I have experienced the…

I have experienced the former (and thus the proposed new) appeal procedure, and that is what I am commenting on.

The major issue with the former procedure is the lack of balance in resources between individual home owners and developers. Developers can afford to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars in fighting the City at the OMB; they plan for and are financed for it. The cost is not material to the millions they make when they succeed.

Individual home owners simply cannot afford this -- we don't budget for tens of thousands of dollars for an OMB hearing when we buy our homes. And the City may or may not help in an OMB appeal. It has its own constraints.

The existing system is much better as it tends to support the Official Plan, which, after all, is supposed to be the plan. The proposed new system will result in more piecemeal exceptions to the Official Plan.

I cannot see any benefit to homeowners to reverting to the old system. The benefit is all to developers.

This is not government for the people, it is government for the developers.