KENILWORTH – Local businesses and property owners can look forward to a new township incentive to help reduce the cost of making buildings more energy efficient.
Sean Kelly, of the rural planning firm Plural, presented township council with an overview of an update to Wellington North’s Community Improvement Plan (CIP) at a meeting last month.
Along with updates to four existing financial incentive programs comes the addition of a new green energy grant.
Eligible projects — such as energy audits, renovations, and green roofs — could have half of the costs or $5,000 (whichever is less) covered by the grant.
Kelly credited township economic development officer Dale Small with recommending the grant, which aims to encourage property owners to improve the energy efficiency of existing buildings, and facilitate installation of small-scale renewable energy systems, and active and sustainable transportation infrastructure, such as bike racks and EV charging stations.
Updates to the other financial incentive programs include expanded eligibility and increased maximum funding limits.
Notably, the maximum funding has been increased for perpendicular signage and the township’s building conversion and improvement grant, with more eligible items also added to the latter.
The CIP is in its 12th year, and received updates in 2017 and 2019, with the most recent update including Wellington County’s Invest Well program.
“Wellington North has done very well,” Kelly told council on June 19.
The timing for the CIP was right, and the programming the right fit for a rural community of Wellington North’s size, council heard.
Since 2011, there have been at least 150 applications for CIP-supported funds according to a Plural report referenced by Kelly.
Successful applicants have received $442,100 from township CIP grants or loans since the program was started, and contributed a further $2.72 million to bring improvements to fruition, according to the report.
The same report pegs the total value of improvements in the CIP’s lifetime at $3.16 million.
Kelly said that amount “is a really remarkable success for communities this size … and I think you should all be proud of it.”
The CIP is a provincially-legislated economic development tool, allowing municipalities to incentivize private investment into commercial, institutional and industrial buildings and spaces with public dollars.
This latest iteration, which also expands Wellington North’s “Community Improvement Project Area” township-wide, would carry the township into 2028 before another review is recommended.
It’s anticipated council will pass a bylaw to bring the updated CIP and the new green energy grant into effect on July 24 — the first council meeting following a 30-day public review period currently underway.
