PUSLINCH - The County of Wellington and Puslinch Township are considering changes to the zoning bylaw for home industries, looking at such potential issues as noise and parking.
It's a township initiated amendment that affects all lands in the Township of Puslinch where home industries are a permitted use.
On March 23, the Township of Puslinch and the County of Wellington held a public meeting about the proposed changes to the zoning bylaw for home industries.
Home industry is a small-scale use providing a service that is accessory to a dwelling unit or agricultural operation. It may be conducted as a whole or as part of an accessory building, and may include a carpentry shop, a metal working shop, a welding shop, or minor equipment repair shop.
Zach Prince, county’s senior planner, said a public meeting last December identified concerns with the bylaw and staff has reworded it to address those concerns.
Those concerns centre on outdoor storage, employee parking, noise from equipment, toxic chemicals, and work where employees congregate at the site in the morning and then move off-site for the work, such as landscaping companies.
Township and county staff have proposed changes to the bylaw such as the minimum lot sizes permitted to have a home industry; outdoor storage; setbacks including from abutting dwellings; scale and maximum area.
“We’re also planning to change the definition of a home industry in the bylaw and clarify that a home industry has to be located entirely within an accessory building. We want them to take up the whole space or area and not just a part of an accessory building,” explained Prince during the meeting.
“We also want to propose a setback requirement of 30 metres, and require a permit for vehicles that regularly access the business such as employee vehicles or business vehicles.”
Businesses that are not allowed to operate as home industries include restaurants, animal clinics, warehouses, sale or storage of vehicles, outdoor storage, and kennels. There are different bylaws that regulate those kinds of businesses.
Marc Reid, vice-president of the Wellington Federation of Agriculture (WFA), was concerned about the language in the bylaw and wanted clarification on whether home industries will impede farm operations in accessory buildings.
“We’re really not changing anything for a larger agricultural lot, we’re really trying to address concerns around smaller lots or residential lots, kind of like where there's more concentrated residential uses,” said Prince.
“We haven’t introduced any language related to agricultural or farm uses, but that’s because our opinion is that home industry would fall under the services of a welding shop or carpentry shop.”
Meanwhile, Puslinch resident, Barclay Nap, pointed out that “if the bylaw is too restrictive, it may discourage someone wanting to start a business” when home industries is how many local businesses started.
County planning staff will compile the comments and include it in the draft bylaw. They will present it to the council at a future date.
