The municipality of Central Huron is looking at how it can streamline its planning, development and building services.
Mayor Jim Ginn, points out everyone realizes there's a housing crisis in most of Southern Ontario, including Central Huron, and he says there's a lot of interest right now in Central Huron, so they have a lot of applications coming in.
"I think everybody realizes we're short on housing and we have a lot of interest in it, so we have a lot of applications coming in right now, almost double what is normal. It's a good thing in a way and we don't want to be the bottle-neck in the process."
Ginn adds, aside from the applications, they're getting a lot of general inquiries as well.
"If someone comes in talking about a small development, you want to give them good information, so that takes some research. So, even though our planning applications have doubled, there's probably a doubling of inquiries as well and that takes a fair bit of staff time as well."
Ginn says they'll be meeting tonight to look at how they can streamline the process. He suggests some options might be lifting some of the work load off of planning staff or hiring more people.
