While I am skeptical that…

While I am skeptical that any comments opposing development will be given any consideration, I still want to let you know that, as a resident, I strongly object to developing these lands. My rationale is as follows:

1) climate change is affecting our food supply and the situation will only get worse as governments (especially the Ford government) ignore it and do nothing to mitigate it
- the high cost of lettuce is being attributed to the havoc wreaked by drought in California...which was brought on by climate change
- southern Ontario has some of the most arable land in Canada...if we continue to just pave over it, we might have a place to live but nothing to eat
2) green space, especially natural environments like forests, wetlands etc., are important for helping manage our carbon emissions and also for our mental health
- trees help capture carbon that's emitted into the atmosphere and generate oxygen to sustain life...with all the skyscrapers planned for the GTA and assumed population growth, we need them more than ever
- studies have shown that taking a walk in a forest improves health outcomes...in fact, some doctors are even prescribing this to their patients. Given the disastrous effects of covid on people's mental health, we should be trying to expand the greenbelt and make it more accessible for recreational activities instead of supporting more concrete
3) opening up the greenbelt for development will not increase affordable housing stock
- people of modest income, need housing close to where they work...and while they aspire to home ownership, what they need is rental housing
- even in the unlikely event that a developer builds rental housing in the greenbelt lands, public transit is non-existent up there which makes it an undesirable place to live...which means that the only people who can afford to live in the greenbelt homes will be the more affluent...people who can afford a million dollar house
- the influx of immigrants will also not choose to live there as they would likely prefer to live close to services and their fellow countrymen
4) I don't like that Ford is rewarding his supporters by making them even richer. All those developers that bought protected land since Ford came into office, only did it because they knew they were going to be able to build on it. There is NO way that they did it for any other reason than their knowledge that it would be highly profitable eventually.