SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
After declaring five years ago that developers would no longer get financial help to develop land to build homes, city council is poised to throw that policy out the window and offer developers a 12 per cent subsidy.
The change in policy, which will require an amendment to the Land Administration Bylaw, will be considered during a first reading vote at Monday's regular council meeting. If approved, it will allow the city to provide up to 12 per cent of the costs to develop land. The proposed amendment comes as developer Homes North negotiates a development agreement that would allow the developer to begin putting down homes this summer at its Block 501 modular project near Kam Lake Road.
The city enacted the controversial 100 per cent full-cost recovery policy in 2008, which meant that developers had to cover the entire costs of all infrastructural upgrades, including paving and parks, for their housing projects.
Some city councillors say it was an experiment that went wrong because it meant the city could not legally contribute funds to a project even if it wanted to, besides inhibiting development.
"We are a bit of a boom and bust town, and when you have an economic opportunity that presents itself, you need to be able to get land out onto the market quickly, so that we don't lose residents to other communities," said Coun. Adrian Bell.
"And that is what happened. We lost many people to northern Alberta and northern B.C. just because they couldn't build or buy."
It now appears likely the city will go back to its traditional policy of "partnering" with developers to get their projects off the ground. Coun. Cory Vanthuyne said this will allow a "fairer contribution" from the city toward development projects.
Coun. Niels Konge, who is in support of going back to subsidizing developers, said he hopes the amendment gets council's full backing next week. When asked if he thought it might make the city look like it is backtracking on its earlier full-cost recovery mission, Konge said that was a possibility.
"It could possibly be but we are a new council and I don't think we necessarily agreed with what the old council had done," he said. "I think it had caused a throwing of sticks in the spokes of development.
"I think it is going back to how it used to be where the city was responsible for paving and parks. Everything else was the responsibility of the developer."
