Sudbury freezes development charges for one more year

Morning North7:14City of Greater Sudbury proposing a one year freeze on development fees

New homes come with a development charge in Sudbury. The cost is somewhere near 15 thousand dollars. The city gets that money, but it's exploring the idea of freezing that charge for a one year period. We look at what this could mean for you.The City of Greater Sudbury announced that it will freeze development charges for another year, saving new home builders $1,000.

Laura Higgs, executive director of the Sudbury and District Homebuilders Association, welcomed the freeze, but thinks the city should go further and scrap the fees entirely.

"The SDHA wants to the city to consider all the costs that go into owning a home, like mortgage and land tax," Higgs said.

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The charges, set by the city to recover growth-related capital needs, affects the local economy, said Higgs.

"We understand growth has to pay for growth," Higgs said, "but we believe development charges have been detrimental to new home start ups since they were introduced."

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Higgs said there were 148 development permits issued last year, but the city usually issues between 225 and 350 permits.

"More people are renovating homes in Sudbury instead of building new ones," Higgs said, "[the fees] may make people build their homes in other cities."

Higgs said that before council decided to freeze the charges, home builders faced a $1,000 increase in development fees this year, and overall have increased $12,000 since 2009.

This pattern should concern people who are considering building a house in the future. she said.

"The average person might not want to build a new home now," Higgs said, "but they might later on and that's when the development charge will affect them."

The city council decision to freeze the fees for another year comes after a two-year freeze voted in by the previous council in June 2014. 

At the time, councillors were planning to phase in a development charge increase over 2016 and 2017, being told by staff that the plan would mean $3 million less to spend on city programs and infrastructure.

The current city council is holding a public information session on June 21 to further discuss development charges and what should happen with them next year when the freeze ends.