Developers want to rezone and combine 8 lots to accommodate large building
Christian Gammon-Roy
Tribune
West Nipissing residents are getting another chance to voice concerns or comments about a planned construction on Dovercourt Road in Sturgeon Falls. The proposed 26-unit apartment complex, to be built on the corner of Dovercourt Road and Cache Bay Road, was presented to the WN Planning Advisory Committee on Tuesday, April 2nd. The committee was asked to discuss merging the 8 lots that make up that street corner, and to rezone them as Residential R4, so that the land could accommodate a multi-plex in accordance with municipal zoning by-laws. Included in the meeting agenda was a petition to halt the project, and a list of concerns from 57 neighbours. In response to those concerns, the committee deferred its decision and put the item back on the agenda for its next meeting, May 13.
Roger Gagnon has very broad insight on the Dovercourt project. He is the chair of the WN Planning Advisory Committee and also president of the corporation which owns the 8 lots being discussed. Gagnon declared a conflict of interest at the April 2nd meeting, and will do so again on May 13th, letting the vice-chair handle the application. According to him, resident complaints and concerns were taken very seriously by him and by the committee. The petition lists issues which they are already working on addressing in various ways, he says.
The first issue concerns residents feeling that they were not given enough notice, yet the committee pushing the item back to their next meeting has effectively given another month of notice.
Another key issue is the fear that blasting might cause damage to adjacent or nearby properties. The Dovercourt lots are currently occupied by a very large rock which will need to be removed before anything can be built. While Gagnon assures that the company slated to do the blasting is insured and very careful, he agrees that the concerns are valid and that they have prompted him to look into other options. He explains that since the rock seems to be already quite fissured, they may be able to simply do some drilling and use heavy hydraulic hammers to break the rock apart instead.
While that may not be as turbulent as blasting, it will still require heavy machinery and some shaky ground, but according to Gagnon, there’s just no way around that. In fact, part of the reason he’s going through the trouble of merging and re-zoning the lots is because of how much rock is present on Dovercourt, both above and underground. “There are 8 lots that we want to rezone [and merge]. (…) I would have been fine to just continue building duplexes with the lots that were there and continue to rent them. However, since it’s all solid rock on that corner, there’s no possibility to run services to each lot. To get around that whole corner to get water and sewer infrastructure, it’s impossible; the lots would then cost $300,000 each. So, since I own the whole corner, I figured that instead of connecting 8 different services, I can run one and build a single building instead, to develop that corner into something the municipality needs,” he describes.
As Gagnon points out, a significant part of Dovercourt Road is occupied by semi-detached rentals which he and his son Stéphane, owner of Gagnon Contracting, have built over the years. As such, the neighbourhood has a very suburban residential feel, which is a point that was brought up by the concerned petitioners, who were afraid that the building could present a negative change in the “current residential profile.”
A further concern is that residents were unsure if this proposed 26-plex would fall under the category of affordable, low-income, or geared-to-income housing. “What worried people the most, and some might not admit it, is geared-to-income. There’s a stereotype associated with people who live in that type of housing; it’s typically people who don’t have much money, who won’t take care of the property, who will cause damage, and won’t pay,” explains Lise Sénécal, who has lived on Dovercourt Road for the last 5 years. Sénécal states that she did not sign the resident petition. She lives in a unit built by Stéphane Gagnon and is in support of the current project, especially in light of the pressing need for more housing in West Nipissing.
Roger Gagnon readily goes over his plans to put fears to rest. “It will be a 26-plex, all on one floor with a common hallway that goes through the middle, and a secured entrance. Twenty-one units are one-bedroom and 5 will be 2-bedroom units, and 4 of the one-bedroom units will be barrier-free for people in wheelchairs or who have accessibility issues,” he describes, adding that units will be at market-value rent. He estimates that will mean $1,500 per month for 1-bedroom units and $2,000 per month for 2-bedroom units, well above the threshold of low-income or affordable housing.
“My dad and I did our due diligence. We sat down with a couple of real estate agents in town, and we asked if it could affect their property values, and they said if anything, it’ll go up,” mentions Stéphane. He also addresses the question of the neighbourhood’s character, explaining that the architects were asked to build something that would fit in with the current homes esthetically. “We don’t want it to look institutional. So, it looks like the homes that are here, it won’t look like a hotel either, it’ll blend,” he assures.
With the meeting set for May 13th, Roger Gagnon is confident that more residents will have a chance to be heard, and to get more informed about the project. Since the last meeting, he’s received some positive support from residents, making him suspect that some of the attendees will be there to voice support, rather than opposition. Sénécal will be among them. “We really, really need apartments in town, for one. Two, it’s a good contractor. I should know, it’s his son that built my place,” she points out.
Of course, May 13th is not the end of the process for the Gagnons. The WN Planning Advisory Committee votes on recommendations for the project, but ultimately it will be up to municipal council, as only they can change the zoning. This means the issue will still need to go on the next council meeting agenda after May 13, with a 20-day period after that before the change can take effect. “It’s just to give time for all the paperwork to get done, or if there’s still someone who’s very opposed, to go to an arbitration board and oppose the municipality’s direction on the matter,” Roger Gagnon explains.
Once the bureaucracy is cleared up, Gagnon estimates that the construction project is still years away from completion. He hopes that things are approved early enough to have the rock cleared out by this winter, but there’s still a lot of other factors before we see any actual construction begin. “After that, it’s going to depend on how quickly the architects will be able to finish the construction plans. There are still many steps to go through, and if they’re not able to have the plan ready in time for the permit, we could be delayed until the following summer, or if it happens to be in the fall, then we wouldn’t start the project late in the fall,” Gagnon explains.
With such a long timeline, that also leaves the developers at the mercy of tariffs and price surges.
“We’re hoping that tariffs won’t affect our construction costs too much. They’re already talking about wood going up again, metal is already on its way up. We’ll just have to wait and see if things stay in line, and if so then we’re going ahead,” Roger says.
When asked what would happen if construction costs suddenly became prohibitive, he does have options, but he would rather not have to exercise those. “I always have the option to sell. I’ve already got a developer from Timmins who approached me to ask if I knew of any land to develop. The thing is that if I put the lot for sale, people from down south will come and grab it immediately, and then you’ll be dealing with people you don’t know, it won’t be local money,” he warns. Stéphane adds that both he and his father are adamant on keeping their business as local as possible, even down to using locally purchased materials when possible. “I’m born and raised here in Sturgeon. We invest in our municipality. We want to grow our municipality, not keep it stagnant,” Roger says, adding that southern owners would hire southern builders and ultimately bleed money out of West Nipissing.
