Secondary suites removed from bylaw

Shannon LeClair
Times Reporter

 

A bylaw to remove the allowance of secondary suites in its entirety from the Land Use Bylaw (LUB) was presented to council at the March 4 meeting.
Werner Fischer, with the Town of Strathmore planning and development department, suggested by removing it now, then in the future secondary suites could become allowable on a site-by-site basis as an amendment. Also by removing it from the LUB, it will give administration and the planning department time to come up with a strategy on how to deal with them.
Fischer said he was looking for council direction. He mentioned there have been some inquiries about secondary suites, and that the planning department was trying to look at different possibilities on how to make things work.
“I think the better way to manage this, especially in new subdivisions, is at the time you register the subdivision and/or zone the property you do an overlay and say these properties are eligible and let that be driven by the developer, rather than having it as a discretionary use in all the districts and then having issues between the developer and the builders,” said Fischer.
There is the potential that in a few month’s time the discussion of secondary suites will be brought back to council with more direction on how to move forward with them.