Development Incentives

Last evening the Smarter Niagara Steering Committee was given a draft overview of policy regarding development charge discounts and exemptions. The Region of Niagara provides incentives to encourage development in accordance with Smart Growth principles.

What concerns me about the draft document is the inherent paradigm in the DC policy discussion, especially relating to cost recovery, which places incentives outside of the costs to be recovered. Incentives are not considered a service. We build roads so that our economy may do well. Street lights are installed to promote public safety. Waste treatment is built to ensure environmental quality. All of this is needed.

What is also needed are expenditures that promote smart growth to be included in the list of services covered by development charges. These costs are not for new libraries or parks - clearly not services that should be included, but to create a pattern of development that fosters a healthy living environment including walkable, safer neighbourhoods, less greenhouse emissions, and lower infrastructure requirements.

Sprawl costs, therefore sprawl should pay a premium to ensure that incentives are available to encourage smarter decisions. Last century definitions of what constitutes a service will not get us to where we need to be.

One further comment; incentives are being subjected to a cost/benefit analysis as they should. Has there been a request of the engineers to explain why there should be 12 stop light fixtures at many intersections? They seem to able to include this in the budget based on standards they have adopted and without any value analysis supplied. They may be right although that should be doubted, but when planners propose incentives as direction signals to development, the level of scrutiny is intense. I say, "no more stop signals."