Niagara’s Regional Council Votes To Extend Big-Dollar “ Incentives” For Developers

And In A Year When Niagara Homeowners Face Another Big Hike In Their Property Taxes, Guess Who’s Going To Pay For Them?

A News Commentary by Doug Draper at Niagara At Large

Posted October 3^rd, 2024 on Niagara At Large

At this past September 26^th’s meeting of Niagara Regional Council, the Council voted overwhelmingly to extend financial “incentives” aimed at making it more financially attractive for developers to build housing in the region.

It is an incentive program (known more formally as the ‘Smart Growth Regional Development Charges Reduction Program’) that may also continue placing more of a financial burden on existing homeowners and renters at a time when many are already struggling to cover the cost of property taxes that, for at least the last two years at the Regional government level, have been rising above the rate of inflation.

“We are looking at an eight percent increase in (property) taxes now,” said Fort Erie Regional Councillor Tom Insinna who wondered out loud at the September 26^th meeting if an extension of the incentive system would force the council to cut resources and personal from its existing services in an effort to keep that tax hike down.

“If it (the incentive program) was for (developing homes on (abandoned industrial) brownfields or for affordable housing, I wouldn’t have a problem with it,” Insinna said. “But everything else (i.e. high-end vanity or luxury homes and condos) gets thrown in there.”

Insinna was one of only five dissenters on the Regional Council who voted NO to a motion tabled by St. Catharines Mayor and Regional Council Mat Siscoe and seconded by Niagara Falls Mayor Regional Councillor Jim Diodati to extend the incentive system.

The others who voted NO were St. Catharines Regional Councillors Haley Bateman and Brian Heit, Welland Regional Councillor Leanna Villella and Niagara-on-the-Lake Lord Mayor and Regional Councillor Gary Zalepa.

The motion to extend the incentives was passed after the Council heard from two Niagara residents who argued against them, except in cases where they can be used to encourage more affordable housing or building on abandoned brownfields.

Herb Sawatzky, who spoke to the Council as a resident of Pelham but who is also known to many fellow residents across the region as a leading member of group of climate activists called 50by30 Niagara, told Regional councillors it is his understanding that “it is not the job of developers to build affordable housing.”

Concerned that the incentives for developers will cost current property tax payers tens-of-millions of dollars, Sawatzky added that “it should not be my job as a taxpayer to guarantee their profits.”

“I don’t know about you,” he continued about the rising costs of housing for younger people and others who are working to get on their feet in Niagara. “but my wife and I could not buy our home today.

Dennis Edell, a St. Catharines resident and member of the Coalition for a Better St. Catharines, told Regional Councillors that “taxpayers in Niagara are burdened enough by rising costs.”

It is one thing to subsidize affordable housing, but “subsidizing luxury condo development (and the like) has no social value,” he said. It would be putting the interests of those who build high-end development above the interests of “struggling homeowners.”

Notwithstanding the concerns raised by Sawatzky and Edell, a majority of Regional Councillors voted to continue providing a welcome mat, at least the next 18 months (until April 1st, 2026), for developers to apply for financial incentives on a hope and a prayer that it will result in the building of more housing.

Citing high interest rates and other costs he said are discouraging developers from building, Siscoe said “now is not the time” to end the incentive program.

Siscoe insisted that, over time, taxes raised from new development will more than cover any burden the incentives may current property taxpayers now.

“The return on investment (from the incentives) is exponential,” agreed fellow St. Catharines Regional Councillor Sal Sorrento, “so I am definitely going to be supporting this. …. We will get a ton of money back.”

But wait a minute. These incentives have been in place across the region for some time. So if Sorrento is right, shouldn’t our Regional government be getting a ton of money back now?

And if it is, where is all that money going and what accounts for this being third year in a row where the Region is looking at a tax hike on its portion of the property taxes of some eight per cent – well over current rate of inflation.

What will Regional Councillors do, if much of anything, in an effort to reduce that tax hike – cut funding to other services like waste collection and road maintenance? Raise user fees even higher for water and wastewater services?

What about public transit, a service the Regional Council spent an inordinate amount of time trying to nickel and diming during last year’s budget deliberations?

I know this is coming from the cheap seats, but what about using some of the money the Region might have if it didn’t give  away in incentives to developers to significantly expand our public transit system and make it more affordable for younger people who can’t afford a car and older people who can no longer drive one?

Would that not possibly be a better a better investment of funds at a time when we should be working with other regions across the country and world to shift to more public transit and fewer cars on the road to address the climate crisis?

Instead, we can only wait and see how much of the incentives developers receive in the months ahead go to more vanity homes and low-density urban sprawl.

Regional councillors should not be surprised if Niagara residents feel that the interests of developers are getting more favourable attention from them and  from other levels of government than preserving what is left of our green lands and the building communities that are more affordable for the rest of us, and more conducive to preserving what is left of our green places and fighting climate change.

• Doug Draper, Niagara At Large

One Brief After Thought – Instead of financial incentives for developers, how about incentives for people who want to rent or buy a home? More on that on another day.

For a related story posted recently on Niagara At Large, click on – https://niagaraatlarge.com/2024/09/26/out-of-control-rent-forces-workers-to-use-a-large-portion-of-their-income-on-housing/

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