Over the last week I have learned more about the consequences, the implications of Bill 23. More knowledge has only deepened my understanding that it is very bad and regressive. And it has made worse by the announcement to take lands out of the protection of the Greenbelt for development. Of great significance is that actions initiated under Bill 23 cannot be undone; a new subdivision in the once protected countryside cannot be returned to fertile dirt to grow food. The good news is that citizens are speaking up, telling the Province that they must pause and listen to others than the developers and their associations. Here is the media statement from a coalition of farmers, housing advocates, urban planners, environmentalists, labour unions, healthcare workers and community groups from across Ontario. And here is a 7 page report explaining the basis for strongly criticizing Bill 23.
In contrast the Province has never explained the basis for their claim that their proposed policies are necessary in order to build more homes more quickly.
And they have never explained why it is necessary to take land out of the protected countryside and Oak Ridges Moraine. It is important to remeber that the Premier’s housing taskforce reported in February 2022 the following: “A shortage of land isn’t the cause of the problem,” the report continues. “Land is available, both inside the existing built-up areas and on undeveloped land outside greenbelts. We need to make better use of land.” To quote from the coalition’s report: “There is no need to remove 7,400 acres of valuable farmland and natural areas from Greenbelt protection when 88,000 urban acres across the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA) are already primed for development.”
If you want to see this terrible bill and Greenbelt amendments stopped I urge you to contact your MPP. For King Vaughan riding that is Minister Lecce at stephen.lecce@pc.ola.org. An email to Premier Ford telling him that you are disappointed that he has broken his often said promise to not touch the Greenbelt would be appropriate also.
Finally, you can comment on the Environmental Registry of Ontario prior to November 24 about Bill 23.
The whole point of the bill IS to stop the road blocks that many put on development. Just to bring us to the average G-7 homes per capita Canada need another 1.8 million homes. Annually we build 200000 but we actually need 240,000 built per year just to keep up with current immigration. That’s based on 2021 immigration numbers. If the federal government raise’s immigration by 200,000k over the
Next few years we will need more About 50-60% come to the GTHA Perhaps you should be more vocal about he the immigration numbers and the devastating effect such large numbers are having on our housing
Crisis, hour healthcare crisis, the damage such population growth causes to our environment And let’s be a bit more honest about the green belt lands the current plan will add more lang that it takes away. You can’t havkktkr
Hi Marc, Yes let’s be honest….the issue is not lack of land.
I’m glad you raised the point about it’s not about lack of land I too have read the studies 125,000 ha of developable land in the GTA. If that is the case I would agree. However can you explain to us all the reality. Let’s take King City East as an example 205ha. Can you tell us how many ha they are actually allowed to develop for homes …… 92/205 ha in the end was used for home development. 44%. The 125000ha is in fact only 55,000ha And the density of housing king East? 7? Avg PERs per home 3.1 ? Enough free space for 1.3M people? And 385000 homes. But we need 1.8 million in Canada and 950000 in GTA.? Truth you say? Let’s hope everyone else does better than King.. or if you like for the 205 ha king City east projects 3100 people? About 15 per ha so the 125000 ha in the GTA will allow for 1.8 million people Hmm Truth you say. I want to have a serious debate so let’s be serious
I don’t know if all your numbers are accurate but I understand the concept behind your argument: not all the land in KC East will be filled with houses. There are two general points I want to make. First, In addition to the houses there is a neighbourhood park, there is a land block for a school and significant natural heritage features including watercourse and provincially significant watercourses which require buffers to protect them. Providng housing which enables safe and healthy communities is more than the residential units. Second, draft plan approval was given in 2019; at that time the density was far greater than the offical plan of the day. Municipal servicing masterplan at that time would not have tolerated much greater density.
Thanks for the point but you simply reinforced my point groups with various agenda tout large numbers of land ready for development The end result is less than half can be used for homes. Don’t get me wrong I think the town has done a great job with king east. But buffers parks schools etc are a reality in the 905. We would never do as they did in Toronto flatten the land replace streams with sewers so we can get the density needed for a city. The GTHA is growing too fast we are falling behind in building the infrastructure to support it School hospitals roads transit all are under pressure as is the green belt. There is a root cause to all of this we need to slow down Good grief south lake recently said 10 years for the hospital expansion in 2031 york is projected to have grown by 220000 people You think we have a hospital crisis now. Ps my numbers came from CBC and CTV news articles and from Kings own data