Editorial — Plaza status quo

For over two years, the question of what to do with, and how to pay for, the two village plazas in South Dundas has been a constant struggle for this council and administration. The villages of Morrisburg and Iroquois were handed a raw deal when the province handed over the plazas in 1964-65 without any funding to maintain them. Those properties became South Dundas’ responsibility with amalgamation, leading to the current situation. Compounding this issue is that the elected council is impaired with two of its five members being absent from the discussion and decision making due to pecuniary interest.

The two plazas are a unique and unorthodox ownership arrangement. The building envelope for each property remains privately owned, while the sidewalk, canopy structure, parking lot and common areas are municipally owned. Without significant capital spending to have property owners buy the common areas, or the municipality to buy the private property, the two must co-habitate.

Since last year, the direction given to administration by council was to seek how to recover the cost of the municipal services provided to businesses in the two plazas — snow removal, garbage pick up, etc. Also under review was what should be those businesses’ responsibilities, and what should be the municipality’s. Businesses in the two plazas spoke up and said how the fees would negatively impact their businesses. Still, administration and council chose to continue to go down this road of having businesses cover the ongoing costs of the plaza.

On April 15 and 16, two public meetings were held inviting comment from the general public on the plan for the plazas once the renovations are completed. Well-attended, the public comments were largely supportive of the status quo. This is the logical and fairest conclusion to this debate. Property owners in the plaza pay commercial taxes like every other business. The municipality owns the common areas of the plaza. Each does their part, and the bill is paid by all. The common areas are no different than the parks, playgrounds, sports fields, and other municipally owned properties — there for all to use and therefore paid for by all. At least some of the council able to vote on the matter appeared supportive of the status quo. We will not know for sure until the next time this is presented before council for direction.

Seeing council vote against planning recommendations on a recent property rezoning, there is cause for concern. If council continues down the path of imposing operations fees on plaza businesses, ignoring the views of businesses and residents, it will raise larger questions. Like what agenda is council truly following?

The simplest way to determine what is best was those public meetings. If council and staff had directed for those meetings be held two years ago, the issue would have been resolved then. What could have been accomplished instead of two years of wheel spinning?