Your Midtown KW Neighbourhood

Earlier this spring we shared the news of a planned rezoning of the ODC property at the corner of Roger & Moore, Waterloo, in preparation for the redevelopment of this site. Here’s an ODC development update from our neighbours Anna-Marie, Megan & a crew of residents:

First things first

Many thanks to those of you who offered input in the past couple weeks about subjects we might focus on in a community meeting with ODC, their developer, and the city’s development planner, Wendy Fisher. The support for this meeting was astounding. Read on!

Community Response

In early July, we reached out to neighbours to get input on a preferred meeting format:

a) the city planner and residents, or
b) the city planner and residents with ODC/developer attending as observers, or
c) the city planner and residents with ODC/developer able to offer replies to presentations

Thank you for taking time to offer input – I was kept really busy for a week replying to a flood of emails!
There was an almost perfect split of opinions regarding who should be at the meeting and option C – a meeting with the city planner and ODC/developer in attendance and able to reply to our presentations – was the majority opinion by just two votes.

Meeting Date

We’ll meet the evening of Tuesday August 22. The exact time and location are still being worked out. I should be able to confirm these for you by the end of July. Until then, please save the date.

Meeting Agenda

Wendy Fisher, the City of Waterloo planner assigned by the city to this project, has agreed to facilitate a meeting with residents to discuss the impact of this housing development. Our aim is to communicate what we find concerning about ODC’s plan, and what parts of it we like.

The agenda suggested responds to concerns and ideas outlined in your emails. I suggest that your ideas be grouped by their subjects. Emails will be sent inviting respondents with interest in those areas to form working groups to develop a presentation on that subject.
The amount of time a presentation will be given at the meeting in Aug. will be determined by the amount of interest expressed in it’s topic. For example, because a majority of respondents express concern about density and traffic, presentations on these subjects will be given more time than other issues.
ODC and the city’s planner will both be offered limited amounts of time to comment on or provide information in response to our presentations but – to be very clear – their chief role as participants is to listen.

How to Help

If you didn’t yet have an opportunity to contact me with topics you want included in this conversation, please briefly outline them in an email to me by July 25th.

Our contacts list now has almost 80 names, and size certainly does matter. Please forward this post to your neighbours and encourage them to contact me to be added to the list for future updates and, of course, to add their own thoughts about what’s important to discuss on August 22nd.

Thank you for your engagement
~ Anna-Marie & Crew