Attracting investment: Downtown Whitby action plan

NRU
Oct. 26, 2016
By Leah Wong

While the Town of Whitby has been growing in recent years, it has struggled to attract new investment to its downtown in lieu of development opportunities elsewhere in the town. Seeking to create a walkable urban downtown, the town has developed an action plan to incentivize development.

Last week planning and development committee recommended council approve the Downtown Whitby Action Plan, which targets projects that will help to attract new investment to its downtown.

“A big focus of the action plan is to try and get other types of incentives, some of them being financial incentives,” Whitby downtown and cultural heritage principal planner Christy Chrus told NRU.

One of the action plan projects is to update the Downtown Whitby Community Improvement Plan, which offers a facade improvement grant of up to $5,000 to downtown property owners.

Chrus said the town is considering tax increment financing, increasing the facade grant or adjusting development charges or planning and permit fees. For example, increasing the facade grant would be beneficial as it would encourage owners of two- and three-storey buildings to renovate.

“We hope [the updated CIP] will be a big catalyst for downtown Whitby,” said Chrus. “With Whitby we’ve had other areas [develop] - we’ve still got a lot of greenfield space left , maybe that’s why downtown hasn’t developed as much.”

In March staff began seeking community feedback on its draft action plan. Staff learned that the plan was on the right track but needed some refining.

“Generally the feedback we received was in line with the action items and incentives we established back in March,” said Chrus. “We reprioritized some items based on feedback and adjusted the timing of projects.”

Through the consultation process many residents indicated they want a permanent home for the farmers’ market, presently held at the Old Fire Hall, and extended hours for more shopping flexibility. They also indicated that they want the Old Fire Hall site, which has been vacant for a number of years and is owned by the town, developed. [See NRU March 25, 2015 GTA edition.] While staff have added the search for a permanent home for the farmers’ market to the action plan, the future of the Old Fire Hall site remains an internal discussion.

Council will consider the financial implications of the action plan during the 2017 budget process. If the plan is approved by council, an interdepartmental action team will provide quarterly updates on the plan
implementation.