Hello, I am submitting…

Hello,

I am submitting comment to the proposed changes to the Ontario Heritage Act under Bill 23. The bill will greatly strip away the little power municipalities had to preserve built heritage in their communities. While heritage doesn't have the same "wow" factor as the other issues this bill threatens (mainly to our environmental and agricultural lands), heritage is still vital to communities. Built heritage helps contribute to a community's character, and is an incentive for people to live, and spend their time and money in these places. Heritage increases tourism in communities, think of Niagara on the Lake or Elora. Heritage also fosters a sense of pride and identity for communities. By removing municipalities' powers to preserve their heritage character, we risk all Ontario communities looking like sprawling suburban waste lands.

These changes to the Heritage Act will not help us build more affordable homes, faster. These changes will only make it easier for developers to destroy the character and history of the communities they come into, to build the homes that will make them more money.

Please, listen to your constituents. Please be a government that looks for long-term solutions that actually help the people you serve. Watering down the Heritage Act to nothing does not help the people already living in communities under threat. I grew up in Grimsby and now live here again after living in Guelph, Ottawa and Hamilton. I came back here for the small-town feel. I came back here for the heritage and the community. I don't want to live in another suburban sprawl of Toronto. There are plenty of other ways to build more affordable homes for the people of Ontario - namely, build on the brownfields and empty lots the sprinkle across the Greater Toronto-Hamilton Area. Please don't threaten our heritage, like the Greenbelt also under threat, once it's gone, it's gone forever. Please be a government that looks to the future, and wants to create a legacy that future generations won't regret.

Thank you.