Whitehorse city council heard that the public does not want the site of the Hyatt Hotel to be rezoned.
At council’s Dec. 2 standing committee meeting, city staff presented a report on the public hearing regarding the rezoning of the Hyatt Hotel on Main Street in downtown Whitehorse.
The report found that all respondents were against the proposed rezoning, except for one submission by the applicant, Northern Vision Development (NVD), who is developing the hotel. The public hearing took place Nov. 12.
The rezoning application from NVD asks the city to lower the required off-street parking spaces from one spot per 150 square meters to one spot per 300 square meters. The number parking spaces available – 43 -- will remain the same regardless whether or not council allows for the area to be rezoned.
The crux of the rezoning is how much money NVD will have to pay. If the area does not get rezoned, they’ll have to pay $542,474 for the 29 parking spaces they wouldn’t be able to provide. If the rezoning goes through, the required amount of parking spaces is reduced, and so NVD would be able to pay $93,530 for only five parking spots outstanding.
This fact was underlined by Mathieu Marois, a senior planner for the City of Whitehorse. During his presentation to council, Marois said approving the rezoning application would decrease the funding available for the city to implement any parking mitigations.
“A reduction in the on-site parking requirements would result in a reduction of the cash-in-lieu payment, as mentioned earlier, restricting the city's ability to mitigate potential parking impacts of this proposal,” said Marois.
However, during the presentation of the report, Marois addressed two documents which NVD CEO Michael Hale referenced in his Nov. 12 public hearing submission: the Official Community Plan (OCP) and an upcoming updated zoning bylaw, which is expected to result from the zoning bylaw review.
The OCP ranks personal vehicles – such as cars – at the bottom of the hierarchy in terms of transit. The plan did consider a reduction in parking requirements for areas with active transportation and public transit routes, such as the downtown. The Zoning Bylaw is being revised to align with the goals laid out in the OCP.
Marois presented council with three options: one, recommend the bylaw go forward for second reading through the bylaw process; two, recommend it go forward for second reading to be defeated (an option which city administration recommended); three, hold another public hearing.
The third option comes from some new information that NVD provided to the city following the closure of the public hearing period. According to Marois, NVD provided a proposal asking for a development permit agreement allowing NVD to meet the eventual parking standard established in the yet-to-come revised zoning bylaw.
That process would require a second public hearing to allow members of the public to comment on the new information at hand. If this zoning amendment were to be approved, said Marois, another bylaw would be required to formalize the contractual arrangement ensuring that parking is provided per the regulations of the future zoning bylaw.
“However, administration does not recommend pursuing this option as it introduces significant uncertainty and undermines the integrity of the public consultation process,” said Marois.
NVD’s new proposal relies on standards which have not been established, under a revised zoning bylaw which has not been finalized or adopted, said Marois. That would leave council and the public in the dark on eventual requirements.
"A second public hearing would also delay resolution, increase administrative complexity and potentially set a precedent for deferring compliance with established zoning requirements,” said Marois.
However, Mayor Kirk Cameron said that future zoning bylaw is expected to be different regarding parking rules.
“This suggests to me, then, that this is an unfortunate incident of timing that unfortunately is now putting the owners of the Hyatt in a situation where they're being caught between a little bit of a rock and hard place, between the timing, if I’ve got it right, for when they want to open versus when we plan to do our zoning policy rewrite” said Cameron.
Marois told council the hotel is expected to receive its occupancy permit at the beginning of summer 2025, and the zoning bylaw review would be adopted during mid-summer 2025.
Cameron suggested a second public hearing may be useful “to really focus in on something that we're going to need to talk to the public about anyway.”
Marois said the proposed second public hearing would focus on the new proposal from NVD.
“It wouldn't necessarily assist, I guess, in the zoning by law rewrite process to have that public hearing,” he said.
Cameron asked councillors to informally vote on whether they’d be in favour of putting forward the scheduling a second public hearing as the committee recommendation instead of the initial administration recommendation of bringing the application forward for second reading. Cameron was the only member of council to raise his hand in favour of his suggestion.
“It appears there's not much enthusiasm for that option,” said city planning committee chair Coun. Lenore Morris.
The Hyatt rezoning application is set to face second reading at city council next week.
Contact Talar Stockton at talar.stockton@yukon-news.com
Editor's note: this article has been updated from the original due to a logical error stating that if the area is rezoned, NVD will have to pay $542,474 in cash-in-lieu fees. The reality is that if the area does not get rezoned, NVD will have to pay $542,474 in cash-in-lieu fees. The News regrets the error.
