PUSLINCH ‒ Several councillors were uncomfortable with the idea that residents be allowed to petition for a road to be resurfaced while potentially forcing their neighbours to foot the bill against their wills.
One of 16 recommendations detailed in the township’s new Road Management Plan, several councillors were hesitant to support a recommendation allowing property owners to petition for existing gravel roads to be paved, but at the cost of homeowners living on that stretch of road.
According to the recommendation, if residents were to petition for road resurfacing, a majority vote would result in the municipality financing the proposed project. However, whatever the total cost would be the responsibility of the residents to pay for upfront or financed over the next 10 years.
“This was added as a way to cater to the residents that have been reaching out about an upgrade to contribute financially for a portion,” said municipal advisor, Matt Scott, during a recent meeting.
But Coun. Jessica Goyda felt the recommendation would cause grief and upset if approved.
“Let’s say we had ten people living on a road and six of them want to convert the road from gravel; what happens if those other four residents don’t have (the means)?” said Goyda. “I’m just uncomfortable with the whole thing.”
Coun. Sara Bailey shared Goyda’s concerns, having experienced them during road maintenance discussions at her cottage.
"Everyone is supposed to pitch in but not everyone wants to," said Bailey. “It gets a little dicey with relationships and stuff because then some people are paying and others aren’t yet they're still benefiting from the improvement of the road and that doesn’t sit well with neighbours.”
Coun. Russel Hurst appreciated that while the recommendation is an option, he would be supportive of holding off.
“Philosophically, from my perspective, I think it’s a public road and the township needs to foot the bill of any improvements,” said Hurst.
Coun. Jon Sepulis took passing the recommendation a step further when he suggested removing the criteria for gravel roads to allow more room for staff to make improvements.
But acting CAO and municipal clerk, Courtenay Hoytfox, asked that the criteria remain for the sake of consistency.
“When staff receive requests for conversions from gravel to asphalt, which we often do, it’s extremely helpful to have criteria laid out in a document that we can point to,” said Hoytfox. “It helps explain to residents why their road might not be on the list.”
According to the plan, no roads currently meet the criteria for asphalt conversion, with all needing some level of upgrades prior to hard surfacing.
Roads missing the fewest criteria were:
• Carter Road, Arkell Road (County Road 37) to Cooks Mill Road
• Cooks Mill Road, Carter Road to Bridge
• Concession 7, Concession 1 to Gore Road
• Gilmour Road, Victoria Road South to new subdivision
• Pioneer Trail, Laird Road West to Niska Road
• Sideroad 10 South, Concession 1 to Concession 2
Council decided to pause the recommendation allowing residents to petition for their gravel roads to be repaved but chose to leave in the evaluation criteria to be re-examined post-completion of the 2023 projects.
Isabel Buckmaster is the Local Journalism Initiative reporter for GuelphToday. LJI is a federally-funded program.
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