A year after first proposing the elimination of a $150,000 annual payment to the Peterborough Downtown Business Improvement Area (DBIA), the City of Peterborough has drafted a by-law that would use a legal manoeuvre to claw back the annual payment in 2026 and future years.
The proposed by-law (By-Law Number 25-126) will be considered during a city council meeting scheduled for 5 p.m. on Monday (December 1).
The city’s $150,000 in annual funding to the DBIA was the result of a 2017 settlement between the DBIA and the city, after the DBIA agreed to drop its appeal to the Ontario Municipal Board of the city’s decision to allow a casino at 1400 Crawford Drive instead of in the downtown core.
Under the settlement, the city agreed to pay the DBIA $150,000 annually for 20 years — funding that the DBIA has been using for events, promotion, and security — for a total of $3 million.
Last year, the city’s draft 2025 budget document referred to a closed session report from the city solicitor (Report LSOCS24-008 Review of OMB Appeal re OPA 173 and Zoning By-law 16-053, dated November 18, 2024) which stated “staff recommend redirecting the $150,000 annual payment back to the city to reduce the 2025 net tax levy requirement.”
During a delegation to general committee last November on the city’s budget, DBIA executive director Nour Mazloum and board chair Sacha Lai-Svirk argued against the proposal to eliminate $150,000 in funding to the DBIA. The following February, council decided to reinstate the $150,000 payment in the 2025 budget, while removing $132,500 in funding for street cleaning.
On November 10 this year, Mazloum answered questions about the DBIA’s 2026 budget during a general committee meeting of city council and, during a public meeting that followed, also spoke to the budget, as did Lai-Svirk. The $150,000 payment, which is included in the DBIA’s 2026 budget, was not discussed during either of the meetings.
The proposed by-law to be presented to city council on December 1 indicates that, since the DBIA is a local board of the city, section 216 of the Municipal Act allows a municipality to pass a by-law to “change a local board including assuming a power or duty of the local board.”
By considering the DBIA board’s ability to receive the city’s payment as a “power” or “duty” of the board subject to the Municipal Act (which does not define those terms), the by-law states the city “hereby assumes the power of DBIA to receive from the City annual payments of $150,000 each pursuant to the Settlement Agreement.”
The by-law essentially allows the city to become the recipient of its own payments instead of the DBIA, potentially reducing the DBIA’s annual budget by $150,000 in the process.
“Any by-laws or resolutions of DBIA pertaining to the exercise of the assumed power are deemed to be repealed or amended to the extent necessary to permit the City to receive the said annual payments of $150,000 and to spend the proceeds thereof subject only to the City’s performance of DBIA’s obligations respecting such payments pursuant section 3 of the Settlement Agreement,” the by-law also states.
As the settlement agreement with the DBIA is not publicly available, it is not known what section 3 of the settlement agreement specifies with respect to how the city can spend the proceeds.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
