After numerous attempts to review and refine the development levies for the City of Weyburn, the new charges were approved by council at their Jan. 22 meeting.
The policy for the city’s off-site development levy has come before council a number of times over the past few months, and was sent back for tweaking, with councillors Jeff Chessall and Jeff Richards assisting with the final adjustments to the policy.
“It took some time to get this together, but I think it’s a format that will work,” said Coun. Chessall.
“We did run some scenarios to look at, and this was a lot more reasonable for the developers,” added Coun. Richards.
One of the biggest changes to the policy was the per-square-foot charge of $12.27 for a development, which had been charged even if no additional demand was made to the city’s water and sewer system. This charge will now be $1.75 per square foot, or $76,440 per acre of development area.
The definition of a development area in the policy includes any proposed structures or buildings, any required parking areas, and any proposed walkways, driveways, interior roadways and any access to interior roadways or parking lots.
Any undeveloped area of the site which is enclosed in a fenced structure or landscaped is not included in a development area and won’t be charged for.
The charges for development for residential properties is $76,440 per acre for the development of single family housing over 0.2 acres, or $15,287 per dwelling unit for low density housing which is 0.2 acres or less, or $76,440 per acre for the development area, plus $8,331 per additional dwelling unit for multi-residential housing.
For commercial, industrial or institutional developments, the same per-acre charge applies for area over 0.2 acres, or $15,287 for areas of 0.2 acres or less, or $1.75 per square foot where no subdivision of land is required. The charge for commercial accommodation will apply the same as for multi-residential housing.
In other council business, Coun. Chessall asked city manager Roy Hardy about the possibility of live-streaming council meetings. Currently, they are broadcast live by Access on the community channel, and are taped for rebroadcast later.
The city is in talks with a company that provides software to municipalities, said Hardy, and they are looking at what would be needed to live-stream the council meetings on the city’s website.
He said this will involve working with Access as well. The software would enable any member of the public to view a council meeting, or to go to a specific discussion within a meeting if they only had interest in what was said on a particular issu
