{"id":5426,"date":"2014-02-05T15:03:40","date_gmt":"2014-02-05T20:03:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=5426"},"modified":"2014-02-26T14:52:31","modified_gmt":"2014-02-26T19:52:31","slug":"community-improvement-plan-vision-limits-questioned-by-council","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/community-improvement-plan-vision-limits-questioned-by-council\/","title":{"rendered":"Community Improvement Plan vision, limits questioned by Council"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Whether you have been making pitches for improvements in Aurora\u2019s Downtown Core for decades, or turned on your stopwatch when Council formally retained consultants to do something about it, a Community Improvement Plan has been a long time coming, according to proponents.<\/p>\n

But last week, when Councillors and members of the public alike had their first formal crack at the extensive plan to stimulate and rejuvenate Aurora\u2019s historic business core, the vision garnered markedly mixed reviews. <\/p>\n

The Community Improvement Plan (CIP) is the result of extensive consultation with local business owners, residents in the Downtown Core, and politicians to develop a game plan to bring more people and redevelopment into the area.<\/p>\n

The result is a series of grant programs and initiatives to stimulate redevelopment and improve the looks of the area. Such programs include a fa\u00e7ade and signage improvement grant which would provide downtown businesses with up to $15,000 towards exterior improvements to their property. <\/p>\n

A Building Restoration, Renovation and Improvement Program would go towards providing a push for property owners to enhance their second floors, particularly in older businesses, for more commercial development. It would go towards funding expansions and additions and making sure it meets the grade from a health and safety perspective between $15,000 and $40,000. <\/p>\n

A Development Charges Grant would provide property owners relief on DCs for redevelopment within the Yonge and Wellington Corridor, relief of up to 75 per cent of the Town\u2019s portion of Development Charges up to $100,000. <\/p>\n

Tax-based Redevelopment Grants would give some leverage for influxes of new taxes coming into Town coffers through a redevelopment project, while a Heritage Property Relief programs would encourage redevelopment of heritage homes for commercial or mixed uses. <\/p>\n

The CIP area focuses primarily on the Yonge and Wellington corridor, running on Yonge from Valhalla Court to Dunning Avenue, and along Wellington from Harriman Road to Walton Drive, along with select side streets.<\/p>\n

Running eastward toward just west of Berczy Street, however, some Councillors questioned a seemingly arbitrary cut off point, creating a situation where next door neighbours might find themselves on either side of the CIP divide. <\/p>\n

\u201cI want to avoid any complications later on where we have one owner of a particular lot [wondering why they are not included] and we need to have a good rationale,\u201d said Councillor John Gallo. <\/p>\n

This was a problem consultant Jonathan Hack of Sierra Planning said could be addressed, but it was bound to be an arbitrary decision no matter how they approach it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t justify why we went one property in [from Berczy] and didn\u2019t go for another one,\u201d he said. \u201cWe had to cut the line off somewhere. Ultimately, at the end of the day, it is a council-public consideration as to how far you should take the boundaries. Some municipalities avoid the discussions and say the entire municipality within the urban plan area is designate as a CIP.\u201d<\/p>\n

But, as one expands the CIP area, so too expands the price tag. <\/p>\n

This came through addressing concerns from Councillor Sandra Humfryes, who said property owners at Golf Links Drive and Dunning Avenue were excited about the plan, as were property owners to the south. She questioned whether the CIP could be extended down to Edward Street. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe are dealing with limited resources,\u201d said Anthony Ierulllo, Economic Development Manager for the Town of Aurora. \u201cThe plan itself has a number of programs that have focused on key redevelopment sites, central in Downtown, or smaller sites that can benefit from some renovations in making those sites more attractive in adding to the streetscape.\u201d<\/p>\n

Councillors also said they wanted safeguards to ensure that once this program is in motion, property owners benefiting from the initiatives don\u2019t take advantage of the program by flipping the properties and making a bundle in return. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou want to make sure you are putting your funds into a stable relationship between a property owner and the Town,\u201d said Mr. Hack. \u201cIf you have a delinquent property owner who takes advantage and then sells it to a better owner, maybe you have won out in that regard. The general proposition is if someone is receiving the grant, they are doing so because they are investing in the Town.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis really is focused on leveraging the private sector [to] invest through the use of seed money from the public sector. If this plan was implemented, as I think everyone here would like, you get a ratio where every public dollar spent would get between $4 – $6 private sector dollars invested. If you do them properly, these things can be quite successful.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some of these plans, however, missed the mark, according to two members of the public appearing in the public session, including long-time trails advocate Klaus Wehrenberg. <\/p>\n

Speaking of his \u201cdisappointment\u201d with what he described as the \u201cnarrow scope\u201d of the plan, he said more needs to be done than just sprucing up the area \u2013 including ensuring Downtown Aurora is a destination for people to come to. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you don\u2019t solve that, you\u2019re not going very far with these details,\u201d he said. \u201cStorefront improvements can go a little way, but we\u2019re not going anywhere in a big way.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Whether you have been making pitches for improvements in Aurora\u2019s Downtown Core for decades, or turned on your stopwatch when Council formally retained consultants to do something about it, a Community Improvement Plan has been a long time coming, according to proponents.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1pw","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-08 01:05:03","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5426\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}