Wellington North council is prepared to stay on as a landlord, despite concerns raised by finance committee chairman councillor Andy Lennox.
Council voted at its Oct. 21 meeting to continue renting the former Kenilworth Public School to Wellington County OPP for use as an officer training centre.
The township currently rents the facility out for $9,900 per year and council instructed CAO Mike Givens to move ahead with a new five-year rental agreement with the OPP.
However, Lennox voted against the agreement, citing costs to maintain the 50-year-old building, including a roof replacement that could be as high as $125,000. A pledge by the OPP to pay up to $75,000 for the work, wasn’t enough to persuade Lennox.
The councillor, known for his tight-fisted approach to township spending and budgeting, said the township will barely break even under the agreement.
In a financial scenario presented by Lennox, it would take the township 12 years to break even on its rental agreement based on the $125,000 estimate for roof repairs. If the roof cost was $100,000 it would take the township about six years to break even, Lennox said.
“At best this proposed expenditure is a break even proposal over the next six to 12 years,” he told council. “(The) building is approximately 50 years old and will likely require further maintenance expenditure over that period.”
The councillor suggested council consider selling the building for at an estimated price of $200,000 and reinvest the money for budget shortfalls to carry out infrastructure maintenance and new work.
“We are already falling further behind in maintaining our infrastructure,” Lennox said.
“Every year we delay important projects to meet our budget revenue. Since taking office we have worked to manage operating costs more tightly and we have raised taxes at more than twice the rate of inflation to improve our financial position.”
Lennox said with provincial and federal infrastructure funding dwindling, the township is faced with tougher budgetary demands for infrastructure work.
“Much more work needs to be done to put our municipality on a solid financial footing for the future.
“We need to continue to make progress and avoid making taxation crippling for residents and businesses.
“Closing the financial gap will get progressively more difficult.”
Lennox said council needs “to look critically at all assets we have and evaluate if we need them to deliver our core services.
“If they are not needed to deliver our core high-priority services then we should seriously consider eliminating them and re-deploy those resources toward the core services.”
Givens said the OPP “would like to stay in the building and they would like to stay for five years.”
The OPP also wants the township to remove any clause in the agreement that would allow council to put the property up for sale.
“They want a five-year commitment,” Mayor Ray Tout said.
Council approved the rental agreement, with Lennox opposed. Council will look at possibly severing off a rear section of the property that could be sold for residential lots.
