City Hall is looking to cash in.
As the eighth-fastest growing municipality, the City of Thorold is a hot spot for developers, but the city feels that they have not been paying their dues.
City Hall sets a fee for every step of the planning process, but these fees have not been reviewed since 2015, so now the city is looking to increase them.
“Recovering costs through application fees minimizes taxpayer dollars subsidizing private development applications,” writes City Hall, in a report, which outlines the new fee structure.
The proposed increases vary and can run up to over $20,000.
For example, while an official plan amendment fee is currently set at $7,410, the city is looking to hike it up to $26,746. A site plan control application, meanwhile, currently costs $4,850 but would go up to $25,440.
Then there is also a wide variety of new fees such as a quarry application which will run a developer $50,865. Resubmissions of proposed plans will also see hefty fees attached.
The matter was discussed during a City Council meeting on February 25, where Director of Development Services Jason Simpson said that the fee increases will help the city recoup costs incurred when processing planning applications.
“In the planning division we’ve been severely underfunded over the years,” he explained. “This is an attempt to rectify that. It is a significant increase at this moment in time, given that the length of time it’s been since the last review. But we’re hoping to monitor it more regularly moving forward.”
Councillor Anthony Longo asked if the fee increases would help stabilize the planning department's staffing issues.
As ThoroldToday reported, more than 50 per cent of positions within the planning department are currently vacant.
“These fees will not have an impact on the workload of staff,” answered Simpson. “It’s simply going to reduce the burden on the taxpayers.”
Councillor Ken Sentance asked how the new planning fees square up with other municipalities.
“The fee structure varies quite significantly throughout local municipalities,” said Simpson. “With this new fee structure we’ll be closer to the top end.”
It is the city’s intention to instate the fees by May 1st so they have ample time to communicate with developers about the changes.