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City facing $9M shortfall for future sports field needs

Mar 8, 2018 | 4:50 PM

NANAIMO — The City of Nanaimo is going to have to find another way to pay for millions of dollars worth of sports field upgrades over the next two decades.

As part of their development cost charge (DCC) review, the City proposed to partially pay for a number of future projects with money collected from developers. However, when the new proposal was sent to the province for review, the government rejected seven of the projects, saying they weren’t eligible for the DCC program.

The proposed projects, totaling more than $18.5 million, included stadium developments, several turf fields, upgrades at Gyro four fields and 10 sets of bleachers. The City’s Dale Lindsay said the DCCs would have paid for roughly half of the total cost, leaving the City at least $9 million short.

When asked where that money would come from, Lindsay said “That would have to come from general revenue…taxation.”

Coun. Bill Bestwick called the matter “extremely important” because of the amount of money involved. He said the whole point of the DCC program was to pay for future infrastructure needs related to development and population growth.

“It puts a huge strain, just in this one area alone, on our taxpayers. Our growth annually…won’t come anywhere near to pay for these kinds of things and beyond,” Bestwick said. “We have facilities that are already past their due date…I think this is really, really concerning and I don’t know where the monies are going to come from.”

Lindsay said based on the way staff interpreted the legislation, they believed the projects were eligible to be funded by DCCs, however the province disagreed. He said Council could challenge the province on the matter, but that would further delay the adoption of a new DCC program which has seen numerous hold-ups.

Coun. Bill Yoachim said he found the province’s ruling “quite alarming.”

None of the projects disqualified from the funding are part of the City’s five-year financial plan. They are upgrades the City predicted would be needed to service population growth over the next 25 years. When it comes time to include the projects in actual budgets, Lindsay said they’ll have to find other ways to fund them.

The new DCC bylaw is one vote away from adoption, with only Bestwick voting against the three readings Monday night.

Council resolved to send a motion to the next UBCM convention, asking the municipal body to call on the province to review how it chooses projects which can be included in DCC programs.

DCCs are collected from developers at the beginning of projects and assigned to pay for things like roads, sewers and parkland.

 

 

dom@nanaimonewsnow.com

On Twitter: @domabassi