Metro Vancouver real estate developers might be a bit more cautious if a proposed hike to development cost charges goes through this Friday.
The regional district鈥檚 board of directors is set to vote on an increase to those charges, known as DCCs, which utilities committee chair Darrell Mussatto says is more than a decade overdue.
鈥淲e as politicians have been asleep at the switch,鈥� Mussatto said. 鈥淲e should have been doing this 10-15 years ago.鈥�
Development cost charges are a way for developers to fund new sanitary sewer works such as new pipes, pumping stations and wastewater treatment plant expansions. The policy in Metro Vancouver, Mussatto said, is that new growth pays for itself.
The last price increase was in 1997, but if the motion passes Friday, some areas could see their rates triple.
That includes the Fraser region 鈥� which encompasses Burnaby, New Westminster, Port Moody, Port Coquitlam, Surrey, 91原创 City, White Rock and parts of Delta, 91原创 Township, Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows.
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Costs to build a single-family development in the Fraser region could shoot up by 213 per cent, while costs for townhouses and apartments could increase by 210 per cent and 226 per cent, respectively.
While other regions will fare better under the proposal, everyone except for the Vancouver region will see their development cost charges at least double, while Vancouver will see only slightly smaller increases.
Coun. David Woods of Surrey is worried about what that will do to already unaffordable housing prices.
鈥淔or a normal middle class working family, it鈥檚 becoming harder and harder to achieve home ownership,鈥� Woods said.
Mussatto doesn鈥檛 think that homebuyers will bear the brunt of the cost. Instead, he sees developers becoming much more careful about what they build and where they build it.
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鈥淲hoever is selling units is going to sell them for as much as they can already,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not like someone is getting a discount now.鈥�
Woods acknowledged there is no way to keep development cost charges where they are. He鈥檚 particularly concerned about the sewage lines under the Fraser River not being seismically sound.
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Developers have asked for the price hikes to be phased in over three years, Mussatto said, but he suspects there just isn鈥檛 time to wait.
鈥淲e鈥檙e in a spot where we have to do something,鈥� he said. 鈥淥ur growth is in the range of 40,000 per year [and] we鈥檙e spending hundreds of millions to accommodate that growth already.鈥�
If the proposal passes, new costs are expected to go in by spring 2018.
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