The Town of Hay River and the GNWT have agreed to work together to develop a large parcel of land – just south of the hospital along the west side of the Mackenzie Highway – to meet projected residential and commercial demand.
Mayor Brad Mapes explained the agreement will mean, in essence, the GNWT will finance the project with loans to the town, which owns the land.
"As we sell the property, we give back the GNWT the funds," he said.
Land development – focused on the area south of the hospital – has been on town council's plate for the last three years.
"I'm extremely happy to see it move forward," said Mapes. "It was one of the big goals that we needed to get done and it's going to be done."
How much money the town would be borrowing has yet to be determined.
However, Mapes noted the agreement with the GNWT would consider how to finance the project so as to not affect the town's existing borrowing limit.
The town announced the verbal agreement with the GNWT on Oct. 5 in a short news release.
"The town sees this alliance as a positive step as we have a lot of economic opportunities on the horizon that will benefit not just Hay River but the entire Northwest Territories," stated the news release. "The two levels of government are looking forward to the economic growth in the South Slave region and realize the importance of being ready to accommodate and support this growth."
Mapes told The Hub the verbal agreement was reached at an Oct. 4 meeting in Yellowknife with Premier Bob McLeod, Municipal and Community Affairs (MACA), Minister Alfred Moses and some other cabinet ministers.
The mayor noted the development would have residential lots, commercial areas and multifamily buildings of small apartments and duplexes.
"What we agreed upon is the MACA department will work with our administration to go forward with how we can finalize our developments," he said.
The targeted land is known as the Evergreen Subdivision and the Sundog Subdivision. Evergreen has enough space for the equivalent of 285 residential lots and Sundog could accommodate about 140 residential lots, although not that many lots would be available because some of the land will be used for commercial, institutional and other purposes.
Mapes estimated the number of residential lots would probably be between 200-300.
The key to the financing arrangement is a lot of people are interested in looking at land in the community, said Mapes. "But, as a town, we want to pre-sell the land. But, we can't pre-sell the land until we've confirmed how we're looking at financing the project. Once we've got it set up, then we can push it out for pre-sell and we'll be able to pre-sell a lot of it."
The mayor noted that, just after the news release was issued on Oct. 5, two large developers touched base with the town about possibly being involved in the project.
"So I think it's really a no-brainer for our community," he said.
Mapes noted that, in the New Town area of Hay River, there is no town-owned lots for sale.
"Basically, our town is in dire need of getting development going so that we can house the future economic growth," he said. "There are quite a few projects that are outside of our community that are close to being reality in the next few years."
Mapes noted the land development will be staged over the coming five years and the exact details of the plan will be finalized with the GNWT.
Mapes said the construction alone will create a huge number of jobs.
The mayor noted there is currently no estimate for the cost of the project.
Jay Boast, a communications official with MACA, confirmed that the GNWT and the town discussed land development.
"Representatives from the GNWT met with Town of Hay River representatives and discussed a request by Hay River to support a phased-in approach for land development with the goal of supporting residential land development to align with their economic development aspirations," Boast stated in an Oct. 5 email to The Hub.
"The town has not yet provided detail on what a phased-in approach would look like," he added. "The GNWT agreed to have staff meet with town staff to understand what this land development approach could look like and what GNWT interests may be related to the development."
For example, he noted the NWT Housing Corporation has identified a need for lots suitable for multi-family units as well as single family residential development.
Boast stated that, given that the meeting with town officials had only taken place the day before, GNWT and town staff have not yet had a chance to follow up and MACA is unable to elaborate at this point on what territorial government involvement will look like.