Movement afoot at Echo Lake Estates

After a three-year standstill, there once again is some stirring at Echo Lake Estates in Emo.
Until recently, lawyers representing the three parties involved in a dispute over who should pay for a drainage system at the 70-home subdivision weren’t even sitting at the table any more, according to co-owner Wendy Judson.
But now, with a new municipal council, lawyers are not only talking but making progress.
“We’ve moved further in the last three months than we had in the last three years,” noted Judson, who credited the recently-elected Emo council for getting negotiations started again.
“The council is looking at things as a business point of view and before they weren’t looking at it as a business point of view,” she noted. “The lawyers are now speaking . . . at least they’re talking now.
“It can’t go on any longer, it’s just stupid,” she stressed.
The battle over Echo Lakes Estates began in 1997 when the Ontario Clean Water Association (OCWA) downloaded responsibility of certain zoning details–including drainage standards–to municipalities.
When the Ministry of Health called for the drainage ditches in the already-approved subdivision to be replaced with an underground system installed to avoid open, stagnant pools and a water hazard for children, the Judsons found unexpected costs added to their development.
Seeking compensation, the Judsons sued OCWA and, in turn, OCWA added Emo to the suit.
“OCWA named the town as a third party,” said Judson. “We had absolutely no wish to sue the town but that would be out of our hands.”
But the new council elected last November, which has just one returning member, is now looking beyond the fear of having to pay for the ditching and instead is looking at the revenue the new development will bring in.
Council has sided with the developers, demanding the OCWA look at their responsibility in the development. Now the lawyers for the Judsons and OCWA are negotiating and could seek discovery in April.
“We’re hoping that OCWA will see that the responsibility of the ditch is theirs,” said Judson.
While Emo council has been assured by its lawyer that it will not be liable because the ditches were under OCWA jurisdiction when the development was first approved, it still is taking an active role in resolving the dispute.
“The new council’s position is we would like to do whatever we can to expedite the lawsuit,” Emo Reeve Russ Fortier said last week. “We went to an insurance lawyer, who will try to facilitate between OCWA and Echo Lake.”
“We’re hoping in this case that [OCWA] will come through with it. From what I understand, they should have in the first place,” added Reeve Fortier. “You’ve had Echo Lakes and council going back and forth when Echo Lakes problem has been with OCWA.
“They have never really responded to that until now.”
To date, only one home has been built as the land is still zoned as an agricultural, one-home only lot.
“You look at the average cost of the homes, about $200,000, and you’re looking at, for every home that goes up, roughly $2,000 [in municipal taxes] each,” Reeve Fortier noted.