BARRHEAD - The County of Barrhead needs to do a better job of enforcing the rules that the municipality already has regarding the adherence to setbacks and other regulations governing the placement of buildings.
That is what Coun. Jared Stoik said to his colleagues during the July 2 council meeting. He added that he needed to see the purpose of one of the proposed changes to the county's land use bylaw (LUB), which would require a permit for farm accessory buildings on properties over 500 square feet.
In the end, the majority of council agreed with Stoik, as the council voted 4-3 to remove the requirement, returning to the status quo, of not requiring permits for farm accessory buildings on a motion by deputy reeve Marvin Schatz. Councillors Stoik, Paul Properzi, Schatz, and Walter Preugschas supported the motion. Opposed were councillors Bill Lane, Ron Kleinfeldt, and reeve Doug Drozd.
The amendment was one of a handful councillors discussed during a more than four-hour debate on potential amendments to the document based on feedback from the municipality's latest public hearing on June 6. Following the discussion, councillors unanimously gave the LUB second reading.
"We need to follow our own rules," he said. "If a building is not in compliance, is in the wrong place, and is not following setbacks, it must be moved. Permit or not, it is on us if our rules are not being enforced."
The municipality has been working on updating the document for more than two years.
The last time the LUB was updated was in 2010. The first reading was on May 7.
Municipal Planning Services (MPS) senior planner Jane Dauphinee said the municipality received several comments, especially on the proposed change for farm outbuildings, at the June 6 public hearing.
Specifically, the proposed requirement for property owners to permit any agricultural outbuildings 500 square feet or larger, excluding grain storage structures. Under the current LUB, farm outbuildings in an agricultural district do not need to be permitted.
"Comments we received ranged from that all agricultural buildings should not require to be permitted, the size [of the permitting threshold] be increased to 5,000 square feet, to the permits are cost prohibitive," she said.
The permit for farm accessory buildings is $100, which Dauphinee said is relatively low compared to other municipalities and the costs involved.
Development officer Jenny Bruns explained that they felt the change to the LUB was necessary because there have been multiple instances of farm operations placing substantial outbuildings where they are not permitted, i.e., on other people's properties or road allowances.
"[The permit] is to help ensure the building is going in the right place," Dauphinee interjected. "[The County of Barrhead] is a municipality that has had challenges with people putting buildings in the wrong locations, and many of the buildings have been expensive, and the only way to resolve the issue was equally expensive. And it's not necessarily just from the county's perspective, but the landowner, such as when they have to cut half their house off."
She said all of these types of incidents could have been avoided if the person putting up the building had discussed their situation with municipal staff, which is the purpose of the permit.
Stoik said while he understands the rationale behind the proposed change, he does not believe permitting farm accessory buildings of any size would rectify the problem.
"The people we've dealt with that have not put stuff where they are supposed to be will not come in for a permit," he said. "They don't typically care. They know the requirements. As a council, we should tell them to move it or take it down."
Councillors Preugschas, Properzi and Kleinfeldt countered that having a permit is helpful as it is part of the education process.
"It is like fire permits," Properzi said. "By having them, you train residents; eventually, they will know where they can build."
Deputy reeve Marvin Schatz agreed with Stoik, saying a permit is not education.
"You can educate without requiring a permit," he said. "People are going to build where they are going to build, and then [we bring them into compliance] through as-builds."
Drozd interjected; he felt requiring permits for the outbuildings had merit.
"Going through the process of issuing a stop-work order or an order to teardown or relocate will consume so much legal money. It is worth the effort if we can prevent that by taking measures ahead of time."
Drozd added that requiring a permit would only strengthen the county's case if they did go to court. Lane also echoed this sentiment.
Bruns added that if councillors opted not to require permits for farm accessory buildings over a specific size limit, they would need to bump up her enforcement budget.
Councillors also approved a recommendation to clarify the wording of the section regarding Environmental Reserves (ER).
Dauphinee said that during the public hearing, several people voiced their concerns that the municipality's dedication of ERs was essentially a land grab.
"There is no taking," she said. "It remains your land. What [the LUB Section 6.4.7] is saying is that in areas where there is an environmentally significant feature, [ERs] prevent development in sensitive areas and need approvals from other levels of government."
However, she admitted the language was incorrect, saying it is a shall statement instead of a may statement regarding designating lands as ER.
The other notable amendment to the draft LUB concerned tourist accommodations. The first amendment added tourism accommodations for discretionary use in an agricultural district and required adjacent landowners to be notified before the county issued a tourism accommodation development permit. The other change was to make the permit renewable in one-year increments.
Barry Kerton, TownandCountryToday.com
