CENTRE WELLINGTON – Reflecting on this past year and looking ahead to the next, Mayor Shawn Watters said he’s never seen the township this busy before.
While relatively new as mayor, Watters has been in and out of various councils for decades, including the last Elora council and the first Centre Wellington council as the township celebrated the 25-year milestone since it was formed through an amalgamation of Elora, Fergus, Pilkington, Nichol, West Garafraxa and a part of Eramosa.
“It’s hard to believe it’s been 25 years that we’ve been around,” he said during a year-end interview in his office.
At the time of amalgamation, Watters recalled Don Wilson was the CAO when he was a councillor. Now he works with CAO Dan Wilson, Don’s son.
“It’s like a big circle,” Watters said.
The biggest thing driving decisions and actions in the township continues to be the expected population growth, leading to the need for increased housing variety, infrastructure and services from Centre Wellington or allowed by it.
A huge thing working toward this, Watters said, was adding about 1,000 acres to the township’s urban boundary, which doesn’t guarantee development but removes a significant barrier to getting housing, commercial or industry built.
Developers were keen to get in on this too, as Watters explained there were requests to bring in over 2,500 acres within the urban boundary. However, Watters said council wanted to preserve as much farmland as possible and aim for more intensification in existing urban boundaries.
“We knew that some of the developers would have a good rationale for bringing their land in but we can’t bring everybody in because of our servicing abilities and also how we want to execute that growth,” Watters said.
The new urban boundary has been sent to the county for approval and it also requires ratification by the province, but, Watters noted, the development community can appeal being left out of the urban boundary expansion to the Ontario Land Tribunal.
“We suspect there’ll be some appeals that way,” Watters said. “Our hope is we’re not at a lot of appeals because there’s a cost … we’re hoping that we’ll get the continuous support of the province in terms of our decision making.”
The list of things went on as Watters detailed the township’s work in 2024 including opening the business park, finalizing the termite program, reopening the Jefferson Elora arena, rebuilding or rehabilitating a few bridges, finishing the first phase of construction on St. David Street in Fergus, starting Gerrie Road construction and undergoing environmental assessments on about nine other bridges to top it all off.
“I’ve never seen this level of activity ever and that again is related to the oncoming growth,” Watters said.
A big piece of that puzzle is the new operations centre, with a phase one cost estimated at $44.4 million that, Watters said, is expected to begin construction next year. The operations centre will replace multiple aging buildings and combine multiple township departments into a single centre at 965 Gartshore St. in Fergus.
This project will displace the doctors in residence living at an old farmhouse on the property but Watters said the township is looking to update the historic Craighead Cottage to serve in its place.
He also noted the township acquired an additional 90 acres of land by the Centre Wellington Community Sportsplex to help facilitate any expansion needed as identified from an upcoming recreation master plan.
“There’s a good chance we might need a new arena or we might need an indoor turf facility,” Watters said as examples. “That’s part of a strategy of ‘okay, growth’s coming, how are we going to accommodate that?’”
A recent rise in tourism coming to the Elora Christmas market has put a spotlight on a few issues in town, including the village’s shortage of parking.
While some short term measures were introduced, the mayor acknowledged staff will have to take back lessons from this influx to address the upcoming summer tourist season and potentially a return of the Christmas market next year.
“We’re hoping to get the details (of the parking plan) all laid out this year … with the idea in 2026 we implement a parking program,” Watters said, adding there may be a pilot program for paid parking in Elora. “The devil is in the details, we’re not quite there.”
With one election scheduled next year and one rumoured to be a possibility, there is a potential for change in the upper levels of government.
Watters said it’s hard to comment on the federal government given municipalities work more closely with the province but wanted to thank MPP Ted Arnott for his years of service as the longtime representative for the area announced he would not be seeking reelection in the next provincial election.
“It’s very helpful to have someone who can navigate the halls there and get us a meeting with a minister when we need to have that,” Watters said. “Whoever is in place there that’s really important, they got to be that person who arrives there basically from day one be able to do that because the needs are here, in terms of growth needs are here and now.”
