Region mulling grant to local BIAs

By Chris Jones/The Oshawa Express

While Oshawa city council recently voted to support the local BIA’s request for aide from the region, regional council referred the request back to staff.

At the most recent city council meeting, Ward 4 City and Regional Councillor Rick Kerr brought forward a motion to support the Oshawa Downtown Business Improvement Area’s (BIA) request for a grant from the region in the amount of 25 per cent, or one fiscal quarter, of their 2020 budgeted monies.

“Whereas under normal circumstances these funds come from a BIA tax levy charged to their members, and are collected on behalf of the Oshawa Downtown BIA by the City of Oshawa, and whereas if the request to the Region of Durham is successful as a grant, then it would only be fair that the BIA tax levy paid by the members of the downtown Oshawa BIA be reduced by an amount equal to the amount of the monies the Downtown Oshawa BIA receives through a grant,” reads Kerr’s motion to city council.

Ultimately, Kerr’s motion requested that city council support the request from the BIA.

“The ask that the BIA is looking for is something in the neighbourhood of $350,000 to be proportionately given to each of the BIAs,” explained Kerr. “The idea is that these BIAs need to have a start up program to jump start the economies in their respective downtowns, and they need to work with a number of BIA businesses to do that.”

With his motion, Kerr hoped to help ease the burden many local BIA members are facing because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ward 4 City Councillor Derek Giberson seconded the motion, and emphasized the importance of keeping the BIA in an economically viable position.

“It’s really important to keep the BIA organization as an entity in a financially viable position, while providing some relief to the members themselves,” he said.

Ward 1 City Councillor Rosemary McConkey also voiced her support for the request.

“The letter pretty clearly spells it out. Businesses are suffering and there’s going to be some major work come into play that attract people into the downtowns,” she said.

However, two councillors were outspoken in their opposition to the request.

Ward 5 City and Regional Councillor Brian Nicholson said he will not support the motion at both the city and regional levels.

“I see it as a transferring of the burden to the taxpayers,” he explained. “I also believe that the expenditure is wholly unnecessary as the budget of the BIA has increased tremendously this year, and the vast majority of the budget was aimed for events that were to be held in the downtown, especially during the summer months.”

He went on to add these events in the summer have all been cancelled, and noted during regional council that Oshawa’s BIA increased its budget from approximately $200,000 to $600,000 in 2020.

“I believe the BIA has more than sufficient funds to look after its needs moving forward to at least the end of August,” he said to city council.

Ward 2 City Councillor Jane Hurst lent her support to Nicholson, noting she has a couple concerns.

“The money budgeted for 2020 has already been allocated and spent, and as councillor Nicholson has already said, a lot of these downtown events have been cancelled for this year, and heaven only knows when we’re going to get back to this,” she said.

While she appreciates the work the BIA has done downtown, she thinks it’s time to take a step back.

Ultimately, city council voted to support the request, with Nicholson, Hurst, and Ward 5 City Councillor John Gray voting against the motion.

However, when the same request from Oshawa’s BIA, as well as several others, made its way to regional council, it was referred back to staff.

Nicholson once again raised the same points he did at city council, and said he wouldn’t lend his support to the request.

When Clarington councillor Joe Neal and Mayor Dave Barton made a motion to refer it back to staff, it was approved with only Ajax Mayor Shaun Collier, and Pickering Councillor Bill MacLean voting against.