Town returns debate over garden and garage suites
By John Watson Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Town of Strathmore Committee of the Whole reviewed and discussed the Land Use Amending Bylaw 24-14, being the Garden and Garage Suites bylaw during the April 9 meeting in council chambers.
Though no decision was made, as the matter will have to be brought before council, town staff will prepare a land use bylaw amendment following the processes outlined in the Municipal Government Act.
Council will be required to hold a public hearing with respect to the proposed bylaw prior to giving second and third readings.
Coun. Denise Peterson expressed concerns regarding the existing bylaw and requested a confirmation that proposals for shifts and changes would not represent a blanket rezoning similar to instances of such occurring in Calgary.
Chuck Proctor, manager of development services for the Town of Strathmore, confirmed during the discussion this would not be the case.
Currently, members of the public are able to apply for a discretionary use development permit for garden and garage suites through the town.
Council’s ongoing discussion is whether to remove that annotation from the bylaws and have decisions fall before council on a site-by-site basis whether to approve development permits for these types of accessory dwellings.
“I would be comfortable with discretionary use regarding this issue; my feeling is with the land availability that we have and the subdivisions that are coming on stream and the multi-unit housing that is also coming on stream, and with the number of people who have applied for these and been interested in these being solo, to me it seems to lend itself to more of a site-specific approval with council being more involved as far as how neighbourhoods go,” said Mayor Pat Fule.
Coun. Melissa Langmaid iterated she has heard concerns from residents largely surrounding parking and potential overcrowding in neighbourhoods, however, argued against removing the annotation as a discretionary use from the bylaw due to the low number of applications received by the town to develop garden and garage suites.
In town, locations where garden and garage suites would be allowed to be developed are the same places where secondary suites are allowed.
“Removing garden and garage suites does not entirely resolve this apparent issue of increasing population and increasing the density of our communities, it just removes a housing option is all we are doing,” said Langmaid. “I also hear the discussion about additional housing units coming into the community, particularly multi-family units such as apartment buildings, but what that does not address for me is that garden and garage suites fill a specific niche and a specific housing need in our community that a multi-unit housing option does not necessarily include.”
The debate will return before the town prior to being voted on as to whether annotation allowing for Garden and Garage suite applications will remain part of the bylaw.