The city of Cranbrook will borrow just over $9-million to connect the Shadow Mountain sewer to the municipal system.
Mayor Wayne Price said this project will be paid for using a local area service fee.
“Any costs associated with it will be borne by the Shadow Mountain community, so there will be no cost to the individual taxpayer,” said Price. “This is fully funded by the residents of Shadow Mountain.”
This comes after city council adopted the Temporary Borrowing Bylaw on Monday.
The project will receive funding so long as Municipal Finance Authority of BC debenture proceeds come through.
Price said the project has been a long time in the making.
“This goes back to about 2006 and it’s time. With the city’s involvement now, it’s going to go forward. The city is going to oversee the project,” said Price.
Cranbrook had to take over the sewer work, even though developers typically pay for any infrastructure associated with construction.
“In this particular instance, it started in phases out there. Originally it had one developer, and it got into financial problems when we saw that economic downturn in 2006 and 2007,” said Price. “We’ve had multiple developers coming online and getting involved with this project over the last number of years.”
Price said this stalled any hopes of infrastructure work getting done.
“They were just waiting for a developer, or a set of developers to take control of the project and just get it done, but it just wasn’t happening. So the city didn’t have a choice,” said Price. “We had to put a cap on building because of the temporary sewer situation out there. In order to have any further development, a sewer line had to be put in and the city just took control of it.”
City staff said the project’s cost and the amount funded through the temporary borrowing bylaw will be converted into a long-term loan once work is wrapped up.
Construction is set to begin later in the spring, with most of the work expected to be wrapped up by the end of this year.