{"id":9244,"date":"2014-12-10T13:03:18","date_gmt":"2014-12-10T18:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=9244"},"modified":"2014-12-23T22:37:36","modified_gmt":"2014-12-24T03:37:36","slug":"council-should-take-another-look-at-buying-historic-property-abel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/council-should-take-another-look-at-buying-historic-property-abel\/","title":{"rendered":"Council should take another look at buying historic property: Abel"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Securing properties in Aurora\u2019s Downtown Core will be an integral component in revitalizing the business area, according to John Abel.<\/p>\n<p>Councillor Abel will put forward a notice of motion at next week\u2019s Council meeting calling on the Town to take a second look at purchasing two historic properties located on Yonge Street, two of three components that were brought forward to Council in the last term in the Hillary-McIntyre Park proposal.<\/p>\n<p>In his motion, Councillor Abel calls on Council to direct staff to negotiate a purchase price of Horton Place, which is currently on the market, \u201cin combination\u201d with Readman House immediately to its north, currently owned by realtor Bruce Spragg, with a report back to Council.<br \/>\nThis is a very different approach to the park proposal, Councillor Abel tells The Auroran, in that by purchasing \u201ckey properties in bulk maximizes the development opportunities for the purposes of revitalization.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBefore Council [last year] was the full concept of developing the land into a park and it required an investment from the Town,\u201d says Councillor Abel. \u201cWhat I am requesting is a look at securing the properties in our Downtown Core and then to be able to put in a revitalization program where we would attract developers, people who would build affordable housing and [provide] intensification along our Yonge Street corridor, as per our promenade plan. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe would rent the properties out so we would cover a tax that would be coming from the two properties. What we\u2019re doing is purchasing the land and going to work with a developer to optimize exactly what we would like in a development in the Downtown Core. We would like to see some affordable housing, maybe some park pathways, a combination of infill as well as green space.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Other properties along Yonge Street could come up for sale in the future, and that is something of which the Town should be \u201ccognizant.\u201d<br \/>\n\u201cWhat I want to do is let developers know the Town is willing to work with them in moving applications forward with a common goal to enhance the community,\u201d he notes.<\/p>\n<p>Looking ahead to next week\u2019s Council meeting, Councillor Abel says he hopes his colleagues do not confuse what he is trying to do with any residual thoughts from the Hillary-McIntyre Proposal, which Town Staff deemed unfeasible from a municipal perspective. These are two very different issues, he says.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAcquiring land is a role that we can play because we can sell it back,\u201d he says. \u201cIt is a revolving investment. We purchase the land, we attract a developer to work with us, perhaps organizations, and then we get back our money because they will purchase the land. Then we will have a role to play in how that development should look.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Securing properties in Aurora\u2019s Downtown Core will be an integral component in revitalizing the business area, according to John Abel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9244","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9244","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=9244"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9244\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}