|
Posted Apr 9, 2008, 3:46 PM
|
Registered User
|
|
Join Date: May 2007
Posts: 1,808
|
|
Claridge bites back at city council...
Quote:
Ottawa's chance for portrait gallery at risk as developer threatens to pull bid
Jake Rupert, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Wednesday, April 09, 2008
The drive to have the Portrait Gallery of Canada located in Ottawa is in "jeopardy."
After a city committee rejected his wishes last night, an area developer says if council doesn't approve a development to host the gallery on his terms, he will not even bid to have the national institution in the city.
Bill Malhotra is president of Claridge Homes, the only area company bidding to have the gallery in Ottawa, and after yesterday's committee decisions, he says the project is hanging by a thread and council better realize quickly that he is serious.
"This is not a joke. If council does not accept our buildings and our plans, we are out of it, we won't be bidding," he said.
Mr. Malhotra said to make the project work financially, the city must double current residential density limits on the site on Metcalfe Street between Lisgar and Nepean streets, where he wants to build two, 27-storey residential towers and the gallery.
The matter will go to council for a final decision later this month. However, last night, councillors on the city's planning committee rejected the request.
By a vote of six to two, the committee voted to keep the current density rules for the site, meaning the maximum height of the residential towers would be less than half of what the company says it needs.
The committee also voted to make approval of the development contingent on the company winning the right to host the gallery. The company was asking for unconditional approval.
Mr. Malhotra said if that's council's final decision, "we are out of it."
Somerset Councillor Diane Holmes led the charge to reject the company's demands, even though there is public support to have the gallery in Ottawa. She said she was not about to be held hostage and be forced to support a project that might not include the gallery.
She said the company's unconditional demands are "totally inappropriate," and to grant them would mean turning the area "into a totally shaded wind tunnel that would not be a friendly place."
Immediately after the vote, Mayor Larry O'Brien's chief of staff, Eric Lamoureux, sent an e-mail to councillors calling on them to reject the committee's decision and support the city's planning staff recommendations of 20- and 24-storey residential towers on the site.
In the note, he said the committee's decision puts "the entire portrait gallery in Ottawa in jeopardy. The mayor will be advocating for the staff-recommended 20- and 24-storey height buildings. Let's turn this around."
The bid by Claridge Homes was put together and rushed through the city's planning and rezoning process in order to meet a federal government deadline of April 16. That deadline has now been extended to May 16.
The company's plans would see two 27-storey towers fronting Nepean Street, opposite a multi-storey parking garage and kitty corner to the 27-storey Place Bell Canada building. The two-storey gallery would face Metcalfe Street and wrap around onto Lisgar Street.
During the committee meeting, Jim Burghout, Claridge's development manager, said company officials are excited about the opportunity to host the gallery and contribute to the city and country. He said the company is insisting on unconditional approval and the increased density for several solid reasons and urged council to support them.
He said the project is large, so financing partners will have to be found, and lenders don't like conditional approvals due to the uncertainty. He said the company is already taking on risk by going through the bidding process.
"It's up to us to finance, and build it, and basically hand over a finished product," he said.
He said company officials are not trying to use the gallery as leverage to get the development approved.
"Our main interest is to create something special, and ideally, the gallery will be part of it, and if it isn't, we can still do something special," Mr. Burghout said. "We just want to make sure we don't get penalized for trying to do something right. We didn't do this on a lark to get something for nothing."
When the federal government announced the competition last fall, three Ottawa developers privately expressed interest. However, only one came forward, despite the city providing $431,000 in breaks on fees and development charges.
Ottawa is competing with Vancouver, Halifax, Quebec City, Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg, Edmonton and Calgary for the right to have the gallery, which is part of Library and Archives Canada. It is not known how many other bids are being prepared.
Capital Councillor Clive Doucet said he was disgusted with the whole process. "What's going on here is really double blackmail," he said. "The federal government is blackmailing every city in Canada, and it's a national disgrace. The other blackmail is coming from a local developer who's saying give me 27 storeys in an area zoned for 12 or I won't give you a portrait gallery. It's all disgusting."
© The Ottawa Citizen 2008
|
|
|
|