Town to explore new off-site levies in new year

By John Watson Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Taking a pre-emptive response to significant future growth within the town, Strathmore’s town council has opened discussions regarding the implementation of new off-site levies. 

Mayor Pat Fule submitted the notice of motion during the Dec. 10 meeting to grant authority to charge levies (soft levies) for new or expanded community recreation, fire hall, police station, and library facilities.

“The Town of Strathmore has not previously charged soft levies for development within the town … and council recognizes that growth will have a significant financial impact to the town,” he said. “The town is looking for opportunities to mitigate the financial impact of growth on existing residents and businesses. Soft levies will mitigate the capital costs associated with growth on existing residents and businesses.”

“Soft levies” are a type of off-site levy which are charged by a given municipality to real estate developers to fund services infrastructure. They function as a condition of subdivision or development approvals. 

Generated funds are subject to be allocated to the capital costs of maintaining existing or developing new community infrastructure in order to support population growth.

Fule suggested to direct town administration to return to the Committee of the Whole, Jan. 14, with a report relating to the potential development of bylaw amendments relating to soft levies and their applications.

Additionally, administration would be to return with a proposed implementation plan for the soft levies.

“I think this is just a way for us to look at ways to help us. I think many of us ran on managing the growth and there is a definite situation where our town is going to grow quickly and this will help us be able to capture soft levies, capture funding for the things that we will need to build and create as fat as our rapid growth for residents,” said Fule. 

“I also campaigned on this. I think we need to grow prudently; I think we need to mitigate our future growth and make sure that our current taxpayers are not subsidizing the future residents as much as possible. I think that this goes a long way,” added Coun. Brent Wiley. 

CAO Kevin Scoble clarified the timeline suggested by the motion is to be able to provide council with information relating to the proposed levies for their strategic planning session in January. 

He added under the Municipal Government Act, this type of off-site levy became an option for municipalities in 2018, though does not see much implementation, as it may be interpreted by developers as a disincentive to investment by the private sector in new developments.

“Clearly, the developers might not be the biggest fans of this, and certainly it is going to increase the cost of new home development in Strathmore, so there (are) definitely some negative side effects to it,” said Wiley. “Alternatively, what it means then is that current residents are paying, for example, a new fire hall, even though the one we have meets the capacity of the town right now. The example would be taxes go up for current residents to pay for the development of a new fire hall that is going to be servicing new residents.”

Council passed the notice of motion unanimously to have the discussion return in the new year.