Dr. Eileen de Villa…

Dr. Eileen de Villa
Medical Officer of Health
Tel: 416-338-7820
Fax: 416-392-0713
eileen.devilla@toronto.ca
toronto.ca/health

June 23, 2017

Sanjay Coelho
Senior Policy Analyst
Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change
40 St. Clair Avenue West, Floor 10
Toronto ON
M4V 1M2

Dear Mr.Coelho:

Re: Amendments to Ontario Regulation 153/04 (Records of Site Condition) EBR Posting #013-0299

Thank you for the opportunity to comment on EBR Posting #013-0299. I wish to suggest amendments to Ontario Regulation 153/04 (O.Reg 153/04) that would help to reduce the regulatory burden for proponents of urban food growing projects. Urban agriculture is an important strategy to address many public health priorities including, physical and mental health, access to healthy and inexpensive food, and climate change mitigation and resilience.

There is increasing interest among institutional, commercial and government stakeholders to invest in community-led urban food growing projects. These projects can be in neighbourhoods where access to food and green space are limited and incomes are typically low. For these projects, a Record of Site Condition (RSC) would be required due to a shift to a more sensitive land use (i.e., from commercial or parkland to agricultural land use). This triggers an expensive and time consuming site assessment and regulatory approval process. In many cases, the resources required to meet this regulatory hurdle is beyond what is available or viable for establishing critically needed community food initiatives.

The Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change has developed a Tier II site assessment approach to streamline RSC assessments for low risk, standardized sites. Unfortunately, this process does not include key risk assessment and risk management assumptions that are specific to urban food growing projects, such as non-permanent structures (i.e., no indoor air inhalation pathway), no groundwater consumption, no livestock production and above-grade container gardening as a risk management approach.

I am requesting that the Ministry adopt an approach analogous to the Modified Generic Risk Assessment (Tier II) already in place for other low risk sites that could be applied to sites to be used for small scale, community-based urban food growing projects. This approach would include assumptions that are tailored and standardized to urban food growing projects significantly simplifying the process to assess and manage potential risks while maintaining health objectives as described in Toronto Public Health’s Soil Assessment Guide for New City Allotment and Community Gardens. Site assessments conducted and signed off by a Qualified Professional - Risk Assessment (QPRA) could then be filed on a transparent environmental approval site registry for automatic approval and allow for an expedited review process facilitated by the local district Ministry offices.

Such amendments to Ontario Regulation 153/04 (O.Reg 153/04) would address barriers to urban food growing projects and contribute to poverty reduction efforts and increase resilience to adverse climate change impacts. Currently, the City has a number of potential partners that are interested in investing in community-led urban food growing projects. These projects are in priority neighbourhoods where access to food and green space are limited and incomes are typically low. I urge the Ministry to develop an approach that could be ready by January of 2018, which would allow the site assessment and approvals process to be completed in time to break ground in the spring 2018.

This proposal would support urban growing initiatives and support two of Ontario’s policy directives: poverty reduction and climate change mitigation. Please do not hestitate to contact Ronald Macfarlane of my staff at 416-338-8097 or ronald.macfarlane@toronto.ca for any clarification or to discuss next steps.

Yours truly,

Eileen de Villa MD, MBA, MHSc, CCFP, FRCPC
Medical Officer of Health

copy: Kevin Moraes, Senior Advisor, Community & Stakeholder Relations, Office of the Mayor Ronald Macfarlane, Manager, Healthy Public Policy, Toronto Public Health