Committee receives report detailing litigation costs

BRANTFORD, ON: At their meeting held Tuesday August 10, 2021, members of Brantford’s Committee of the Whole – Community Development received a report detailing an accounting of costs associated with defending the application for judicial review and motion for leave to appeal to the Court of Appeal for Ontario, brought unsuccessfully by Know Your City Inc. (“KYCI”). Ronald Heaslip of Brantford, Ontario and Veronica Martisius, of Vancouver, British Columbia, are listed as the sole directors of KYCI. KYCI sought to challenge Council’s decision to sell a portion of the lands located at 282 Stanley Street and formerly operated as Arrowdale Municipal Golf Course.

According to the report, the total cost to the City of defending KYCI’s unsuccessful application for judicial review and unsuccessful motion for leave to appeal, was $186,390.23. These costs, however, do not include the hundreds of hours incurred by City staff on this file since December 2019. This includes time spent to prepare reports to Council, meetings to provide instructions to external counsel and seek instructions internally, preparation of communications, responses to requests from the public and the press as well as responses to Freedom of Information requests regarding this matter. 

KYCI has been ordered to pay the City $41,000 to compensate for the City’s costs to defend these proceedings. To date, the City has only received $10,000 from KYCI - collected as security for costs earlier on in the court process. As of today, KYCI still has not paid the City the remaining $31,000 of court-ordered costs.

On December 17, 2019, Council voted to dispose of a portion of the lands located at 282 Stanley Street through a fair and open process, with the proceeds of the sale being allocated to affordable housing within the City of Brantford. In addition, the tax revenues generated from the redevelopment of the Arrowdale property are proposed to be transferred annually into a reserve fund dedicated to affordable housing initiatives to help support some of our community’s most vulnerable residents.

The acute need for more affordable housing in our community, and the positive impact affordable housing stability has on people’s lives cannot be understated. In October 2019, the City’s Housing Master Plan identified the urgent need for close to one thousand housing units to be built in the next 10 years. At present, over 1,700 households are on the community housing wait list. 

The City’s approved Housing Plan calls for $45-55M as well as additional funding from the CMHC Co-investment fund and debt financing to meet the total requirement of $100-105M in funding over 10 years to build over 500 new affordable housing units in our community. The revenue from the sale of the Arrowdale lands are proposed to fund 3 buildings with a total of 140 units, plus 80-90 units funded from ongoing annual property taxes. That’s affordable housing for over 230 households which will make a huge difference in the quality of life of those who in some cases have waited over 5 years for affordable housing. 

Once completed, the Arrowdale sale will provide the necessary means to begin addressing the increasing demand for affordable housing in Brantford.

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