City of Burlington takes steps to stimulate residential development for a two-year period

The City of Burlington wants to re-start residential construction in a stalled market with the hope of becoming the first municipality in Ontario to temporarily eliminate residential development charges.

If the plan moves forward, it would eliminate the fees for a two-year period, and hopefully entice developers to build.

Burlington Mayor Marianne Meed-Ward said the city has a total of seven housing starts this year.

There are not many cranes in the sky building homes in Burlington. A condo project on Fairview Street currently under construction was sold three years ago but now there is nothing being built.

“In fact we just had a condo project on Appleby Line cancelled, they don’t have the buyers, they can’t make it work, ”the mayor said.

The City of Burlington is now taking next steps to temporarily eliminate residential development charges for a two-year period, all in an effort to stimulate residential building.

The group currently building the project on Fairview Street said this is the first time in the company’s 60 year history it has no new projects set to go. Thirty per cent of of the total price of any home is usually taxes and fees.

“There are no sales happening right now, we need consumer confidence back now in a big way, and we need all three levels of government to step up immediately,” , Vince Molinaro, with the Molinaro Group said.

If passed by council, the City of Burlington will be the first in Ontario to temporarily pause 100 per cent of the development fees in residential construction.

“Right now there are virtually no sales happening in Burlington and Southern Ontario and housing starts have falling off the cliff. so this is less about the home builders and more about the thousand of people’s who are employed in this sector,” said Michael Collins-Williams, chief executive officer of the West End Home Builders’ Association.

The City of Burlington received $6.9 million in development fees last year. The mayor says they are counting on the province and federal governments to make up the shortfall.

“We are not in normal times, we are in a crisis and we have to behave that way,” said the mayor.

CHCH News  did reach out to the province to see if there are plans to make up the funds the City of Burlington won’t be getting. We  did not hear back by deadline.

Burlington City Council will vote on this next week.

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