It was interesting to hear Councillor (Cam) McLennan demand, as he did at the Sidney council meeting Feb. 26, that residents understand “the economics” of development proposals on Beacon Avenue before they criticize developers’ requests for additional floors for their projects.
Mr. McLennan seems to believe that unless we grant variances to add additional floors to developments on our main street, development proposals will simply dry up because they won’t be profitable.
Factors that determine profitability are complex, of course, but Mr. McLennan especially left out a crucial detail.
He and the rest of council, not the residents, had a chance to level the development playing field with a Downtown Revitalization Tax Exemption long before Monday night.
The tax exemption, which he and a majority of council defeated, was part of the Town’s Strategic Plan and would have allowed developers to get a tax exemption as a “carrot”, to quote a council member, “to do what the community wants to see” done.
The exemption would have functioned to ensure that a development proposal meets the community’s needs, for example, to comply with the new streetscape guidelines.
If so, we may never have had to be in the contentious place we were in on Monday night, dividing residents and council members against each other.
With the tax exemption, a profitable four-story design may have been possible for the Fourth and Bevan site.
Mr. McLennan and others on council should stop blaming the short-sightedness of residents and take a close look at themselves and the decision-making process they are engendering.
The tax exemption issue is but one example of a number of failures in all of us to take responsibility for our own short-sightedness, be better informed, sincerely listen to our critics and work together for the betterment of our Town.
Bob Carey
Sidney