NEWS

PCs make another move to greenlight environmentally disastrous highway

After an October Supreme Court ruling found parts of the federal Impact Assessment Act to be unconstitutional, the PC government is doubling down and asking the courts to free its Highway 413 project from having to undergo the rigid environmental assessment the Act requires.

Ontario won’t submit Highway 413 assessment to feds until late 2023

TheFord government is closing in on making the case for its signature Highway 413 project — frozen for more than two years — as it prepares to send Ottawa new justifications for the route.

Last week Ford accused the federal Liberal government of stepping on the toes of provinces and municipalities by bringing forward the national Housing Accelerator Fund which allows Ottawa to work directly with municipalities on housing starts—3.5 million of which are needed across the country by 2030 according to the Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation—and has already seen some success since its conception earlier this year.

ust weeks after revelations of impropriety forced the Ontario government to reverse its imposition of corrupt settlement boundary expansions on unwilling City and Regional governments, a leaked letter from Municipal Affairs Minister Paul Calandra, dated November 2, 2023, suggests that the Premier and Cabinet ministers are doubling down and trying to make the mayors of lower-tier municipalities accomplices to the scandal by having them rubber-stamp the government’s forced farm, forest and wetland eating boundary expansions.

On April 6, 2023, the Ontario Government announced new components of its Housing Supply Action Plan, which seeks to encourage the construction of 1.5 million homes by 2031. Two key elements of the announcement are the introduction of Bill 97, the Helping Homebuyers, Protecting Tenants Act, 2023, which is currently at second reading stage in the Ontario Legislature, and the release of a draft Provincial Planning Statement, 2023 (the “Statement”), which is out for public comment until June 5, 2023. The Statement, if it is adopted by the Province, will replace A Place to Grow: Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe(“Growth Plan”) and the Provincial Policy Statement, 2020 (“PPS, 2020”).

Under the new draft Planning Statement, density targets have been watered down or eliminated altogether, and municipalities given flexibility to expand their boundaries. This change is expected to remove the requirement for municipalities to prioritize infill development before expanding urban boundaries to overrun natural lands.

The legislative changes relating to land use planning passed by the current government under Bills 3, 23, 108, and 109, among others, have resulted in:

• a massive overhaul of the land use planning process and heritage and environmental protection,
• a new set of directives focussed on supply, rather than demand for homes,
• reduced the role of duly elected municipal councils, and
• eliminated appeals by residents who devote their time and energy to contribute to their communities’ development.

We now have Bill 97, another omnibus bill dealing with land use planning and landlord and tenant matters.

The tenant protection measures in Bill 97 are a mixed bag – some welcome, some concerning.

The land use planning measures are welcome if you are a land developer, but otherwise very concerning to Ontario residents.

On-line survey research was conducted in the period December 2022 to March 2023, to assess Ontario public opinion regarding the recent measures by the Government of Ontario related to Bill 23 and its potential impact on housing and the Greenbelt.

The on-line survey research was carried out independently by SPR, an expert survey research group and not funded by government or other sources. Dozens of NGOs and community organizations from across Ontario participated in the stakeholder portion of the survey.

The results show widespread opposition in Ontario to the Government’s Bill 23 and measures affecting the Greenbelt and affordable housing.

We, the 78 undersigned organizations, are strongly opposed to the Ontario Government’s proposal to remove 7,400 acres of land from the Greenbelt. Opening these lands to development would destroy vital wildlife corridors, negatively impact woodlands, wetlands and watercourses, and result in the loss of over 5,000 acres of farmland. The government’s rationale – that these lands are needed for housing – is unfounded and untrue. We urge you not to proceed with this proposal for the reasons outlined below.

We agree that there is a housing supply and affordability issue in Ontario and support the broad goal that new housing should be built and be available across a spectrum of incomes and needs. However our dreams are not focused on detached single-family homes with ‘white picket fences,’ but include a diverse range of dwelling types for both renters and owners, and all income levels. The focus of all orders of government should be on liveable communities where all residents can thrive and grow.

We have identified ten substantive and specific issues with Bill 23. The legislation does many regressive things, but of the ten key items of concern the most egregious is #10 – to prohibit any third party (ie. citizen/resident association) appeals of development applications to the Ontario Land Tribunal.