To both Minister Clark and…

To both Minister Clark and Premier Ford:

Do not pursue this policy. Your own housing task force's report states that lack of land is not a cause of the housing crisis. Your sudden invocation of that theme to justify destroying one of Ontario's most important environmental protections is extremely disappointing.

Building more low-quality, unsustainable, expensive suburban neighbourhoods will not offer the help you claim to Canada's housing market. All this does is enrich developers who quite obviously have lobbied your government extensively to enact such policies. You are putting the greedy demands of the few over the needs of the many with this policy.

Leave the Greenbelt alone. Stop messing around with conservation authorities. Stop meddling in municipal elections. Follow the actual advice in your own housing task force's document and stop coming up with solutions looking for a problem.

This legislation is one of the worst I've seen in a long time, scoring a hat trick with two other recent bills unrelated to the environment. Waiting until the beginning of a new "mandate" (18% of eligible voters, what a mandate!) to enact this horrible policy shows a level of cynicism I've long suspected but until recently not observed.

Do not enact this legislation. Throw it out wholesale and start over using the housing task force's report and recommendation as the starting point. Hold longer and more meaningful consultations. And stop acting to enrich developers--they do not care about sustainability, they do not care about consumer benefit, they do not care about healthy communities. Their insistence on low density urban sprawl proves this and their opinions cannot be trusted.

You previously listened when people told you clearly and without reservation that we do not want you chipping away at the Greenbelt, subjecting it to death by a thousand cuts. If you have any spine whatsoever you will make the harder decision which is to forbid its development, and to encourage densification and high quality development within existing urban areas to solve the housing crisis. You are capable of doing this and people will respect you for it. Take that harder but more rewarding road, Mr. Clark and Mr. Ford--I truly believe you are capable of it and will feel better about having done so.