High River council evens the playing field

The Town of High River is making a change to its agreement with Homes by Dream.

They'd approached the Town about its use of a letter of credit as security.

Mayor Craig Snodgrass says it's a matter of making sure the Town and its ratepayers are protected.

"When you're doing a development, and I don't care if you're doing a tiny little project like a little ramp in front of your business or you're doing a full scale development like Dreams of the Hampton's or Montrose or any of these big developments, those developers have to put securities in place with the Town of High River to ensure that all the infrastructure is built properly and if there's any issues then we have money to go in and fix it  and it doesn't cost taxpayers money," he says.

The issue is that a letter of credit can affect the developer's ability to borrow for the actual project they want to build.

Mayor Snodgrass says they'll use bonds for Dream's Montrose Phase 3.

However, council turned down their request for a reduction in the security.

Council also directed Administration to look at a more comprehensive bond structure that could be incorporated into the Town's Security Policy and bring it forward to council in the future. 

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