Plan to clean up West Hunt Club land approved

The 11.6-hectare site on West Hunt Club between Merivale and Prince of Wales was since the early 1950s primarily a petroleum storage facility and is now vacant.

But two Toronto developers, Triform Developments Inc. and Unitrim Developments Inc., now own the land and have plans to build a Lowe's home improvement store and other retail and entertainment buildings.

Various environmental studies have revealed the soil and groundwater on the land are full of contaminants, and must be removed before the site is developed.

The companies applied to the city for help to cover the costs of the clean-up under the Brownfield Property Tax Assistance/Rehabilitation Grant program, which would see the developers pay for the clean-up cost while the city pays 50 cents for every dollar spent in the form of forgiven tax revenue and development fees.

City to cap contribution atclose to$4.6M

The committee agreed to the proposal, and put a cap on the amount the city pays out in forgiven taxes and fees at $4,579,511.

Councillor Keith Egli said the city will more than earn back its investment in the form of future tax revenue and new jobs created once the site is cleaned up and developed.

"We went over the details and we thought that it was a very positive step for it because that's a site that's been sitting vacant for a long time," said Egli.

"Numerous people have looked at it but haven't been able to find a way to make it work primarily because of the cost of the clean-up... the clean-up is going to cost close to ten million dollars," said Egli.

City council is expected to give its approval to the cleanup plan at its next meeting.