The Wellington Community Association and the Wellington-on-the-Lake Citizens for Responsible Growth hosted the meeting August 12. Councillors in attendance included Chris Braney, Corey Engelsdorfer, David Harrison, Brad Nieman, Phil St-Jean, and John Hirsch.

The star of the show was the WCA’s legal counsel, municipal lawyer Andrew Biggart, who came to warn residents about what he called the “sheer recklessness” of Shire Hall’s waterworks plans.

The meeting addressed complaints about the County’s failure to answer questions or offer information about ongoing, and expensive, waterworks renewal.

Many speakers noted they were unable or unwilling to read lengthy, complex reports. Most prominent was the fear that there is in fact no development underway in the County — and none to come.

“If development doesn’t come, our water rates could double or triple,” said the WCA’s Jennifer Armstrong, who questioned growth estimates employed by CIMA engineers and did her own math instead, to suggest the population of Wellington will remain virtually unchanged for the next three decades.

According to Watson’s current estimate of a 1.1% growth rate, she said, Wellington’s 1970 or so residents would swell by just 648 over 30 years. At that rate, she concluded, “we are building waterworks for a population 150 years away.” 

In fact, Watson projects 9,700 new residents for the County over the next 30 years, most concentrated in Wellington and Picton. 

Ms. Armstrong warned that “if building does not occur, costs will fall on all of us.” 

Helen Prolas, of the Citizens for Responsible Government, also suggested no development was either underway or on the way. “6000 ratepayers are going to be paying $200 million,” she said.

“Then they won’t have any money left over, so all the shops will fail.”

Biggart Boggled

Mr. Biggart noted, “the current Council, Mayor and CAO resist all my requests for information,” despite the fact that all the reports and studies the County has carried out are available on its website. All current development applications are available on its applications portal.

Nonetheless, he felt informed enough to charge, “they’ve turned on its head the way things are supposed to work” in municipal infrastructure financing.

“Normally developers pay for development, except the County seems to be operating as a developer in and of itself — but without any benefits for paying ahead of time.

“It boggles my mind why a municipality would pay a quarter billion dollars for development when the developer should be the one paying for it from the beginning,” he said, perhaps unaware that the municipality is creating development charges frameworks in the wake of engineering recommendations on the best infrastructure, and has already entered into front-ending agreements with developers.

Mr. Biggart had reviewed the County’s two development charges agreements with Kaitlin Corp. These set a schedule for interim servicing and up-front payments.

“If you are going to become a developer, you must make darn sure you are going to get reimbursed. I’ve seen no evidence at all that this municipality has in any way secured a guarantee of repayment,” he said.

The  pre-payment agreements with Kaitlin require the developer to post securities equal to 20% of the estimated charge for the entire approved subdivision lands, $20.5 million. Kaitlin has put up $4 million in securities. Development charges payable by Kaitlin for their first phase subdivision agreement come to $6.5 million, due by September 2024. That agreement is legally binding.

Alexandra De Gasperis, Vice President at DECO Communities, one of Base31’s Community Partners, and a former municipal lawyer, worried, “there has been a significant misrepresentation of the facts surrounding this infrastructure project, which can lead to fear mongering.”

“If Mr. Biggart knows anything about municipal law, then he will know that every municipality makes decisions the way the County is making them and there is nothing improper about what the County is doing, nor is it overleveraging itself.

“A municipality has a responsibility to ensure their infrastructure is in good repair and upgrade their systems as required, especially as they plan for growth.”

She was also puzzled at the denial of development in PEC. “I find it hard to understand why there is worry that growth is not coming, when there are so many development applications already underway in the County” 

She noted current applications for 14,500 units, 8000 of which are in the advanced stages of the approval process.

“Just come look at what is happening at Base31,” she said. 

“I assure you, the shovels are in the ground. 

“We have heard loud and clear that housing and social infrastructure is needed. We have every intention of providing it. We are fully prepared to upfront the development charges required to pay for the infrastructure we need to make it happen.” 

The Gazette fact checked the claims made at this meeting. For the results, see the Waterworks Fact Check. 

Ed note: this article has been amended to show the correct name of the community group Wellington On The Lake Citizens for Responsible Growth.