One topic that arose at various times, in various debates during budget deliberations at city hall over the past two weeks was the city’s lack of available, developable land.
The city is attempting to address that in several ways.
First, councillors agreed to spend $200,000 on a land needs assessment - a tool that could pave the way for the city to acquire much-needed land in neighbouring townships.
Secondly, more than $2.8 million was committed to getting the next phase of the Horne Business Park in west Orillia open.
And, lastly, after a contentious debate, a majority of councillors voted to increase, by $150,000, the amount going into the Downtown Tomorrow Community Improvement Plan (DTCIP) Reserve that funds the grant program.
That increase means a total of $375,000 is being invested in that reserve - some of which, for the first time, will be used to incent developers to breathe new life into brownfields.
Land Needs Assessment
City councillors earmarked $200,000 to hire a consultant for its land needs assessment.
Such a study will “take a look at whether the city has an adequate amount of land to accommodate its population allocation as noted in the growth plan by 2041 as well as an adequate amount of land to accommodate its employment land needs,” said Ian Sugden, the city’s director of development services and engineering.
The study was underway when the provincial government changed. As a result of that, the project was suspended.
“They asked everybody to stop work until they came up with their new methodology on land needs analysis,” said Sugden.
He said he hopes the study will be completed in 2020 “and we could then start to look for lands around us that could be suitable.”
What is suitable? “In order to choose those lands you have to make sure they’re actually developable and they are not layered with constraints such as wetlands or endangered species habitat or slopes are too great … so we need some technical advice on that.”
The cost of the study will be paid from the development charges reserve account; in other words, the costs will be recovered by future development.
Horne Business Park Expansion
Councillors gave the green light to spend $2.82 million to create about 10 acres of serviced employment lands along a new roadway off of Swinimer Drive, across from Rotary Place.
That price tag includes grading two parcels of land for the Hydro One development, grading the remainder of the area and the installation of utilities including looping the watermain to Harview Settlement Road, a sidewalk and roadway.
City staff estimate the lands will sell for $220,000 per acre, resulting in a revenue of $5.34 million.
CIP Grants
Since 2018, the city has allocated $225,000 to the DTCIP reserve. This year, that contribution was increased by $150,000.
In the past few years, this reserve was used to fund development in the downtown core for projects such as façade improvements, signage, feasibility studies, building improvements and the creation of residential units.
While that program will continue, in 2020, the next phase of the CIP program - brownfield development - will be unveiled.
Richard Bertolo, the city’s director of business development, said the program, to date, has been a “tremendous success.”
He urged city councillors to endorse the extra contribution so the city could move into the next phase of incentives.
He said the idea is to “build that reserve” because “there’s going to be potential demand for all the brownfield sites we have in Orillia.”
Bertolo said “this is fundamental” to developing those brownfields. Not financially supporting the program “is is cutting off a growth path potentially that is going to have ramifications for an awful lot of development that has been targeted for the downtown core.”
In the end, councillors agreed to the increased funding.
All decisions made during budget deliberations are subject to ratification at special meeting of council Monday night.
