Sechelt council needs to decide how much to up development cost charges (DCCs) after two previous councils couldn't come to a decision, but they want more consultation first.
At the March 27 committee of the whole meeting, director of development services Ray Parfitt explained the District had been in a lengthy DCC review process that saw two councils debate the merits of raising rates, without a decision being made.
Most DCCs in Sechelt haven't been upped since 1996 except for the sewer DCCs, which were adjusted in 2004 to save funds for a new treatment plant.
Currently single-family DCCs for roads equal $4,224, drainage DCCs are $652, parks DCCs are $1,088 and sewage treatment/collection DCCs are $3,900.
DCCs are paid when someone subdivides a single-family residential lot or when a building permit is granted for multi-family residential construction, industrial, commercial or institutional construction.
The money goes towards Sechelt's future infrastructure needs in each area.
Projections for the next 20 years show about $16.5 million will be needed for roads, about $3.7 million for sewage collection, about $3.3 million for drainage and about $4.1 million for parks.
District staff is suggesting raising DCCs to better reflect the actual costs associated in each area and fund future works accordingly.
Parfitt's staff report showed the need to raise road DCCs to $8,876, drainage DCCs to $2,262, sewer DCCs to $2,331 and parks DCCs to $2,813.
In total that would mean single-family DCCs would jump from $10,872 to $16,282.
It was too big a change for some councillors, who noted building starts have dropped dramatically in Sechelt and speculated an increase in DCCs would only make things worse.
"It's not something you can just pass the burden over to the developer and say 'here, you deal with this' in a time when house sales and construction costs are high and nobody's building. Why? Because there's no incentive to build," Coun. Doug Hockley said. "We're DCCing them right out of business, so I'm not in favour of increasing this at all."
Hockley suggested cutting back on the things planned for DCC funds in order to keep the rates low.
Coun. Chris Moore agreed the list should be looked at.
"I would like to have these capital projects exposed to the public. It may well backfire and they come back with $100 million they see we need. On the other hand, there might be some ideas about how we can save some money or some suggestions on things that maybe don't need to be on the wish list," Moore said. "I'd like that list subjected to sort of an acid test so that we are established on a very strong foundation that this is the kind of development that we're looking at for the next years. That will have a huge bearing on my ability to move forward on what will happen with our DCCs."
Moore also wanted to see what similar municipalities charge, noting the price of a single-family lot in Surrey is significantly higher than on the Sunshine Coast, so it wouldn't be a fair comparison.
Coun. Alice Lutes was in favour of the apples to apples comparison, but noted there is a need to increase DCC rates soon.
"I really think we need to address this and get the changes happening. "It may be that it's not smart to do it too quickly, that we need to do it in bits and pieces, but it's definitely time," Lutes said. "We all know the costs have gone up. Just the cost of living alone has probably averaged close to two per cent every year since 2005 and we have not changed these costs."
Coun. Mike Shanks agreed.
"There hasn't been an increase in 20 years. I can't think of any other bylaws that haven't been increased in 20 years, to tell you the truth," he said. "By postponing it we're just exasperating the issue and yet we're faced with a budget that has diminishing reserves and this isn't going to help if we don't move ahead with it."
With only Lutes and Shanks opposed, the majority of council passed a motion to seek more public input before making any decisions. They also asked staff to come back with a comparison of what other similar municipalities charge for DCCs.
