Samsung Solar LP Community Benefit Fund

That a reserve be created to accumulate funds for the three approved initiatives

That the annual Kingston Solar LP (Samsung) funding contribution of $92,000 per year be placed in the reserve to accumulate sufficient funds for a project in the three identified areas; and

That after 2022, City staff engage with the community about the continued accumulation of funds or use of funds, including consideration for improving rural boat launches.

215 total contributions

570 participants visited the project page

67 participants contributed ideas or participated by commenting or liking ideas on Get Involved Kingston

4 participants engaged with the City for the first time on Get Involved Kingston

Tree planting/maintenance: 7 ideas, 6 likes

Park improvements: 7 ideas, 18 likes

Land acquisition: 7 ideas, 23 likes

Boat ramp/water access: 4 ideas, 8 likes

Active transportation: 20 ideas, 68 likes

Technology access: 4 ideas, 7 likes

Climate initiatives: 20 ideas, 29 likes

Programming: 10 ideas, 13 likes

Funding/taxation: 9 ideas, 14 likes

Public transit: 5 ideas, 15 likes

Farming/food: 8 ideas, 16 likes

Infrastructure/roads: 9 ideas, 26 likes

Policy/council: 7 ideas, 15 likes

Solar panels: 15 ideas, 25 likes

Tourism: 2 ideas, 4 likes

Indigenous initiatives: 1 idea, 3 likes

Trees and wildflowers planted along roadsides

More trees for landowners

Trees planted at parks and on public land

Plant trees on private property near the solar project

Contract professionals to remove dead trees (fire hazards) from public and private property

Revitalization of parks, outdoor activity and conservation areas (including Cecil Graham Park and Shannon Corners Park)

Fund demonstration community gardens and food forests at schools and parks (including Madoma Park and Grass Creek Park).

Make the George Merry Wetland Conservation Area more accessible and add viewing areas.

Increase public transportation to rural areas (like Little Cat Conservation Area) & improve cycling infrastructure to increase use of the park.

Add land to the Little Cat Conservation Area

Add land for Green Burial sites

Create a destination for locals & tourists (lazy river in the summer, skating rink in the winter).

Invest in increasing multi-purpose hiking and biking trails

Acquisition of Collins Creek trails

Create water access to Colonel By Lake through park land on Aragon Road

Cecil Graham Park developed with access to Colonel By Lake

Informal boat ramp and fishing spot on Isle of Mann Rd

Invest in increasing and improving multi-purpose trails/lanes (e.g hiking/walking and biking).

Expansion of protected bike lanes/trails (including paths screened from the water)

Advanced bicycle crossing signals

Designated bike paths on Unity Road

Create a tourist destination for bikers

Sidewalks in rural residential areas

Small rest stops along trail roads

Improve data access to encourage more people to work in rural communities

Improve cell service and WiFi access in rural areas

Charging stations (solar powered) for phones, E-bikes and EVs at K&P Trail parking areas.

Climate agenda item at all council meetings

Home improvement subsidy for green projects (including incentives for solar panel installation and agro-voltaic land use)

Demonstration food gardens, including a solarized communal Indigenous food sovereignty garden

Fund endowed for end costs of cleaning up the solar panel site, solar panel sustainable lifecycle research

Green programs including phragmites eradication program, a rain barrel program, promotion of energy storage

Turtle fences on roadsides

Rotational community programming at Shannon Corners Park

Book walks (book stations along trails)

Food gardens as educational opportunities at parks/schools

Destination for locals & tourists with annual memberships (lazy river in the summer, skating rink in the winter).

Green programs including phragmites eradication program and a rain barrel program

Home improvement subsidy for green projects

Rural taxpayer rebate

Home improvement subsidy for green projects (including incentives for solar panel installation and agro-voltaic land use)

Incentivize local farmers to develop perennial hothouse farming practices with solar power to contribute to the city's local food supply.

Provide the funds so that rural homeowners can capture and use rainwater for outdoor water use

Develop and subsidize public transit and bike paths to rural areas (currently no mode of public transportation in rural parts of the City)

Add a bus route from downtown Kingston to Glenburnie via Hwy 10 and the Little Cat Conservation Area.

Bus routes in Westbrook

Need a bus to CRCA sites

Incentivize landowners with solar panels to grow lowlight crops around the panels

Solar fields used as grazing land for poultry and other animals

Incentivize local farmers to develop perennial hothouse farming practices with solar power to contribute to the city's local food supply.

Grant to incentivize agro-voltaic land use

Demonstration food gardens, including a solarized communal Indigenous food sovereignty garden

Charging stations (solar powered) for phones, E-bikes and EVs at K&P Trail parking areas.

Turtle fences on roadsides

Upgrade roads/road repair

Sidewalks in rural residential areas/school zones

Increase rural road safety by enforcing speed limits with installed photo radar systems.

Convert area near George Merry Wetland Conservation for vehicle parking

Climate agenda item at all council meetings

Collaboration with different government agencies such as CRCA, SLPC, County of Frontenac, Province of Ontario, Parks Canada to rejuvenate outdoor spaces

Speed limit in rural Kingston should be lowered by 20 km/h across the board.

Convene to influence other institutions to follow your lead on climate initiatives

Incentivize landowners with solar panels to grow lowlight crops around the panels.

Solar fields used as grazing land for poultry and other animals

Incentivize local farmers to develop perennial hothouse farming practices with solar power to contribute to the city's local food supply.

Home improvement subsidy for solar panel installations

Fund endowed for end costs of cleaning up the solar panel site, solar panel sustainable lifecycle research

Solar powered charging stations at trail parking areas

Grant to incentivize agro-voltaic land use

Continue to plant trees near Samsung solar project.

Rest stops on trails powered by solar/wind energy

Solar panels and solar supported water distribution to a food garden

A destination for locals & tourists (lazy river in the summer, skating rink in the winter).

Create a destination for bikers similar to the Millennium trail in PEC.

Solarized communal Indigenous food sovereignty garden

Invite public to open each council meeting with a climate message, concern, questions, suggestion etc. Use your extraordinary powers to co [sic]

Extend bike lanes along Unity Rd particularly west of Sydenham Rd to increase safety for the riders as well as helping to decrease the clouds of dust created by large vehicles passing. Benches along the KP trail. Trees and wildflowers planted along roadsides.

Create water access to Col. By Lake through park land owned by City on Aragon Road. There used to be a boat ramp on Aragon Road that provided water access to Col By Lake. This boat ramp is no longer accessible, consequently, there is no public boat ramp to this lake or the Styx River.

Absolutely, many require access to these waters year round.

Incentivize landowners with solar panels to grow lowlight crops around the panels. Solar is a great energy source, but one issue is that it generates far more revenue than traditional farming, which disincentivizes food production. There are lots of benefits to be had by planting crops in the wasted space between and below the panels.

Solar fields are also used as grazing land for poultry and other animals in different places around the world when planted. Even sheep raised for wool, herb farms, etc. The panels have the ability to 'guide' the rain for the crops. Tons of plants prefer part sun. Multi-use. Best idea so far.

This is an efficient use of land and city resources.

Bus routes in westbrook, kingston i think we need buses in westbrook because more of the kids are getting jobs and dont have many ways to get there. at least one bus route is needed

Improve data access Add to existing communications infrastructure by improving wifi signal strength. This could encourage more people to work in rural communities

Cell service in rural areas also needs to improve. On top of making it easier to life and work in rural areas, it's also a safety issue. In my area, I can't even make an emergency call if there's an accident.

Green Burial sites https://greenburialkingston.com/ Green burials involve a natural return to the earth and provide a place for celebration of life surrounded by our rich natural world.

I ditto this request. It is something I have been searching for but nothing like this exists within Kingston.

Rejuvenating outdoor activity and conservation areas and providing public transportation and active transportation connections to them Currently no mode of public transportation in rural parts of the City as well lack of active transportation routes and connections. A lot of the environmentally friendly projects raising money should be put back in to promote environmentally friendly developments. Not being able to access different rural parks and conservation areas reduces the use of them. Collaboration with different government agencies such as CRCA, SLPC, County of Frontenac, Province of Ontario, Parks Canada

Agree, Certainly need a bus to CRCA sites.

Home Improvement Subsidy for green projects The Fund could be used to support home improvements to make existing older homes more energy efficient, convert to greener energy sources, solar panel installations etc.

Kingston and Federal Government programs already exist residential energy improvements. More info available here https://www.sustainablekingston.com/energy-services

Start a "sinking fund"! Contribute the annual amount towards the end costs of cleaning up this site when the solar panels become obsolescent and the project is dumped!

not a bad idea, or perhaps the fund could be endowed for sustainable lifecycle research to find responsible ways to dispose or reuse the old panels.

Add land to the Little Cat. in a way that the Province of Ontario Can Not get their hands on. SO MUCH for the GREEN BELT in TO

A destination for locals & tourists I’ve always thought it would be cool to build a lazy river that transformed into a skating rink in the winter for a community. The city could sell annual memberships to pay for maintenance of it.

Charging stations (level 1 or 2, solar powered if possible) for phones, E-bikes and EVs at K&P Trail parking areas.

Phragmites eradication program

Incentivize home owners in rural Kingston to install solar panels for own consumption and community sharing. Reducing the cost for installation of solar panels can motivate people to reduce their dependency on large power sources (Ontario Hydro, etc.). This will also contribute to a faster payback for installation value.

Incentivize local farmers to develop perennial hothouse farming practices with solar power to contribute to the city's local food supply.

Active Transportation Provide more pathways across the Rural portion of Kingston that include bike paths and walking paths that residents can use to get to parks, shopping and schools. Several other ideas are related to this one. There is no safe way to walk or bike on Unity Rd, Sydenham Rd, Perth Rd, Battersea/Montreal, Kingston Mills, Abbey Dawn etc. If Kingston wants to be recognized as a sustainable City, there needs to be a safe way to travel without a motorized vehicle

Rain Barrel Program Provide the funds so that rural home owners can capture and use rain water for outdoor water use to reduce the use of ground water/well water by providing free rain barrels/totes to all, including installation and accessories required to use the rain water.

Rural Taxpayer Rebate Based on the Council report, the fund should hold $368,000. My suggestion is to distribute that as a property tax rebate in 2024 to any residential properties located in the rural area. Note: I do not live in the rural area and will see no direct benefit from this suggestion.

Storage and community It would be a great idea to promote energy storage as to not overwhelm the current grid this can be done using batteries but also though gravity potential storage (this is more cost effective, email me if this idea is of interest for more clarification) and for our community if people with storage had a smart home panel that can use the internet to communicate with power plants and better address grid instability in case of high load draw during hot summer days

Bike Path along Unity Road

I would like to see a bike path added along Unity Road. I live in Elginburg and people ride their bikes on the road and not the shoulder because they’re gravel. There are many blind spots along Unity Road that aren’t safe. A designated bike path on Unity Road would make it safer for people to enjoy and share the road.

This is a great idea. I think more cyclists would venture outside the city and utilize rural roads (like Unity) if the few roads that cross the highway had protected lanes for cyclists.

I would add that the Bike Path be modified to include walking

Turtle Fences Could we please get turtle fences installed on either side of Hwy 2 where it crosses Grass Creek. For decades now we have been helping turtles to cross the highway during egg laying season or sadly removing their bodies after they’ve been killed by cars

Grant to Incentivize Agro-voltaic Land Use I would like the city to make some of this funding available to supplement the cost of small farmers/large land owners adopting Agrivoltaic farming practices on their properties. Agrivoltaics is the simultaneous use of land for farming and the production of electricity - usually in the form of solar panels. It's sustainable agriculture and sustainable power, a win-win. The primary barrier to adopting this model is cost. I think this fund should be spent on lowering that barrier to entry by offsetting the cost of land owners seeking to adopt Agrivoltaic practices on their land.

Invest in increasing and improving multi-purpose trails/lanes (e.g hiking/walking and biking).

More trees for land owners Upgrade roads Unity Rd from 38 hwy west to city of Kingston Better WIFI bring Fibe to Unity 38hwy and west

Develop the Cecil Graham Park The Cecil Graham Park along Aragon Road is completely undeveloped and is frankly an eyesore. This park should be developed with a view to providing Kingston rural residents with an appropriate amenity with access to Colonel By Lake.

Expansion of bike trails. The current bike gutters that Kingston has are a decent start, but it would be great to see expansion of protected bike lanes/trails that can help people choose alternative modes of transportation

Start with connecting lovely rural road cycling to the city. Visitors should get off the 401 and immediately have to wait for an advanced bicycle crossing signal. Then they will really know they are in a forward thinking city.

Install protected bike paths to make rural kingston a destination for biking Protected bike lane with bolers/curbs separate from the roadway. Create a destination for bikers similar to the Millennium trail in PEC.

Develop and subsidize public transit and bike paths to rural areas. Less cars, less winter driving, etc.

Revitalization of Shannon Corners Park It would be great to have an actual washroom on site as this is a park that is used daily by community members (basketball, baseball, playground users) Score Board even an old school wooden one that kids can keep score of their games Rotational community programming even if it was once a month (library programming or community groups) Trees and picnic tables for some shaded space. Community garden Check out some smart park designs. https://www.engoplanet.com/amp/smart-park-design-with-solar-benches-and-solar-streetlights With the video screen benches you could bring virtual exercise programming to the park

sidewalk needed on Unity in residential areas. A sidewalk complete with kerb is sorely needed on Unity Road between Wagner, or even further east, and Countryside Cres. to the west. Combining it with a segregated cycle path on one side of the road will do. Many people walk their dogs, push baby carriages, etc. along the gravel shoulder. Motorists sometimes slow and give them a wide berth, and then almost collide with oncoming traffic. It is time. It's tough for taxpayers here to see new sidewalks installed in Kingston in places where there are NO houses, (I can give you a list) and rural is ignored. It's been done by South Frontenac in Perth Road Village, Harrowsmith, Sunbury, etc. Why not rural residential Kingston?

Sidewalks are desperately needed along Unity Road from Leaman's Road to the school. Everyday I see children and parents struggle along the side of the road especially when cars are parked along the road.

Increase rural road safety by enforcing speed limits with installed photo radar systems. No reason to drive 130 km/hr through our community.

Elginburg has a 50 km/hr zone and their are vehicles doing 80 plus. For many people it is very difficult to get out of the driveways.

Continue to plant trees on private property near Samsung solar project. The fund was intended to directly offset the damage to the land that clear cutting fence rows did to the area where the Samsung solar farms are located. This project has not yet replanted anything even close to the sheer amount of trees that Samsung cut from the area during construction. Only when this imbalance is remedied should the fund be used for any other purpose. The fund has a lot years left before Samsungs obligation to the local community is finished. Once the original purpose of the fund is complete, and the project is finally close to being tree neutral, the balance of the fund should be used to create and fund a plan to ensure that as the solar panels age, they do not detrimentally affect the quality of the water table and ensure monitoring is in place to ensure the compromised panels don’t leach forever chemicals into the rural land on which they are located. This is a known problem with aging solar fields. Solar energy projects are necessary, but can have problematic downstream results/consequences. The decommissioning plans aren’t well understood and without funding to continue monitoring the land, we can only rely on estimates made early on in the planning phase of the project about the projected life cycle of these panels. The balance of the fund should be used or held in reserve for the inevitable decommissioning of these projects.

Well said and explained!

Unity Road Cycling Infrastructure Cycling infrastructure and/or multi-use pathways on Unity Rd between the project site and Glenburnie would improve safety and non-vehicular access to the K&P trail from the west and the east.

Book walks Install book reading stations along trails

That's a wonderful idea. Maybe, small rest stops along the trail roads with snacks and books; powered by solar/wind energy?

Demonstration food gardens and forests in every community My idea is to be proactive regarding the City-declared climate crisis and fund demonstration community gardens and food forests in every Countryside community as educational opportunities to the local citizenry. These could be set up in every school and every park. For example, Madoma Park, Grass Creek Park.

Would be great to get some trees planted at 2490 Unity Road in front of the ugly solar farm that was not subject to City landscaping rules

Boat Ramp/Fishing spot improvement Informal boat ramp and fishing spot on Isle of Mann Rd, some solar lighting, waste cans and signage would be awesome.

Climate crisis: Get climate at the top of every meetings agenda. Make it the most prominent word, button and content on city web site.

Make the George Merry Wetland Conservation Area more accessible The George Merry wetlands (North of the 401 and West of Hwy 38) does not have safe off-roadway parking or usable viewing points. (1) It would be helpful to convert some nearby area for vehicle parking; and (2) More important, it would be a public service to build pathways - screened from the water - around the outer edges and to build several blinds from which people could view the wetlands’ birds and animals without disturbing them.

Update the bike paths on Middle Road. Sections are in such poor condition that you have no choice but to ride on the road. With the dramatic increase in vehicle traffic in recent years, this is a safety issue.

perhaps the speed limit in rural kingston should be lowered by 20 km/h across the board. The faster large vehicles travel the more ware there is on roads.

Convene to influence other institutions to follow your lead. End the silence on the defining issue of the century. Respectfully Jim & Joan

Some of the roads are in terrible shape. Its time to repair.

Increase public transportation to rural areas & improve cycling infrastructure Add a bus route from downtown Kingston to Glenburnie via Hwy 10 and the Little Cat Conservation Area. It will increase use of the park and allow people in parts of rural Kingston get downtown without having to drive or cycle along busy roads which don't have designated bike lanes (e.g. Division Street south of the 401).

1467 HWY 15 Solarized communal Indigenous Food Sovereignty garden - a site of community-led land stewardship with All Our Relations Land Trust; Existing infrastructure supports rain water collection and with funding modernize the system with solar panels, solar pumps and augmented with a submersible solar pump for an existing well. This strategy would enable garden and forest care and equipment operation to get off oil and gas, and also feed the public grid. In particular Solar panels and solar supported water distribution to a garden, fruit guild and Little Forest plantations (currently 1000 canopy/tree/shrub, 1000 more in Oct 2023). This site will benefit east rural kingston with holding land for biodivesity, conservation and public access into the future.

I have no idea if this is already a submitted idea or what options can be voted on. But as I look out my rural window, the vast amount of dead trees can not escape the view. I continue each year to reduce the the amount of dead ash on my property but many rural residents do not have the time or resources to do the same. There are extensive swathe of dead trees in bush lines not on my property that represent a danger to me. I likely still have several years of effort ahead of me. Beyond the tarnished sight lines, the real concern which can not be overlooked as wild fire ravage much of Canada, is the abundant fire fuel that is accumulating. The fund should be used to contract professionals to remove dead trees = fire hazards from public and private property. What is Kingston's carbon foot print if this dead wood is burned and exposed to the air? What is the carbon saving by cutting chipping and using this commodity in other ways? I leave this for you to add to ideas or supplement to decision makers as an important and valuable use of funds.

I am a member of Just Recovery Kingston's Community Garden group. I live in Countryside on 11.5 acres of bush and old pasture. We have turned the pasture into a (large) vegetable and fruit garden that provides us with vegetables all year long. It is concerning to me that many people in our district do not have vegetable/fruit gardens, especially in this time of a City-declared climate crisis. So, my idea is to be proactive and fund demonstration community gardens and food forests in every Countryside community as educational opportunities to the local citizenry. These could be set up in every school and every park. For example, Madoma Park, Grass Creek Park are locations near me. If this were to be funded, I would be happy to research the District for other potential locations

What areas constitute rural Kingston for the purposes of this project? I was hoping that the area known as Collins Creek trails might be included. I believe it is in private hands and it would be such a shame to see a vast wooded area like that developed.

I think that the entire city would benefit if a network of bike paths and walkways was created to expand and extend current routes.