'Dream home' by water's edge at centre of flood construction debate
Couple got necessary provincial permits to develop the Grand Bay-Westfield site
A house now under construction on the Grand Bay-Westfield waterfront has come centre stage in the fight to limit development in flood-prone areas of New Brunswick.
The house on Brandy Point Road was cited as an example last week by Premier Blaine Higgs, who described the case as "shocking."
"This is obviously where we shouldn't be building," Higgs said. "So I think we have to look at the rules and regulations around the province, in wetlands and floodplains, and make some changes. It's a new day, and two years in a row is telling us we can't just do the same thing."
The Grand Bay case pitted the property owners, Stella Taillefer and John Balemans, against the town, which tried, and failed, to stop construction of the home from going ahead.
Environment Department gives go-ahead
It also demonstrates New Brunswick's municipalities can be trumped by the Department of Environment and Local Government, which earlier gave four approvals to allow the couple to clear the land and build it up in preparation for construction.
The town was also overruled by the New Brunswick Planning Appeals Board and by Court of Queen's Bench Justice Darrell Stephenson, who ordered the municipality to provide the couple with a building permit.
- Home purchased by province was built in flood area just 3 years ago
- Drone footage of flooding in Grand Bay-Westfield, New Brunswick
The board's ruling came during the flood of 2018 and Stephenson's ruling came after it.
Grand Bay-Westfield is one of the worst-hit communities by flooding in 2018 and 2019. In fact the municipality's then-new Brundage Point Community Centre, built with provincial and federal approvals, flooded a year after its 2007 opening.
The Brandy Point Road property, toward the south end of the town, has been under water four times since 1973. Although many other properties in town stand on a lower elevation, most of them were built between 40 and 100 years ago.
Mayor Grace Losier said the lessons of flooding have not been applied in the case of the Taillefer-Balemans house.
'It's crazy, it makes no sense whatsoever," she said.
Although construction of the home is in the very early stages, the flooding of the past two weeks completely encircled the concrete slab foundation but stopped well below the floor level, which has been set on a mound of ground raised over several years by the addition of fill.
The case is complicated by the fact Balemans is a town councillor.
He has recused himself from the discussion and declined to talk to CBC News.
Couple didn't expect problem
Stella Taillefer, however, is willing to tell the couple's side of the story, which begins with the purchase of the property in 2007, long before the floods of 2018 and 2019 and even before what was then described as the one-in-100-years flood of 2008.
"We have invested so much time and money and we just loved the property so much," said Taillefer.
"We had thought of our dream home for so many years. We were confident we were building at 6.3 metres — above the flood levels — that we would not have any problems at that property."
Floodwaters peaked at 5.5 metres in the lower St. John River this spring, slightly below last year's record 5.76 metres.
Taillefer said the couple plan to bring in more fill to further raise the yard between the house and Brandy Point Road.
She said they have worked closely with the Department of Environment, hiring an engineering firm to determine the proper level for construction, brought in the necessary fill, and spent "tens of thousands" of dollars before applying in 2017 for a town zoning variance to begin construction.
They were advised they would have to take the application to Grand Bay-Westfield's planning advisory committee, where it was rejected in December of that year.
The couple took the committee's decision to the New Brunswick's Assessment and Planning Appeal Board, which ruled in their favour. The board found the town did not have a set standard elevation at which construction can be allowed, instead making more "arbitrary" decisions based on whether the property is "subject to flooding."
Not officially a floodplain
It also noted the province has not designated the property as being in a floodplain.
The town appealed the decision to the Court of Queen's Bench, where Stephenson also found in the couple's favour, upholding the Planning Appeal Board finding that the town's planning advisory committee had misapplied the Community Planning Act and its own bylaw when it rejected the couple's application.
Stephenson also agreed with another finding of the board, that the couple had been subjected to "oppression" at the hands of the municipality.
"All those steps taken by the appellant were all that any prudent homebuilder could be expected to do and the denial of the building permit has caused unusual and unreasonable hardship to the appellant," wrote Stephenson.
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