Council asked to reconsider Legion land decision

BY KIRK STARRATT

kstarratt@kentvilleadvertiser.ca

NovaNewsNow.com

A Kings County councillor is not happy that his colleagues have defeated a motion to refer a rezoning request from the Wolfville Legion to the planning advisory committee (PAC) and to waive the application fees.

Councillor Chris Parker, who represents the area south of Wolfville where the subject property is located, says he has given notice that he will make a motion of reconsideration at the next council meeting. Council defeated a recommendation from the committee of the whole (COTW) to refer the rezoning request from the Wolfville Legion to PAC and to waive the application fees at the Tuesday, April 1 session.

Parker said the new information he has to constitute the reconsideration motion is councillors did not understand that part of the property the Wolfville Legion would like to have rezoned is zoned Commercial already. Another part of the subject property is zoned Agricultural, protected from development, and would have to be rezoned.

Parker said the legion is seeking R7 residential zoning and noted that the land across the road from the subject site, which is owned by another party, is already zoned R7.

Parker said the proposed project could help get sewer service up as far as the Ridge Road and that was one of the biggest issues he remembers from when he first campaigned for election eight years ago. He said allowing the project to proceed would be a win-win situation for the community.

Parker said three-quarters of the subject land is forested and a water main belonging to the Town of Wolfville runs right below the property parallel to Highway 101.

Don’t see why they can’t rezone: Sullivan

Wolfville Legion President Hubert Sullivan made a presentation to council’s COTW on behalf of the Legion in March to request a rezoning for the property. They would like to someday construct a new hall at the site and develop some condos as living space for veterans. Parker said the Wolfville Legion would remain in control of the project even though they would like to develop condos.

Sullivan said the subject property is about 17 acres and the Legion bought it 12 years ago. At the time, a map showed that about three-quarters of the land was wooded. He said about one-quarter is zoned Commercial and there are only a few acres of farmland.

Sullivan said he would like to see farmland preserved if it is indeed active farmland, but, with the location of the subject property, it will never be used for that purpose.

“I don’t see why they can’t rezone it,” he said.

Although they do have projects in mind such as a new hall and some living quarters, Sullivan said you couldn’t do much planning until you know you can proceed. If the land is rezoned, it will be there for such use by veterans in the future. One benefit to the property for the Legion is its proximity to town.

The Legion rezoned a portion at the front of the property Commercial a number of years ago and were told they could build a new Legion hall there. However, around that time, the Legion experienced a decline in revenues and the banks wouldn’t lend them the capital needed to build. The group was a few hundred thousand dollars short.

“We thought if we could get more value from the land (by having it rezoned), we could do more,” Sullivan said, pointing out that land zoned Agricultural is currently not worth as much money.

Didn’t see it coming

He said the Legion was somewhat surprised when the matter came to a vote at council April 1. He made his presentation March 18 and was under the impression from council that the rezoning request would take a long while to process. Because they didn’t realize it was coming up again so quickly, there were no representatives of the Legion on hand for the April 1 session.

Parker said it has rarely been the case during his eight years on council that his colleagues have refused to send a planning matter to PAC for consideration.

“I was shocked by the whole thing,” he said. “I didn’t see this one coming.”

Parker told his colleagues prior to the motion being defeated that allowing the matter to proceed would be a way to give back to our veterans, as far as he’s concerned. He said Sullivan, for example, served in Normandy and is a phenomenal community volunteer.

“He’s not looking for money,” Parker said. “We should let the public process take place.”

Councillor Wayne Atwater said he would be in favour if Sullivan, as a veteran, wanted to build a house, but he would not support the proposed development in its current form.

Following the meeting, Parker, a former UN peacekeeper, said he thought the decision was a major slap in the face to our veterans and he had tears in his eyes when he heard it. He said when Sullivan presented the proposal to the COTW and other veterans were in attendance, councillors voted in favour of referring the rezoning request to PAC and waiving the application fees, but as soon as the matter came to council and there were no veterans in attendance, council flip-flopped.