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Businesses near major Edmonton construction projects that hinder access won’t be getting financial relief from the city.
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A proposed grant program that would offer businesses near years’-long construction projects like LRT extensions was narrowly defeated 6-7 on Tuesday. The proposed grant relief was as much as $20,000 per year.
Had it been approved, the program would have offered support to shops that rely on customers stopping by in person, like retail stores, and that faced a gross profit loss of more than 10 per cent in a year.
Coun. Andrew Knack told council that while the city’s current work with businesses is strong, construction has real impacts, particularly on small businesses.
“Businesses have closed that are adjacent to large construction projects, businesses have lost actual substantial revenue,” he told council before the vote.
Coun. Keren Tang, who voted against the motion, said she knows there are real challenges for some businesses but the city can look at preventative measures instead of a “bandaid solution.”
“When it comes to construction, I would much rather see policies that will prevent these kinds of detrimental impacts to businesses,” she said.
Councilors Tang, Tim Cartmell, Karen Principe, Jo-Anne Wright, Sarah Hamilton, Erin Rutherford and Michael Janz were opposed. Mayor Amarjeet Sohi and councilors Knack, Jennifer Rice, Ashley Salvador, Andrew Paquette and Anne Stevenson voted in favour.
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‘Disappointing’
This is the second time Knack proposed such a program that failed to garner council approval — he first pitched it in 2018. Knack is disappointed it won’t proceed but said he’s not giving up.
Although the city isn’t legally obligated to help businesses in this way, Knack wonders if they have a moral duty to do so.
“It’s disappointing because we have more to do, and didn’t do what we should be doing,” he told Postmedia. “We need to keep doing, as a city, good advertisements, doing what we can to mitigate access issues, but I do think we play a role in making sure we’re not the cause of businesses potentially shutting down or getting significantly impacted. ”
Downtown Business Association executive director Puneeta McBryan was also unhappy with the way the votes fell.
“This is so disappointing. The businesses who suffer most during major construction are the smallest, locally owned ones — the ones who don’t have deep pockets nor a dedicated marketing team. Beloved ones, like The Nook. I was surprised at some of these “no” votes,” she wrote in a tweet.