Interview with the Mayor - Feb 18th 2025

Tuesday, 18 February 2025 10:42

A new housing development is being proposed for Lakeview Drive, Council will have its first look at a Revenue Budget for 2025, and the Downtown Streetscape Master Plan will move forward.

WOODSTOCK - The Downtown Streetscape Master Plan will proceed in the City of Woodstock.

The future of the multi-million-dollar project was up in the air due to a conflict of interest matter involving one of the City Councillors. You can read more about that online here.

Mayor Jerry Acchione says council discussed the matter and decided to move forward with the plan.

"We had a couple of closed meetings where we did discuss legal opinions. Council also wanted an estimate if we were walk away from Phase 1 and it came back at $900,000. This far into it, I'm not surprised at all."

Each phase will still be brought to council for approval.

Looking at this week's municipal matters, the City is expecting a large turnout for the planning meeting at 7:00 p.m. tonight. There will be seven matters up for discussion, so the meeting will be held in the Council Chambers of the Oxford County Administration Building to allow for more space for the public.

One of the big projects up for discussion is a proposed development for 401 Lakeview Drive. Mayor Acchione says it looks to add over 250 housing units to the 10 acre property.

"What is being proposed is two seven-story apartment buildings, so that's 160 units in the apartments, 68 townhouse units, and 26 semi-detached homes."

Depending on how everything goes tonight, Acchione says this project could be brought to council for final approval this Thursday.

Woodstock City Council will also have its first look at the draft Revenue Fund Budget for 2025 this Thursday.

The budget overview will be brought to council, and Mayor Acchione says they're looking at a 5.1 percent increase before growth.

"There are a bunch of asks of staff, so there are looking at each department and each department is going to put a request in for what they need moving forward, considering that we are a growing city, and we're going to look at all of that. If everything went through, it would be just under 7 percent with all of the asks."

Special budget meetings have been scheduled for Tuesday February 25th and Wednesday February 26th.

Thursday's City Council meeting will begin at 7:00 p.m. and it will be livestreamed on the City of Woodstock YouTube page. You can also find the meeting agenda online here.

During his interview with Dan and Marcie this morning, Mayor Acchione also discussed the following:

- The new ice skating pad that the Downtown Woodstock BIA has installed at Museum Square.

- A presentation from the Woodstock Hospital about the HART Hub on this week's council agenda.

- He also thanked all of the city employees, contract workers, and city residents who have worked hard to clear all of the snow recently.

You can listen to the full interview below: