Rockwood church seeking severance

ROCKWOOD  – The Rockwood United Church, located at 119 Harris Street, is seeking to sever a house next door (107 Harris Street) from the church land. 

Both the church and the neighbouring house are currently zoned institutional and the applicant – the church – wants the house to be zoned for residential use.

The severed property would be approximately 0.5 acres in size.

The church had previously applied to sever the neighbouring property to create a church parking lot, but that application has since been abandoned. 

Township staff issued the following conditions for the application. 

– the applicant must provide additional parking as the lot currently allows for one vehicle;

– applicant must pay the township the required cash-in-lieu contribution for parkland dedication for the creation of one new lot; 

– zoning compliance for both lots be achieved; and 

– applicant provide spatial separation and unprotected opening calculations as per the Ontario Building Code. 

Mayor Chris White, seemed curious about the last condition.

“What are you talking about?” asked White. “There’s too many windows in the church?”

Wellington County planner Thomas Freeman said the fire code spells out the number of windows and doors a building can have within a certain distance of a lot line.

In this case, the church would either have to upgrade the building face or move the lot line of the severed lot. 

The church is a designated historical building, therefore it is likely the lot line of the severed land will be adjusted. 

Councillor Corey Woods asked about the cash-in-lieu contribution as the house and its lot were previously severed before the church had bought the land and merged it into one lot with the church.

Township staff assured council the cash-in-lieu contribution would likely be waived as technically a new lot is not being created. 

Council voted unanimously in favour of the application, which will move to the County of Wellington land division committee in March. 

Councillor Bruce Dickieson was absent from the meeting.