A community organization is asking High River Town Council to put a pause on a potential redevelopment project.
Members of Neighbourhood Rescue High River filled the council chambers during the Aug. 11 Regular Meeting of Council.
The group is concerned about the redevelopment of the property at 605 MacLeod Tr SW in High River into multifamily housing.
“Our concern is that this development, as proposed, will set the standard or set the process for what's going to happen in the rest of the Southwest quadrant,” said Dave Dobson, Neighbourhood Rescue member.
In July, the group sponsored a public meeting and invited the developer, Jordan Laporte, to attend and share up-to-date information about the proposed redevelopment.
The group took a survey of residents' concerns who attended the meeting, and common concerns included the preservation of the neighbourhoods character and heritage, the scale and aesthetics of the building in comparison to the surroundings, parking and traffic flow, and the precedent the project would set.
“This is quite likely the first time we've had a demolition of a major building with a proposal to redevelop in that area of town,” Dobson said.
According to the group, there are areas of the town’s plan, which was approved in 2024, that oppose the redevelopment proposal.
Such as, the dedication to the maintenance of the historic feel of High River, ensuring the character of new developments complements the existing neighbourhoods character, maintaining green and forested areas of the town, and providing landscape design, including transitional buffers between any property and its neighbours.
“We believe that the redevelopment as presented puts High River at a crossroads. We must be bold. We must demand developers recognize our values,” Dobson said.
He added, “People want to live here. We have relatively inexpensive land in parts of town that could be bought and redeveloped. We need to manage that.”
The group is insisting that the development process is well-managed, with the future of the town in mind.
Dobson explained that the group is hopeful for members of the community to work with the developer and the town’s planning department and be more involved in the process.
“Community members, unfortunately, are not afforded an opportunity to comment unless there is some variance that has to be allotted or granted,” Dobson said. “We would like a role to play in making these things happen in a way that suits the town and the neighbourhood.”
The group is asking council to push pause on the process, and assign a representative from the planning department to act as a coordinator and facilitator to bring the community and developer together to establish a design that is appropriate for the town.
“We're not anti-development. We expect development will occur,” Dobson said. “We would like to see something with better massing and better buffering between this and other community properties.”
The town’s planning department currently doesn’t have a complete application for the redevelopment.
“Having a three-story apartment building is not an astronomical thing. In the Southwest, there's quite a bit of it,” Mayor Craig Snodgrass said. “What the concerns are is, of course, the scale of the building currently does not conform to the Land Use Bylaw.”
He explained that the property has not been historically designated.
“It's an emotional piece of property for all of us, but at the same time, the property owner owns the property, and we have to be very careful. There are property owner rights.”
The Land Use Bylaw was designed to accommodate developers' ability to design and create within the context of the community.
“There might be some things we need to revisit, a Land Use Bylaw is organic and needs to be reviewed, that doesn’t mean we rush to change it right now,” Councillor Michael Nychyk said. “At this stage, it’s a working relationship between the developer. I would like the community to give the process the opportunity to have that working relationship.”