Skelly plunges into Hamilton’s stormwater fee controversy
Says she can’t comment on role of province’s regulatory changes
Flamborough-Glanbrook MPP Donna Skelly avoided her own government’s Greenbelt and urbanboundary controversies at a “rural community town hall” as she dove headfirst into a municipal one: Hamilton’s proposed stormwater fees.
“It’s just, in my opinion, wrongheaded,” she told about 70 residents at the Feb. 8 meeting at the Ancaster Fairgrounds, urging them to pack city hall’s council chambers to push for an exemption for rural residents and farmers.
Skelly began the session by touting her government’s record and opposition to Ottawa’s carbon tax before turning to the main topic, highlighting how councillors have voted on the stormwater fees, which have yet to receive final approval.
The former Ward 7 councillor maintained the charges can be scrapped by tightening the city’s budget, skewering spending on bike lanes, a bus barn, consultants, hiring of additional staff and increases to councillors’ office budgets.
“And, finally, we have a poet — a poet works for the City of Hamilton,” she said derisively, referring to the two-year pilot Poet in Place program, which pays an annual $10,000 honorarium.
Four farming representatives who addressed the meeting echoed Skelly’s call for a rural exemption from the proposed fees, which levy charges based on a property’s percentage of hard surfaces like roofs and parking lots that direct rain into sewers.
The city is considering a “green space” credit that could reduce the charges by up to 97 per cent for large properties like farms with mostly permeable surfaces.
“At the agricultural level none of it makes sense at all,” said Shawn Brenn of Brenn-B Farms in Waterdown, estimating the bill for his vegetable farm at $45,000 per year before any credit. “It makes us feel like it’s a grab for money to help fund other city initiatives.”
But Rockton resident Natalie Feisthauer questioned if Skelly’s government helped create the fee controversy, noting that Coun. Alex Wilson told a Jan. 19 meeting the charges were prompted by new provincial regulations.
At the time, Wilson said the new rules changed how the city must fund stormwater services and council’s goal is to generate the same amount of money, about $43 million per year, $3 million of which is spent in rural areas.
“Not true,” Skelly said, ending the meeting shortly thereafter by declaring support for an exemption for anyone who doesn’t receive a water bill.
Afterwards, Feisthauer said there are intense feelings about the stormwater fees and she appreciated hearing from affected farmers, but found Wilson’s meeting more informative and less political.
“I’m puzzled,” she said. “I understand that as the MPP for the riding she’s here to represent constituents and people with issues but I’m not entirely sure of the point of the meeting because it’s a municipal issue.”
Skelly said afterwards she was unaware of the provincial regulatory changes referenced by Wilson. “I haven’t heard it, I haven’t seen it and I’d like to look at it before I can comment,” she said.
Contacted for comment, Flamborough councillor Ted McMeekin said he believes farmers deserve and will receive an exemption from the fees, suggesting Skelly needs to do some homework on why they’re being proposed.
“The province has laid out a very strict series of procedural things that a municipality has to do and that’s the largest part of what’s driving the stormwater fee,” he said, calling the attacks on council’s spending priorities “cheap, rightwing stuff.”