Mayor O’Shaughnessy provides clarification on waterfront development

Handout from City of Cornwall
Mayor O’Shaughnessy provides clarification on waterfront development
Mayor Leslie O'Shaughnessy said in a letter to the Counties that he shared their frustrations on the delays to the shared services agreement

CORNWALL, Ontario – At Monday’s City Council meeting, Mayor Leslie O’Shaughnessy took a moment to provide some clarification on the recent commentary in the community regarding waterfront development.

“This City Council has not investigated nor encouraged waterfront development,” the Mayor said.

Mayor O’Shaughnessy stated there have been a number of articles and opinion pieces in local media with incorrect information surrounding the conceptual development presented by developer CH Clement Construction at a recent Planning Advisory and Hearing Committee (PAC) meeting.

“Cornwall City Council as a whole has never met behind closed doors or in private with Mr. Clement. In one article, it had indicated that I had met with Mr. Clement. I have never met with Mr. Clement,” he said. “Also in a letter to the editor, it had indicated that I am the third Mayor to promote waterfront development which is completely untrue. I have not done so. I have never met with the people from the baseball association. I have never met with the people from the Legion in regards to development on our waterfront.”

City Council made a decision to allow Mr. Clement to make a presentation at a PAC meeting, the Mayor added, and the matter has not progressed beyond that.

“The motion at the end of that meeting was to receive the report. I moved the motion to also include ‘with no further action’,” he said.

At this time, there has been no recommendation to City Council to proceed any further with the matter, Mayor O’Shaughnessy said. If it were to even proceed, procedure would dictate that the matter be presented to the Waterfront Development Committee for a report and additional research be undertaken.

Such a proposal would also require an Official Plan amendment and a Zoning change, both of which involve public input components.

“All of the things that would ever happen on our waterfront will require complete public input processes,” he added.

The Mayor’s statement can be seen in its entirety by accessing the archived Council meeting webcast link on the City Council Meetings page of the City website (www.Cornwall.ca/CouncilMeetings).

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