Township scores funding for infrastructure work

By Morgan Ian Adams, Collingwood Enterprise-Bulletin  January 15, 2013

CLEARVIEW TWP. — Ken Ferguson admits he did his million-dollar happy dance.

Or, that should be, $10 million, after an impromptu announcement at Monday night’s Clearview Township council meeting by Simcoe-Grey MP Kellie Leitch that the municipality was successful in getting infrastructure money from the federal and provincial governments.

The funding will help the municipality to pay for a sewage pipeline to Wasaga Beach’s sewage treatment facility, thereby allowing growth in the Stayner area.

Leitch’s appearance on Monday was completely last-minute, and will be followed up in a couple of weeks with an official announcement.

On Monday, with the OK on the $5-million federal portion of the funding, provincial infrastructure and transportation minister, Bob Chiarelli, gave the approval for the matching provincial share.

“It was very much on and off, on and off all day,” said Clearview’s mayor. “This is a true partnership from all levels of government, and especially our neighbours.”

The turning point leading up to Monday night’s announcement was a meeting a year ago in Denis Lebel’s office; Leitch had arranged a meeting with the federal minister of transportation and infrastructure and she, Simcoe-Grey MPP Jim Wilson, Ferguson, Wasaga Beach mayor Cal Patterson and municipal staff were all there to plead the township’s case for funding.

“This was a huge leap of faith… and (the federal bureaucrats) had never seen anything like it before,” said Ferguson. “It’s a credit to MP Leitch to make it happen.”

It was there that the municipality proved — even after several years of working through the Environmental Assessment process — that the engineering behind the idea was solid.

“When it came to servicing, we needed to look at the most efficient and effective option,” said Clearview CAO Sue MacKenzie. “The best option for wastewater was the connection to Wasaga Beach.”

The second hurdle was a decision late in November by the township council to go ahead with the first phase of a servicing component to increase sewage treatment capacity in Stayner, working with Wasaga Beach.

The two municipalities had earlier reached an agreement that Wasaga Beach would provide 5,000 cubic metres of treatment capacity for Stayner’s sewage treatment plant, and the first, $2.9-million phase, would see construction of a pumping station at Knox Road East, with a forcemain to carry sewage under the Nottawasaga River to the treatment plant — required work for projects in Wasaga Beach, but also sized to accommodate the flow from

Stayner. Ferguson expects that work to start this year.

“I’m proud of staff, and especially my council” for that decision, said Ferguson. “It could have easily gone south.”

That decision met a Dec. 1 deadline to participate in the Knox Road work so the Wasaga Beach option remained open. Township council also gave developers an option to pre-purchase development charges for the sewage component in December. Within the week, several developers of projects in Stayner lined up with more than $1.2 million.

“I am pleased to see the response of the development community,” Ferguson stated in a news release in early December. “This shows that they believe in partnering to provide needed services and it also demonstrates council’s commitment to ensuring the our taxpayers will not be funding new infrastructure.”

The amount raised exceeded the first $616,000 payment that was due for the work on Dec. 1.

“That proved we were doing the right thing,” Ferguson told the E-B on Tuesday. “This allows us to plan for the future, for Stayner, for jobs, and for the environment… this will allow us to grow for the next 30 years.”

The second phase of the work, estimated to cost $9.4 million, would see the construction of a pumping station in Stayner and sewer lines to Knox Road.

There is also a separate component for servicing the industrial area of Stayner at a cost of $4 million; that waste would be treated at the Stayner facility, with only residential wastewater bring processed through the Wasaga Beach treatment facility.

The municipality’s portion of the funding is expected to be fully recovered from developers.

Ferguson expects it will be another two or three years before construction begins on second phase, though he noted that will be driven by the economy and how quickly developers are able to begin work on their projects.