UPDATED: Ottawa city council approved the deal with Ashcroft Homes on July 10, along with a motion calling on staff to develop a communications strategy around the closure of Navan Road and monitor its impact on traffic.
Homeowners who bought into Ashcroft Homes’ Eastboro development in 2019 — and spent over a year looking at completed homes they couldn’t live in — could soon see an end to their residential limbo.
Lawyers for the city and the developer reached a deal on Monday for how to split the cost of a new and expensive storm sewer system, prompting a last-minute meeting of the planning and housing committee.
Members approved an agreement to reimburse $30 million for construction, land and other costs, which Ashcroft will pay upfront. If all goes as planned, the full council will greenlight the deal on Wednesday.
Orléans South-Navan Coun. Catherine Kitts said she feels angry and handcuffed, after a process her colleagues called “terrible” and “dysfunctional.”
“I have been advised by our legal counsel not to share my true thoughts on … the experience of working with this developer,” Kitts told the committee. “But I find it deplorable that these folks have been in this situation.”
The construction would start this summer. If the developer can complete it within six months, the city has agreed, as an incentive, to pay additional interest.
Homeowner expresses hope
Sami Bibi is one of about two dozen owners whose homes have been fully constructed but have been unlivable since last year, due to a lack of storm sewer connection.
Bibi’s family was attracted to the Eastboro development because of its proximity to a secondary school. They signed a contract in 2019, and moved into an Orléans rental home in 2021, shortly before they were due to take ownership, in order to avoid seeing their son change school districts.
What followed was a perpetual cycle of updates that all led to more waiting.
“We have some boxes that are still closed,” he said. “We didn’t open all the boxes. We said, “we’ll move in six months. What’s the point?””
He said he has spent roughly $90,000 on rent that could otherwise have gone toward paying down the mortgage on his roughly $700,000 property, or toward a retirement investment.
Staff told councillors it was wrong for the city to issue any building permits before this agreement was in place, and said it would not happen again. But Bibi feels lucky that he’s not one of over 100 buyers who are still waiting for the city to issue building permits.
Clay forced pricier option
The Orléans development hit a road block when crews looking to install a sewer found the bottom of their trench was filling with nearly liquid clay soil, explained Derrick Moodie, the city’s planning services director.
That created an unsafe work environment, he said, which forced the effort to be abandoned. Instead they’d need to tear up the entire street.
Ashcroft launched a court case against the city amid those mounting expenses.
“I wasn’t sure who is more responsible for the delay. Is it the builder or is it the city? Because the city said it’s the builder, the builder said it’s the city,” said Bibi.
Kitts feels certain she knows the answer.
“What Ashcroft just agreed to was always our position,” she said. “But, because of legal proceedings, we are now in a situation where [the closure of Navan Road] is coming at us fast and furious. There’s no heads-up to the community.”
At the heart of the issue is the “oversizing” of infrastructure to prepare for future development, which the city says is a common practice.
Ashcroft will pay for the portion that services its community, while the city has said it will reimburse the company for what it spends on the excess capacity and then recoup that cost with development charges on future projects.
Closure set to further snarl traffic
The latest work is set to start in 30 days.
While Kitts said she feels for the incredibly stressful situation facing homebuyers, she hopes the construction will be pushed back to give local businesses and commuters time to prepare for a lengthy and disruptive road closure.
One public delegate, Mathieu Surprenant, signed up to speak at the last-minute meeting. He explained what an “extremely hard burden” the road closure will be on seasonal businesses.
“This is a main road. When it was one lane open … we had about a 40 per cent decrease in revenue,” he said. “I cannot imagine what a full closure would do to all these businesses, employees and all of that.”
Surprenant said having a few months to plan their next steps would make a world of difference.
And while the city said it has secured an agreement for one public consultation meeting and signage to flag that businesses remain open, Kitts said that cannot compare to the more than a year of notice given for construction on Bank Street.
When can owners move in?
Manny DiFilippo, Ashcroft’s chief financial officer, declined to comment.
When asked by email when homeowners may move in, he told CBC, “it is difficult to assess timing, as there are many moving parts that will need to be coordinated and the outcome and terms of the front-end agreement is the start of that process.”
Moodie hopes the goal of this process is to get waiting owners into their homes and have “other purchasers in this subdivision be able to see their home start construction.”
The Bibi family understands the process may still see delays beyond the new six-month construction timeline, but any progress is welcomed.
“I waited many years, so if it’s one or two months [more]…” He shrugged.
Until that time, Bibi will continue to look at his vacant home every day, as he drives his son to school.