Developer halts Highlands of East Hill

Aug 6, 2019 | 1:00 PM

Plans for a major new residential development on the former McMechan reservoir site in Vernon, have been put on hold by the developer.

Vernon Reservoir Development Ltd. (VRD) has posted a notice on its website that it issued deposit refunds to the 46 pre-sale homeowners for the proposed Highlands of East Hill at 901 39th Avenue.

One-hundred and seventy-three mixed housing units had been proposed for the site.

The developer blames the City of Vernon for its decision to halt the project.

“The question that we are all asking is, why would a new community with over $24 million in pre-sales be put on hold indefinitely? The answer is that at 3:21 p.m. August 1, the City of Vernon through its Legal Council (sic) informed the developer, that the developer could no longer rely on the commitments made by the city. Most of those commitments are related specifically to permits or city-controlled costs,” the company statement said.

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Sign at site of proposed Highlands at East Hill site on 39th Ave. (Tiffany Goodwein/Vernon Matters Staff)

VRD said that means the city’s commitments regarding the timing of providing building permits, engineering approvals, and site access agreements were also rescinded.

“The increased risk of these actions directly impacts the timing as the city would be in a position to make changes to previously approved draft agreements or impose further project costs or even change the project as they had threatened to do on May 27 by raising the issue of the 43rd Avenue entrance,” the website statement added.

“Again, for context and as a single example, if we continued forward, but the city missed any commitment or permit deadline that resulted in a delay of the project by three weeks or more, we would not be able to complete the installation of asphalt which would restrict us from legally being able to transfer home title’s on completed homes until approximately June of 2020 regardless of the completion of the construction of the homes,” the statement added.

The city sold the 19.6 acre site to the company for $6.4 million in 2017, a sale which was criticized by some, including city councillor Scott Anderson, for not going on the open market.

“I didn’t oppose the selling of it. I opposed the way it’s being sold. I think it should go on the open market,” Anderson told Beach Radio News in November 2017 after council announced it’s in-camera decision on the land sale.

Vernon Matters has reached out to the City of Vernon for comment.

by Pete McIntyre

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