It is unfortunate that the commentary published in the Saint City News gives little or no credit to the mayor and councillors to make independent business decisions regarding the Arlington development project.
To imply that the decision to approve the project will be based on public outcry over one letter says little about the leadership at city hall. If that is the case, one need only send outrageous letters to the editor to guarantee approval/decline of pet projects in the future.
Further, as stated previously, this is not a Habitat for Humanity project. It is an Apollo Developments project submitted on the coattails of Habitat because the owners of Apollo Developments are praying that the city will approve the project simply because Habitat will have some vested interest. Habitat will have approximately 25 per cent of the units, with Apollo owning the remaining 75 per cent. There are no guarantees what portion of the remaining units will be owner-occupied, if any. The remaining 44 units could well be low rentals. We do not know.
If the city does approve the project, the current zoning by-laws regarding density should be uniformly enforced. Reduce the number of units to comply rather than changing the bylaws.
It is also unfortunate that Habitat would permit their once untarnished name to be associated with this type of project and would even consider public pressure to change bylaws just for a few units.
Norm Harley, St. Albert
