meeting, Mayor Andrea Matrosovs and councillor Paula Hope were on board with the discounted fee and Deputy Mayor Peter Bordignon was present and voted in favour as well. Coun. Gail Ardiel declared a conflict on the matter.
For the past four years, the Carletons have been working to split their property at Highway 26 and Camperdown Road into two parcels. They plan to sell the lot containing their existing home and construct a new home on the vacant lot. As the severance process was drawing to a close, they learned that the parkland dedication fee for their new lot would be approximately $50,000 or five per cent of the value of the lot. They subsequently appealed to council for relief. The town’s policy calls for a parkland dedication fee of up to five per cent of the value of the property. The fee is paid in lieu of an actual donation of property for parkland purposes.
At committee of the whole, council narrowly approved a fee reducing the fee to $650, which was the flat rate the town collected prior to the five per cent policy being implemented.
Prior to council’s decision, Ben Carleton spoke at the meeting and said the parkland dedication fee policy is difficult to find on the town’s website and was not explained to them until the end of the process.
“It only came up after we inquired,” he said. “It was not explained to us why we were required to pay the maximum.”
Carleton said the severance process had taken four years to complete and when they started their application the $650 flat fee for parkland dedication was the town policy. Carleton noted that they are paying full development charges on the new lot, which include $4,000 for parks and recreation. He also pointed out they had to spend $5,000 on a rezoning for the property to correct a town zoning error.
Carleton also emphasized that they are building a single house.
“We are not causing extra strain on parks. This is not a big development,” he said.
Members of council cited the town’s somewhat vague policy language of “up to five per cent” and the fact that the $650 fee was in place at the time the application began as reasons to support the request for a lower fee.
“To me, five per cent all the time is punitive,” said Bordignon.
Hope noted that the timing of the policy change in relation to when the Carleton’s application had started “had not come forward” earlier in the discussion on the issue.
“We are trying to help all kinds of families. I wish you well,” she said.
As part of the discussion, Adam Smith, the town’s director of planning and community development, said it is a priority of town staff to conduct a full review of the town’s parkland dedication policies and bring a follow up report with recommendations to council before the end of the year.
