Chestermere City Council carried amendments to the Municipal Development Plan (MDP) for Clearwater Park during the Nov. 16 Regular Meeting of Council.
The primary issues were reducing employment lands within the City of Chestermere, expansion of possible interim land use, entranceway features, providing recreation facilities, and municipal services, community engagement strategy.
“The direction of the resolution was the developer and administration were supposed to do more work, and solve the complex problems, that’s now been yet,” said Liz Armitage.
Adding, “There are some very big issues in presenting any Area Structure Plan (ASP). At this point, administration is of the opinion that Centron, IBI Group, and administration have addressed all the issues.”
Although amendments have been made, Armitage told council there are critical items related to the project that they need to be aware of before approving the proposed MDP.
The amendments proposed by the applicant will result in an overall reduction of just over 11 per cent reduction of employment lands from the entire city currently identified in the MDP land use map.
The proposed amendment will also result in language being embedded into the MDP to permit the development of private recreational and community amenity facilities.
“Developing a new community will have significant impacts on the city’s existing and projected future municipal services, including water, stormwater, sanitary, and transportation networks,” said Armitage.
Adding, “These are significant issues.”
Armitage presented options for council such as directing administration to present a comprehensive analysis of the proposed MDP amendment at a December Committee of the Whole Meeting, pass first reading of the bylaw and direct administration to initiate formal circulation to agencies and adjacent properties as per the Municipal Government Act (MGA) requirements, or council to defer the first reading until the analysis is presented.
The recommended action that was carried was to give first reading, and direct administration to initiate formal circulation to agencies and adjacent properties as per the MGA requirements.
