I am writing to submit a…

I am writing to submit a comment regarding Bill 97, specifically, the language allowing for three residential severances on farm lots. I previously submitted a comment expressing how giving small farmers the ability to sever small plots of land, particularly land which may be unsuitable for farming, can help to improve agricultural infrastructure rather than hinder it. I am a younger farmer myself, and I can tell you from personal experience that I would not have been able to develop my current operation into an organic farm without being able to sell a surplus dwelling, which we were then able to reinvest into tiling our property. The small loss of an acre of land is minuscule when considering that we were able to convert 90 acres over to organic production.

I have read in recent media reports that the Ontario government has succumbed to pressure from large farm lobbyists, such as the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, and backed down on this proposal. While I do understand and agree with many of the concerns raised by the OFA, I feel that the severance concerns mostly represent corporate farm operations and larger/wealthier players who own 500+ acres of land. Based on an anecdotal sample of smaller farm owners I am connected with, all of them welcomed the idea of being able to make decisions to sever small amounts of property to leverage the remaining operation.

While it is disappointing that the Ontario government has decided to back down on the severance changes, I am hoping that you are still working to find a middle ground that will help smaller farmers to leverage their properties as a way to improve their overall operations. In particular, it makes little sense that more than one dwelling can’t exist on a 50 or 100 acre plot of farmland. Allowing more housing options will help with family succession planning: it would give smaller farm operations the ability to house their children, and therefore get them involved in the business. There’s also the possibility of renting out such housing to those who wish to be more connected with rural and agricultural life, and perhaps even grow their own food. This will offer another income stream in a business where profit margins can be razor-thin. Of all the smaller farmers I know (those managing 200 acres or less), 100% of them have to work other jobs because farm revenues are not enough to be a full-time farmer. Therefore, other sources of revenue are essential.

Moreover, in terms of environmental sustainability, consider this: it is currently permitted to build a ten-bedroom, five-bathroom, sprawling mansion that gobbles up five acres of farmland, simply because it is considered a “single-detached” dwelling. However, it is currently not permitted to use two or three acres to build three single-detached dwellings that can house multiple families. This makes absolutely no sense, and it’s time to take a common sense approach to how our properties are managed.

In summary, please do not back down on the proposal to allow farm operations multiple detached or semi-detached dwellings on a property. If managed properly, this approach would actually be more sustainable than what is currently permitted, that being massive, sprawling, single-detached dwellings. Three or four dwellings all connected to the same septic system could easily fit into 1.5 to 2 acres of land. The benefits of allowing farmers to use their property in this way far outweigh the supposed losses speculated by lobbying groups, and will have the added benefit of helping to ease the housing crisis.