A conundrum

"Let's leave the Siftons out of this"  somebody has said.

It sounds like a bit of a scold.

I'd like to point out , we didn't bring the Siftons into this. Mr. Sifton was part of the delegation  representing St. Andrew's College on  Tuesday night. He was introduced to Council..  I  don't think he was on a social visit.

I doubt the  Sifton family wealth and influence would come as much of a surprise .

I think  the fact  St.Andrew's is classified as a non-profit charitable foundation  is the contrast that made people sit up and take notice.

But  now the fact  of  wealth has been raised , the details contribute little to the discussion.

What surprises me is that no-one is shocked by the amount of Development  Charges  not been collected from St.Andrew's

With added fees for this and that, it's  two and a half million dollars over and above what it costs to build the facilities.

I still pause when figures run into double digits , let alone seven. Not my colleagues though.

It;s proposed to scatter a hundred thousand dollars at the feet of Bell telephone. They will be pleased to move the tower. We will keep the threat of an injunction at $150,000. in our back pocket to scare them into submission,

Well.it's only money. We've  got  plenty where that comes from. We will increase the charges on new home buyers of town houses with barely a footprint on the ground to make up.

We'll make the ticky-tacky box  home owners pay up  for the million dollar mansion dwellers.

But I digress.

The  assessed value of the school buildings is not relevant.  The  non-profit .charitable foundation  classification means no  property taxes are paid.

Staff residences are assessed and taxable.

Another  question just popped into my head.

The agreement with the town allows deferral of development charges until such time as the use of the property changes or the property is sold.

In the event of  the latter , the new owner would  then be liable for development charges on whatever new use may be made of the property,

The municipality, the Region and the Board of  Education would be in the position of  collecting  development charges from St Andrew's when the sale is made and  again on the  developer who purchased the property for development.

I'm not sure how the municipality would collect DCS owing if the property were to be sold. Is the agreement registerd against the land title.  Nobody said so.

Council was not given a copy of the ten page agreement. We have no idea how that's supposed to work.

I doubt very much thought was given to that aspect of the deal. Not for a minute do I imagine there is any intention of the use or land changing hands.

I am convinced the agreement is nothing more than a dodge to escape paying development charges.

And the preferential treatment  for St Andrew's is  quite acceptable with the Mayor and Councillors.

By the way, Councillor Ballard  joined me in not voting  to extend the agreement.