Another meeting of city council where city council isn’t being city council. In another instance where our favourite local government has to exercise their semi-legal powers to hear a case of accidentally assigned development charges, did the developer pay too much and whose fuzzy math is the fuzziest? Council will be the ultimate arbitrator in another edition of The Price is Right, Guelph real estate division!
NOTE #1: Since this is a hearing, there are no delegations.
NOTE #2: In addition to meeting in-person, this meeting will also be live-streamed on the City of Guelph’s website here.
Public Meeting to Hear Complaint Under Section 20 of the Development Charges Act, 1997: Development Charges Complaint for 300 Water Street – For the second time this year, city council will be acting in its capacity as a tribunal and exercising quasi-judicial power. Reminder: a development charge can be appealed if the person paying the charge feels that it was incorrectly determined, if a credit was available and not applied, and if there was an error in the application. Council then hears the complaint and can either dismiss it or correct it.
In this case, 300 Water St Inc. paid $228,552 in development charges for their townhouse development on Water Street containing six above-ground rental residential units each containing three separate bedrooms. Since there are at least four separate residential units in this development, and since all the units count as purpose-built rental, the builder believes that they are entitled to a 25 per cent reduction in DCs meaning that they should get a refund of $57,138. Council will hear from the developers and then Allison Thornton, associate solicitor for the City of Guelph, to lay out their case for keeping the money.
Guelph Politico 