Excessive red tape at St. Albert city hall is putting the high-tech Avenir development at risk of being abandoned, says its proponent.
Gerry de Klerk, CEO of Rampart Group of Companies, said the city won't approve his area structure plan until he completes a fiscal impact study – something he's already submitted three times.
But city officials say that Avenir hasn't provided all the studies required to approve the project. Nor has the developer of an adjacent property presented a certificate from Alberta Environment stating that an old landfill has been properly cleaned up.
"We will not approve the development until there is environmental clearance," said Mayor Nolan Crouse.
"We don't think it's a problem but we have to wait to hear from Alberta Environment and we have not heard from them yet."
Avenir, located in the city's northwest, is pitched as a blend of residential, commercial and industrial development. The concept is to incorporate cutting-edge data technology to make the area suitable for companies and individuals who work in technology businesses, particularly those serving the oilsands.
Bordering Avenir is Elysian Fields, a proposal by SAS Sports City to build a sports village with elite athletics facilities. Though the two developments are separate, city council gave direction two years ago that both developers would have to meet certain requirements before their area structure plans are approved.
Those requirements include the remediation of a landfill on property optioned by SAS Sports City. Until Alberta Environment issues a certificate stating it has been remediated, council won't be looking at Avenir's area structure plan, Crouse said.
De Klerk said the landfill has been cleaned up and is no longer an issue. The holdup is at Alberta Environment, he said.
He insists the city is making it difficult for his $1.8 billion development to proceed despite a positive meeting with city manager Patrick Draper in April.
"We were unbelievably impressed and pleased, we were received in such a courteous, friendly and professional manner. We had never seen that in St. Albert," he said.
Following the meeting, de Klerk said he sent his area structure plan to the city for approval.
But on May 27 he received a letter stating the area structure plan could not be handled until a new fiscal impact study was completed. In addition, the letter said the study would require updated data from the city, which would be forthcoming by the end of June.
De Klerk said he has yet to receive this information and is disappointed that he was not informed of the changes at his April meeting, at which he felt encouraged to submit his plan.
"This now set us back probably a year which will cost us a million dollars," he said.
"Not only that, we have to redo a study which we had already submitted under the old guidelines and nobody warned us that this was going to happen."
Updates
Carol Bergum, St. Albert's director of planning and development, explained that the city is in the process of updating the servicing capacity of new lands, which will affect any outstanding fiscal impact studies. The city is committed to providing this information by the end of the month, she said.
She added that Avenir's latest fiscal impact study didn't match its development plan so the developer was required to submit a new study anyway, she said.
"Basically, as within any area structure plan they submit their application and we review it to see if it is complete," she said. "So there were a number of things that were not complete and so we just passed all those things on to the developer and are just waiting for them to complete that."
De Klerk said feedback from the city on the area structure plan application had been exceedingly positive and any questions resulting from it were answered.
Due to the continued setbacks, the company already lost a number of large homebuilders and investors interested in the project, many of whom refused to work in St. Albert, he said.
The company has sunk $17 million into the project for land purchase and planning costs and now wants to see something in return from the city.
"There is a cost to that money and there is an opportunity cost to that money that we continue to bear and that has to come to an end," de Klerk said.
"We may come to a point where we say that Avenir is dead and we sell little pieces to small developers because we may have to do that if we don't get some sort of thing soon."
