A little over a year after a group presented its concept to city council to purchase Orillia’s post office building and create 40 new, mostly affordable, residential units in the downtown, plans continue to inch forward.
And while the hope remains that tenants could move in next year, the project proponents say they need some assistance — both financially and otherwise — from city council to ensure the plan moves forward.
“Raising the Roof requires the support of council to ensure the rezoning process is successful and that this project can bring community benefits to Orillia as soon as possible,” Adrian Dingle, the director of housing development for Raising the Roof (RTR), wrote in a recent letter to council.
RTR is asking the city for $834,000 in rebates and grants and, perhaps more importantly, for latitude when it comes to parking.
Under RTR’s plan, the post office will continue to operate out of the main floor of the building at 25 Peter St. N.
The plan is to renovate the second floor of the building to create 20 units and construct a third floor with another 20 units.
Officials say 24 units will boast “affordable” rent rates, while the other 16 units will have "CMHC average market rent" for Orillia. Most would be bachelor and one-bedroom units.
According to a staff report circulated to councillors July 22, there are just 12 parking spaces available on the site and nine will remain allocated for Canada Post, leaving just three spots for the proposed 40-unit housing development.
RTR believes that is sufficient and is expected to apply for a zoning bylaw amendment asking city council to approve the plan.
Dingle, in his memo to council, explained RTR commissioned a parking study to “quantify our impact to municipal parking limits in downtown Orillia.”
He said the study “confirmed our residential development could be serviced by the equivalent of three parking spots. As such, we feel it is appropriate – based on our partners’ experience at other local mixed-income buildings and the input of accredited third-party traffic consultants – that this development proceed without vehicle parking spots to support its residential operations.”
Dingle said RTR would agree to stipulate, in rental agreements and marketing material, that there is no parking available and “even committing to selecting market tenants who do not have vehicles.”
He also noted there would be ample bike parking and bike storage made available to tenants.
Due to the parking issues, Dingle said city staff, informally, have suggested RTR modify its plans so all 40 units are affordable.
“Raising the Roof has taken time to carefully review this direction from staff,” Dingle wrote.
He said RTR’s conclusion is “Orillia will be better served by a mixed-income building. Including market rent units in an affordable housing development creates a holistic community where people from different walks of life can form supportive neighbourhood bonds.”
He stressed this “concept also avoids the stigma of operating an entirely affordable building, particularly one geared toward a specific demographic or subset of the local community.”
In addition, he noted, “the additional income associated with including market rent units will allow this building to be constructed sooner and within the attainable parameters of the $5M capital fundraising campaign that we intend to launch this summer.”
In addition to some parking flexibility, RTR, in its presentation, also noted it is requesting $834,000 in grants and rebates from the city.
The request consists of a grant to support RTR’s cash equity contribution on the purchase price of the land ($106,500), a grant or exemption for 100% of development charges and municipal planning fees as well as a per-door grant of $10,000 for each of the affordable units.
“Such a request would be above and beyond that which could currently be accommodated within the city’s existing Affordable Housing Reserve fund which currently has a balance of $300,000,” notes a city staff report to councillors.
It’s expected the matter will be up for debate at an upcoming council meeting, as early as next month.
The letter from Dingle also gives council some insight into the costs of the ambitious project, its potential funding sources and a proposed timeline.
Dingle’s memo noted RTR was expected to finalize its purchase of the post office building at 25 Peter St. N. on June 30, via the Federal Lands Initiative, a CMHC affordable housing incentive program.
He says the proposal has a $13.4 million price tag and notes RTR has arranged financing and funding of $10.3M, leaving $3.1M remaining.
“Short term impact investment tools are available to provide these funds up front to ensure the project proceeds in a timely fashion and RTR will begin a $5M capital campaign this summer, locally and through our national partners, to ensure interim equity contributions are replaced,” Dingle wrote.
“With the anticipated success of our rezoning application this summer and fall, we expect residential occupancy in late 2023.”
BACKGROUND:
RTR is partnering locally with Redwood Park Communities (RPC) to arrange building and tenant services including intakes, ongoing support for the affordable units and property management of the commercial and residential spaces.
"RPC is well established in Simcoe County and will work with local agencies such as The Lighthouse and Couchiching Jubilee House to select and support tenants," notes the report circulated to city councillors.
Community Builders (CB) will integrate their trainees into the labour force of the general contractor and will ultimately be responsible for finishing the units including drywall, taping, painting and installation of finishes and appliances.
As a result of this project, a minimum of 40 trainees will experience CB’s full training program and receive hands on training and exposure to this job site throughout construction. CB is a Barrie-based social enterprise contracting group specializing in providing hands-on training in the trades to people with barriers to employment.
The Federation of Canadian Municipalities, through their Sustainable Affordable Housing program, is funding RTR to complete a study project at this site to explore the maximum potential for energy efficiency and carbon neutrality. Following the study, RTR will receive up to 20% of total project costs depending on the energy consumption reductions available through the build.
The Federal Lands Initiative (FLI) is a CMHC program that identifies vacant and underutilized federal-owned buildings and arranges for their disposition and conversion to affordable housing. The building at 25 Peter St. was identified by this program and RTR won the RFP in 2020. FLI will be supporting RTR by providing $1.39M of the total purchase price.
CMHC has also provided seed funding in the amount of $140,000 (including a $65,000 grant) to support the ongoing due diligence and preliminary design process. In addition to this funding, RTR will apply for grant and loan-based funding through the co-investment fund.
