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Town’s permit values increase after news of cannabis production site

Sep 19, 2018 | 5:00 PM

Battleford is already reaping a benefit of the new cannabis production operation coming to town with a boost to building permit values.

At council’s meeting on Monday, Mayor Ames Leslie said the cannabis production building permit reflected a big chunk of the total values with its $20 million price tag. 

Leslie said the town had already doubled the amount of what it had last year for permit project values. So with the cannabis operation on top of that, it puts the town permit values in the range of close to $27 million for the year. 

“There’s the same amount of permits, I think actually one more than last year at this time, but the value of the permits is double the year to date,” he said.

He pointed out the town is not actually receiving $20 million, to clear up any possible misconception from the community.

“Quite often it’s the engineered value of the build of the property,” Leslie said.

The town’s building permits value for the year to date in the August report show a total of $26.5 million, compared to $3.7 million for the same time in 2017. The production site project planned by Thunderchild First Nation will be located off Highway 16, west of Battleford.

As previously reported, the First Nation, the Ministry of Highways and town administration are working together to make sure the project meets a number of provincial conditions.

Leslie said the developer is still in the process of building the plant. It is estimated it will take from 10 to 12 months before the site will be operational.

Ultimately when the site is complete it will also mean more revenue from property taxes coming back to the town as well as more jobs for area residents.

Leslie said in addition to this big project there are more developments in the wings for the town.

“There are other developments waiting to get started,” Leslie said on future projects to come. “They are just waiting for the right up-tick in the economy. There are some things being worked on as the days go by.”

 

Angela.brown@jpbg.ca

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