South Frontenac Council - Jan. 12/10

Wilma Kenny | Jan 14, 2010

CONSTRUCTION ACTIVITY 2000-2009: A summary of the last decade’s construction activity, which includes single and seasonal family dwellings, agricultural and commercial buildings, renovations, garages, woodstoves, decks, pools, fences and demolitions showed that 2009 wasn’t as much of a slump as had been feared. Overall construction value, at $24.5 million, was slightly above the 10-year average and well above 2006's $18.8 million. The actual number of new dwellings, however, was the lowest in the decade, and the last half of the decade has seen fewer new seasonal residences than were constructed in the first half.

During the last five years 629 new woodstoves have been installed: possibly a comment on the rising price of fuel?

PROCESS FOR CHANGING COUNCIL COMPOSITION: Councilor David Hahn brought a motion outlining the process by which council could change its composition. This was in response to a motion brought forward and later withdrawn last month by Councilor John Fillion. It would have limited Bedford district to one representative on council. Fillion was not present at the Jan 12 meeting. After some discussion and one modification, Council passed a resolution stating that, in order to change the composition of council, three criteria would have to be met: 1) five votes would have to support the change; 2) one representative from each district would also have to support it, and 3) there would have to be widespread public consultation with the voters, including one public meeting, before the proposal could come to council for decision.

LAST-MINUTE BID FOR FUNDING FOR THE POINT: FedDev Ontario has launched an intake for applications under the Community Adjustment Fund in Southern Ontario, with the deadline of 3 pm next Monday Jan. 18. Council agreed "to direct staff to proceed with preparing an application for the development of The Point in Sydenham." There was some concern because the development plan was still in early stages, and has not been passed through the recreation committees. However, both Mayor Gary Davison and CAO Wayne Orr assured council that should the grant be awarded to the township, the project could be developed, fine-tuned, and if necessary scaled back, as long as all work was completed by the end of March 2011. Both cautioned that there was a very slim chance that South Frontenac’s application would be accepted, as there is expected to be a lot of competition for the money. All members of council agreed that they didn’t want to pass up an opportunity, however slim, of a grant that would pay 90% of project costs. The application will be for over $2 million, of which the township would have to pay only $212,000. This would come from reserve funds.

ZONING BY-LAW AMENDMENTS: Several non-contentious zoning by-law applications passed through public meeting and approval stages with minimum comment.