Residents of a mobile home park in Faro could be faced with moving their homes as the town, which owns the land the trailers are on, considers rezoning the space to for an expansion of the RV park next to it.

As Ian Dunlop, the chief administrative officer in Faro, explained in an interview Wednesday afternoon, the change is being considered among a number of changes to Faro’s Official Community Plan and zoning bylaw.

Debate on the matter, however, is far from over, and a number of options are being looked at, he said.

There are two mobile home parks in town that both once housed many more trailers than they do today.

The mobile home park that would be used as RV park space currently has seven trailers – five of which are occupied full-time – in what was once a space for about 30 mobile homes.

The community has seen an increase in RV traffic through the summer, particularly for major events like Faro’s annual sheep and crane festival.

There is an area for overflow parking in the community. However, Dunlop noted additional RV space would allow those visitors closer access to the visitor centre and the like as well as a wider turning space for the larger RVs that are more common today than when the RV park was built.

With the site zoned for commercial use – a result of a previous vision for the downtown – the mobile homes are considered a non-conforming use.

Dunlop noted the other mobile home park in town, less than a kilometre away, has space that would allow for the consolidation of the two, with larger individual lots than the site they are in now.

Dunlop stressed though that there are many details that need to be considered. The bylaw has only passed first reading, with a public hearing set for next Tuesday.

“We realize this will take some time,” he said. “These are people’s homes.”

The town is working to reach out to each mobile home owner who would be impacted to get a sense of their individual issues.

The trailers, he said, are older and there may be some that would not survive a move.

There’s also a question of whether they would have to be brought up to current building code requirements – and whether that is possible.

In some cases, depending on the situation, the town may consider working with home owners to provide one of the abandoned housing units in the town.

As a starting point, Dunlop said, the community is looking at providing the owners with $5,000 to offset costs, but it recognizes that won’t likely cover all the expenses owners may incur.

All these factors – and more that may come up at next week’s public hearing – need to be considered, he stressed.

It was just last August that Darrell Rieger bought his trailer.

Now, he is being faced with the possibility of moving, a move he insists would cost much more than $5,000.

“Some of the trailers here won’t survive a move,” he said.

If they are required to meet current codes due to the move, Rieger added, new electrical breaker boxes can cost $5,000 alone.

Then there’s the cost to move the units along with any additions to the buildings that would be hard to move, other renovations that might be required, landscaping at the new site which does not currently have any in the vacant trailer sites, the cost of hooking up to utilities and so on.

At the end of the day, Rieger said, such a move could cost in the tens of thousands of dollars and that’s money many who live there just don’t have.

“We’re losing our homes,” he said, adding that it will come at a cost to taxpayers.

Rieger has heard, though hasn’t been approached on it by any officials, about the possibility of vacant housing units also being considered for those in the trailer park.

He noted they too would require renovations likely costing more than $5,000 to bring them up to current standards.

He argued a better and less costly way to deal with the space for the community would be to consider selling the trailer sites to residents, noting the community doesn’t need more RV parking.

There might be two or three weekends each year where RV parking is at a premium in town and the overflow sites are used, he said, pointing out that the Johnson Lake territorial campground is nearby.

“There’s no shortage of camping,” Rieger said.

The hotel in Faro is also there to accommodate any tourists who are visiting the community, he pointed out.

Rieger is expecting he will be joined by many others at next week’s meeting concerned about the mobile home park or any one or more of the numerous zoning bylaw and OCP changes being considered.

Rieger noted his plans to review the 60-plus pages of documents detailing potential changes before next week’s meeting.