“Open Ontario for Business” an environmental setback

Did you know a proposed new piece of provincial legislation will enable municipal governments to give approval to industrial developments employing 50 or 100 people right next door to you without any prior notice to you and leave you without any right of appeal? 

Imagine having some industrial facility built next to your property without your knowledge. This is all so the provincial government can “cut red tape” and “Open Ontario for Business.”

On Dec. 6, Minister Todd Smith introduced a bombshell piece of legislation entitled Bill 66, Restoring Ontario’s Competitiveness Act. This is an omnibus bill that environmental lawyers from the Canadian Environmental Law Association have claimed is “the biggest and most significant environmental rollback to occur in a generation.”

This proposed legislation creates the ability for Clearview Township and every municipality across Ontario to pass new “Open for Business” bylaws, giving the municipality the power to override a raft of development restrictions in provincial land-use law such as the Clean Water Act (think Walkerton), the Greenbelt Act, the Oak Ridges Moraine Conservation Act, the Lake Simcoe Protection Act, the Great Lakes Protection Act, municipal Official Plans, zoning bylaws, and most site plan controls, source water protection plans (including the protection of municipal drinking water systems), the Provincial Policy Statement, and the list goes on.

Under the “Open for Business” bylaw there is no requirement for public notice, public comment or public meetings. Once council makes its decision (which can be done in private), it goes to the Minister of Municipal Affairs for approval to come into affect 20 days later. That’s when the public would get first notice and there is no right of appeal to the Local Planning Appeal Tribunal.

By the way, the province already has the power to override local planning rules to designate land for development if they want to use it. This power is called a Minister’s Zoning Order (MZO). By proposing that the new “Open Ontario for Business” bylaw be implemented by municipalities, the province is distancing itself from the scrutiny, criticism and accountability that would normally be directed at them had they used the MZO.

The government says Bill 66 is intended to cut red tape (such as public notice and comment) and to permit new factories to be built to provide employment. However, there is a current surplus in employment lands in many communities across Ontario. We in Simcoe County currently have some 2,918 ha of vacant designated employment lands available for new factories and industry – 122 per cent more than we did in 2010. And while new factories are the “primary use”, residential, retail, and commercial uses could also be allowed. 

Already, municipalities are receiving staff reports recommending that their councils not avail themselves of this planning tool on the grounds of health and safety, the dangers to the environment, the orderly planning of their community, and the undemocratic lack of provision for due notice, comment, and appeal procedure. Many municipalities, including Waterloo Region, the Town of Mono, and our neighbour Mulmur, have already passed council resolutions speaking against the use of the “Open for Business” bylaw tool. 

The provisions under Bill 66 will cause the following negative consequences:

• New speculative pressure on farmland, farm communities such as Clearview, and more sprawl;

• Loss of natural heritage areas and water protection;

• Eroded local democracy;

• Higher infrastructure costs and higher property taxes;

Had Bill 66 been in place a few years back, the Melancthon Meqa-Quarry could well be a reality today. The public would not have had any knowledge of what was afoot and would not have been able to oppose it.   

If any of this is cause for concern please contact your local council member to see what Clearview council’s position is on this and call your MPP and voice your views. You can get further information on Bill 66 at www.ola.org/en/legislative-business/bills/parliament-42/session-1/bill-66.

The government is asking for your comments on this proposed legislation by this Sunday, Jan. 20 at ero.ontario.ca/notice/013-4239. I would urge you to make your views known.

Brian Bell is Chair of Food and Water First and Vice-Chair of NDACT.

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