ARTHUR – The Township of Wellington North is purchasing a 4.88-acre lot at the dead end of Gordon Street in Arthur for future work related to the community’s wastewater treatment plant.
Growth in the community of 2,628 residents (2021 Census) is all but impossible beyond 2025 without an second upgrade to the wastewater system.
The first system upgrade was completed in 2020, and township staff are presently investigating options to cover a $13.5-million second-phase upgrade.
The property hit the market last fall at $870,000.
Council directed staff, in at least one meeting closed to the public, to negotiate purchase of the property.
According to a purchase agreement, the township secured the property for $700,000 from a numbered Ontario company with corporate records listing Mississauga-based realtor Vishal Member as a director.
“This was an opportunity that came up unexpectedly,” CAO Brooke Lambert told the Advertiser, calling it a “strategic land purchase” in an email.
With a bylaw recently passed by council approving the purchase, the township can now close on the sale.
An existing sewer forcemain, which moves waste from a low-lying area, is situated on a part of the property the township has rights to access for maintenance, Lambert explained.
Purchasing the land provides the township flexibility when it comes to timing, workspace and construction methods to update that forcemain during the second-phase upgrade — all of which Lambert suggested could later work out in the township’s favour financially.
