Thank you for your continued interest in the City of Waterloo.  It has been a few months since my last update, so this one is a bit long.  Enjoy!

What did City Council do?

2024 Speed Management Update

Council received an update on the city-wide rollout of lower speed limits.  In 2024, wards 4, 5 and 6 had the lower speed limits implemented.  This leaves only wards 1 and 3 remaining to be completed in 2025.  As was shown when the lower limits were implemented in other parts of the city, overall speeds dropped by 5.4km/hr (at the 85^th percentile) and 4.4km/hr (at the average) after implementation (as compared to previous speeds on the same street).  Overall, we continue to be pleased with the results of the implementation and will continue to monitor results.  In that vein, the speed reductions we saw in 2023 in school zones, ward 2 and ward 7 continue to remain stable 1 year after the implementation in those areas, indicating that some behaviour changes are taking place.  In further positive news the total cost to date is $187,000, which is $112,000 less than budgeted.  Any remaining funds leftover after this entire project is concluded will go back into a fund for additional road safety initiatives in the future.

Beaver Creek Road & Conservation Drive Reconstruction

The reconstruction of Beaver Creek Road and Conservation Drive continues to inch forward.  Residents may have noticed some preparatory work completed last year.  Council approved the funding release for the reconstruction project last month.  While there is funding coming from our Capital Investment fund, the Region of Waterloo and developer contributions, the vast majority of this project is funded through Development Charges.  The City of Waterloo also continues to seek grant money from the Provincial government for this project, as it is a project that will enable significant housing development in the Northwest corner of the city.  We need the Province’s support in order to meet our housing targets.  Now that the funding has been released we will be tendering the project for the road work (and accompanying underground work) in the Spring, with the project intended to be completed in phases by 2028.

Short Term Rental License Update

As part of Federal requirements to qualify for affordable housing grants, the City of Waterloo updated our short-term rental license bylaw.  In addition to defining short-term rentals, the bylaw prohibits them unless the property is owner occupied, prohibits them for greater than 30 consecutive days and prohibits them for more than 275 days within a calendar year.  Based on our data, there are approximately 500 active short-term rental units in the city.  The expectation is that this new bylaw will convert approximately 100 units from short-term rentals to long-term rental units.  As this is an interim bylaw it will be reviewed and potentially updated to include medium-high density housing as well.  This new bylaw can be carried out without financial impacts as we are receiving funding from the Federal government for enforcement.

Informal Public Meeting – Erb St & Ira Needles

Council held an informal public meeting to review potential changes to the property at 651-663 Erb Street West.  The property owner is looking to expand the current plaza (where the Beer Store is), to expand permissions to allow for a food store and to undertake a land swap with the Region of Waterloo in order to facilitate a new stormwater management pond.  Importantly (if approved), this development will also begin the work on a new bypass road that connects Erb Street to Thorndale (via The Boardwalk).  The bypass road will include a roundabout at the current signalized intersection into the Canadian Tire plaza and connect through this property and the current private golf course, into The Boardwalk.  This is a key piece of transportation infrastructure, as is contemplated in the city’s west side multi-modal transportation study, the transportation master plan and our official plan.  It will alleviate pressure on the Erb/Ira Needles roundabout and help facilitate better traffic flow on the west end of the city.

Waterloo Region Economic Development Strategy

Council received a report on the Region’s updated Economic Development strategy.  This strategy involved engaging with 1,800 individuals, as well as key economic development organizations across the Region.  This new regional strategy will underpin the work in updating the City’s economic development strategy, with a focus on implementing this work.  The five pillars of this strategy are; Talent, Land Readiness, Scaling Local Innovation, Strategic Sector Support and Quality of Life.  In addition to these five pillars there are eight key themes that emerged as well; Immigration, Equity and Reconciliation, Housing, Childcare, Transit, Family Doctors, Climate Action and Rural Success.  I think this is really important to highlight that our economic success as a Region necessitates a focus on important social equity issues such as affordable housing, health care, arts and culture, equity and inclusion, as well as climate change.  I look forward to seeing these priorities reflected in the city’s forthcoming plan as well.

KW Symphony Update

Council received an update on what’s next for the KW Symphony (KWS).  In September 2023, KWS declared bankruptcy, the board resigned and it was highlighted that $2M was needed to continue to operate.  In June 2024 a new board was created with a primary goal of figuring out ‘What Happened?’.  It has been determined that COVID killed an already weakened KWS.  In 2019 there was a deficit of $730k, with operating losses continuing and exacerbated by COVID.  The next steps will be to reimagine the KWS, with a new business plan and strategic plan to guide the KWS going forward.  They are planning a 2025/2026 concert season, that is musician led.  As the work to rebuild this key cultural institution continues, I look forward to the City of Waterloo supporting KWS in getting back up and running as an organization.

Wood Lily Park

Wood Lily Park, in Vista Hills was approved by Council.  This new, primarily developer built park, is to be built at the end of the Sundew Drive extension.  This is the area that was formerly identified as a location for a natural amphitheatre.  The ‘amphitheatre’ was approved by Council 2002, however existing conditions make the original plan no longer viable, due to encroachment into the adjacent environmentally sensitive protected area.  This includes slope issues, safety issues, invasive species growth and overall disturbance to the area.  Fortunately this allowed staff to reimagine this space and update the plans with community engagement to create a new park space that the community will love.  Some of the key components of this new park include lookouts into the natural environmental feature, improved trail connectivity that will connect Autumn Willow park all the way to the Sundew parking lot by the stormwater ponds (eventually), covered seating, a fitness station and a much needed tennis court in the community.  This project is mostly a developer project, however we have indications that the Sundew Drive extension, the accompanying housing and this park are intended to get started in 2025.  I look forward to having another desirable park space in Vista Hills to go along with Autumn Willow, Sundew and Beechdrops Park (in addition to all of the other smaller park spaces within the subdivision).

Inclusionary Zoning

Due to developer concerns related to the cost of building housing, in addition to an analysis of the real estate market in the Region, Council chose to defer the implementation of our inclusionary zoning (IZ) bylaw.  As a refresher IZ would require developers in Major Transit Station Areas to set aside a small percentage of housing that is designated as affordable.  The percentage would start very small (as low as 1%) and rise to 5% by 2030 in some cases.  The IZ bylaw was intended to begin on March 31^st, however Council was advised that local market conditions have made the economics of housing challenging in recent years.  As a result we were advised that implementing IZ could delay the recovery on the residential market.

While I respect and value the expert opinion of staff, it was my belief that we should move ahead with the IZ bylaw.  There are of course uncertainties in the market, many of which are beyond the control of the city; construction costs, land valuation, interest rates, labour issues and more.  There are also many initiatives that are within the control of the city that we are tackling to improve the economic conditions for development; increasing permitted maximum heights to 30 storeys, allowing four-units and four-storeys on all lots across the city, a variety of Housing Accelerator Fund initiatives to enable more missing middle housing and to streamline development, and utilizing city-owned land, such as with projects at 2025 University Avenue and the recent purchase of St. Columba Church.  While I respect and empathize with the challenges the development community are facing, when some of the challenges are alleviated, not having IZ in place represents a host of potential lost opportunities to secure affordable housing from the private market, particularly in important transit rich areas of the city.

Ultimately Council chose to defer the implementation of IZ and while I did not support that, I fully appreciate and respect the difficult decision that Council faced.  I look forward to revisiting this conversation in the future, as staff have indicated IZ should still be implemented when it is feasible.

Other Council Business

In other Council business, we had a year in review of activities undertaken by the corporation in 2024, as well as a full review of the neighbourhood initiatives that we supported.  As alluded to above we purchased St. Columba church in Ward 5, to be used in an interim basis for arts and creative industries, with a long term vision for affordable housing.  We also approved the Sugarbush South corridor expansion and approved minimum parking reductions for affordable housing providers as part of our Housing Accelerator Fund initiatives.  An informal meeting was held for a potential future development at Albert and Seagram, a number of properties were designated under the Ontario Heritage Act, consultants were hired to help design and implement elements of our Fire Master Plan and more.  If you’d like to discuss any of these items in more detail, don’t hesitate to reach out.

In The Community

Outside of the City of Waterloo Council chambers, I had the pleasure of attending the Laurelwood Skating Party at Gatestone/Laurelwood Park and I also attended the Grand River Accessibility Advisory Committee (GRAAC) 20^th anniversary celebration.

I had a wonderful opportunity to go on a ride-along during the major winter storm to witness first hand the challenges and hard work that our snow plow operators do every day to keep our streets safe and clear.  It was an eye opening experience and an opportunity to learn and thank staff for all of the hard work they do during our winter months, particularly in a challenging snow season.

I attended the Vista Hills Public School Council meeting to discuss school pick-up and drop-off challenges and subsequently witnessed some of these challenges first hand as part of an education campaign for parents.  The Vista Hills Community Association held their AGM, which I was pleased to attend, as I look forward to them continuing to do the great work all of our neighbourhood associations do to build community in our neighbourhoods.

Lastly, I had the pleasure of meeting a number of Grade 5 students from Laurelwood Public School, as they visited city hall and held a mock Council meeting.  The following week I was invited to conduct a land-use planning talk with the Grade 8 students at LPS.  Getting the opportunity to engage, educate and learn from the youth in our community is perhaps my favourite part of my role and I hope it inspires some of the students to get more involved in local issues not only as youth, but in the future as well.

I hope that I will see all of you on April 6^th, either at the Council Community Fun Day (10am-12pm; Waterloo Memorial Rec Centre) for free skating and/or swimming, plus a chance to connect with Council; or at the Clair Hills Community Association skating party/AGM (2pm-4pm; Albert McCormick).

Take care