By Amelia Naismith The Pipestone Flyer
In April, 2017 County of Wetaskiwin council received an application to rezone 148.77 acres of land. The matter was back before councillors at their July 20 planning and economic development meeting.
However, director of planning and economic development David Blades noted at a recent meeting of council perquisites for watershed protection are 80 per cent of the land and must have mature tree cover or contain historic wetlands;the land in question didn’t meet these requirements and was deemed not eligible for the rezoning.
“Initially throughout this process they said they wanted to do 20 acres,” said Blades to council.
However, administration later discovered the whole quarter section was included in the application. “It did not comply,” said Blades.
Council felt it could move ahead to rezone 20 acres of land if applicant John Phippen was comfortable with the reduced number.
With no conformation from the applicant that they would like to move forward with 20 acres the councillors voted on third reading; all were opposed and the motion was defeated.