So, build already

The Quinte Home Builder’s Association (QHBA) is sending a procession of emissaries to County council, urging quick approval of expensive waterworks infrastructure plans. Several QHBA members, each armed with a prepared script, have come to Council in recent weeks, essentially making the same pitch: Growth is coming, the County’s engineering department prefers a regional water plan, and they are the experts, therefore Council should abide and push the spending button. That’s the argument.

Council listens along. Nod their heads. Thank the builders for their comments. Yet none has yet posed the obvious questions: Why are you here? And why now?

New homebuilding in Prince Edward County is at multi-year lows, but it isn’t for lack of water infrastructure. There is plenty of water and sewer capacity in Picton— enough for more than a thousand homes. A few hundred more in Wellington. There is capacity, too, in Consecon, Carrying Place and Rossmore. But builders aren’t using it. Not at a pace that would suggest we urgently need major new infrastructure expansion.

So why is the QHBA urging Shire Hall to build massive infrastructure it can’t afford? And why now?

Follow the money.

Who benefits from expanded waterworks? Particularly when the municipality is paying? Folks with large landholdings have been promoting big infrastructure spending for years. It increases the value of their property.

With an election coming up, they may worry a new slate of representatives will be less inclined to bury the County in debt—to construct infrastructure it may never need. They may have concluded that time is not on their side.

None of the QHBA emissaries has addressed the extraordinary cost of a regional water plan, nor who should pay for it. None is raising their hands to do so. Instead, existing water bill payers are being called upon to underwrite these big ambitions.

If there is, as they predict, burgeoning demand for new homes, why aren’t they building them in Prince Edward County? Their answers ring hollow.

“It’s time to push forward with infrastructure projects and not pause,” said Keith Watson, a land surveyor, in his comment to Council last week.

Councillor Roy Pennell asked the QHBA member why new homebuilding is occurring in Trenton and Belleville, but not in Prince Edward County.

Keith Watson didn’t have an answer. He suggested that Trenton and Belleville are not comparable to the County because they have a larger industrial base.

His response doesn’t explain why the County must spend money it doesn’t have to build infrastructure it doesn’t need.

Councillor David Harrison wanted to know whether QHBA members were prepared to upfront the cost of the waterworks expansion they were seeking.

Keith Watson didn’t have an answer to that question either.

The QHBA push comes at a moment when the pace of new homebuilding in the County is excruciatingly slow. Further, those new homes that have emerged from the ground are mostly outside the municipality’s urban—municipally serviced—core. Whether they are building in the countryside to avoid high water bills and development charges is unclear.

What is obvious is that Shire Hall is collecting a fraction of the fees from building (permits, DCs and connection charges) it would normally generate in an active building season. Every measure is grinding lower, finding new depths.

If new home demand exists, why aren’t builders building? If the QHBA is convinced that rapid growth is nigh, where is it? Why can’t we see it? Where are the framers? Roofers, plumbers and electricians?

So, build already—what is holding you up?

rick@wellingtontimes.ca