Ottawa calls development fees a housing tax, but without them, who pays for new infrastructure?

Andrew Sancton started to wonder about the way local taxes worked when his entire street in an older neighbourhood near Western University in London, Ont., got dug up and completely redone. New sewers, sidewalks, pavement, all at no extra charge to him or his neighbours.While those upgrades 10 years ago didn’t cost him a penny, he knew that anyone who bought a new house in a new development would be paying hefty extra charges in the tens of thousands of dollars for that same infrastructure through the “development cost charges” that the builder was charged by the city.