A controversial development on the site of Sidney’s fire hall and adjacent parking lots will go ahead as planned, despite attempts by the newly elected town council to scale back the size of the project. Sidney Mayor Cliff McNeil-Smith announced Monday that the town was unable to revise the sale agreement despite “diligent” and “good faith” talks with the developers, Fire Hall Development Ltd.
“After much consideration of various options, council has determined that the two parties are too far apart on a renegotiated purchase price, and will proceed with the originally approved contract of purchase and sale,” the town said in a statement.
The development at the corner of Sidney Avenue and Third Street was a key issue during the municipal election campaign last October, with a number of residents expressing concern about the size of the project and the lack of parking.
The previous council selected Fire Hall Development to purchase the town-owned properties at 9837 and 9821 Third St. and 2477 Sidney Ave. for about $9.9 million.
Council also granted the developer variances for the mixed-use project with commercial space on the ground floor and condominiums above.
Instead of the permitted four storeys, the developers could build six. They were also allowed to install fewer parking stalls than required. A town parking lot on the site will lose additional stalls.
McNeil-Smith said the previous council made the decision to “maximize” the purchase price for the old fire hall to help cover construction-cost overruns at the new hall.
“And the purchase price they arrived at more than covered the new debt requirements for the cost overruns,” he said. “But they gave variances on the project that resulted in a scale and loss of parking that, quite, frankly the community at large wasn’t happy with.”
McNeil-Smith said he and the new council felt they should at least try talking to the developers, even though there was a “signed-and-sealed” sale agreement in place and the town was set to turn over possession of the old fire hall this spring.
“And quite frankly, [the developers] acted in good faith,” he said. “They said: ‘Yes, we’re willing to listen.’ ”
The two sides entered into a memorandum of understanding last month to look at scaling back the project and reducing the purchase price.
“We had some negotiations back and forth and it’s unfortunate it didn’t come to be,” he said.
“When you look at scaling back the development and trying to retain most, if not all, of the parking, it just became a challenge on the redesign of the project and timelines and coming to a purchase price.”
Fire Hall Development partners Fraser McColl and Dan Robbins were unavailable for comment Monday.
The memorandum of understanding specified that if negotiations failed, the original deal would stand.
McNeil-Smith said the only change now is that the developers will take possession a couple of months later than expected, due to the time spent trying to reach a new agreement.
Steve Duck, president of the Sidney Community Association, said council’s inability to reach a new deal with the developers will trouble a number of residents, given the project’s height and parking issues.
“I think there’ll be some concerns in the town with that,” he said.
“I appreciate there’s nothing this council could do but ask for that renegotiation, because the past council had already essentially accepted and approved it.”
— with files from Richard Watts
