Calgary Minute: Rezoning Approved, New Communities, and Access Fee Delays

Calgary Minute - Your weekly one-minute summary of Calgary politics

This Week In Calgary:

• The Community Development Committee will meet on Wednesday at 9:30 am. The Committee will receive a progress update on the Home is Here: The City of Calgary’s Housing Strategy 2024-2030 before voting on a bylaw to establish a Council Advisory Committee on Housing. Also on the agenda is a discussion about the Secondary Suite Incentive Program - qualified homeowners can receive up to $10,000 for registering a secondary suite, with an additional $5,000 for suites that meet accessibility standards, and up to $1,250 for energy efficiency improvements. In its first year, the program plans to incentivize up to 3,000 suites, aiming to increase registrations by 50% over 2023 levels.
  
  
• On Thursday, at 9;30 am, there will be a meeting of the Audit Committee. No agenda is available for this meeting yet. Later in the day, at 1:00 pm, there will be a meeting of the Calgary Planning Commission. The agenda includes several land use amendments. Finally, to end the week, the Infrastructure and Planning Committee will meet at 9:30 am on Friday. No agenda is available for this meeting yet.
  
  
• The City and the Province are engaged in a disagreement over the responsibility for cleaning up an abandoned encampment near the community of Dover. The City asserts that the cleanup falls under provincial jurisdiction due to the encampment's location near Deerfoot Trail, while the Province maintains that it is the City's responsibility. As of yet, neither side has cleaned up the mess…

Last Week In Calgary:

• Following weeks of debate and extensive public feedback, Council voted 9-6 to approve the amended citywide rezoning bylaw. The decision followed a record-setting public hearing where Council deliberated for 12 days and 100 hours, marking the City's lengthiest public hearing. A total of 736 speakers participated, with 227 supporting, 458 opposing, and 51 remaining neutral regarding the bylaw. Additionally, the City received 6,101 submissions, and over 50,000 individuals tuned in to the livestream. Mayor Gondek, along with Councillors Carra, Dhaliwal, Mian, Penner, Pootmans, Spencer, Walcott, and Wyness were in favour, while Councillors Chabot, Chu, Demong, McLean, Sharp, and Wong voted against the proposal.
  
  
• The Infrastructure and Planning Committee evaluated seven applications to expand the City’s outskirts through new community developments, but Administration recommended advancing only four based on criteria such as land supply and infrastructure needs. Despite some Council members advocating for all proposals to be accepted to increase housing supply, only those for Belvedere, Hotchkiss, Lewisburg, and Huxley were approved. These four developments are expected to provide 18,677 new homes, though they come with significant capital costs and would require continued investment. The proposals, pending final Council approval, will be included in budget deliberations. What happened to being in a housing emergency?
  
  
• The City said it anticipates a delay in implementing changes to local access fees (LAFs) beyond the January 2025 target set by the Province. The Province’s Bill 19 aims to standardize LAFs across municipalities by requiring that the fees not be linked to the default electricity rate, but instead be associated with consumption levels or calculated as a proportion of transmission and distribution costs. Despite previous plans by Council to adopt a new LAF formula, a recent update heard by the Executive Committee suggests a timeline of 13 to 25 months for these changes. Challenges such as legal interpretations, negotiations with utility companies, and regulatory approvals were cited for the anticipated delay. It's amazing how quickly Council seems to be able to raise taxes and fees, but how long it seems to take them to reduce fees, isn't it?

-----

Donate:

Common Sense Calgary doesn't accept any government funding and never will. We think you should be free to choose, for yourself, which organizations to support. If you're in a position to contribute financially, you can make a donation here.

-----

Share:

If you're not in a position to donate, we understand, but if you appreciate our work, you can help by spreading our message. Please email this post to your friends, share it on Facebook or Twitter, and help make sure every Calgarian knows what's really going on at City Hall.