ERO 019-5732 I support…

ERO 019-5732

I support freezing the urban boundary of Hamilton for these reasons:

A more efficiently run city that can have lower tax rates.

We know that low density urban sprawl is much more costly to service (transit, roads, sewage, storm water etc...) and that high density development is much more cost effective. So freezing the urban boundary will create a more efficiently run city allowing for lower taxes and a higher standard of living.

Protect valuable farmland.

Ontario has some of the world's most productive farm land. Ontario has a huge economic advantage due to our ability to grow more food than we need. let us preserve this economic advantage and be an economic powerhouse in food production and refining into exported products.

Climate change and the environment.

Endless population growth is foolish. Just look to many examples where overpopulation has led to environmental disasters and economic ruin. We need to determine the optimum population levels for each bio-region in Ontario, each city in Ontario. We need to find out what is the optimum population level to provide the best standard of living, best quality of life, best environment. Instead we have a blind ideological belief that endless population growth is a good thing. Why, when there is no evidence to support this illusion ?
It is time to stop this blind belief in endless population growth and start finding out what is the best population level for Ontario, and her cities, including Hamilton.

Ontario must have control over immigration levels so we can have a wise and cautious population increase, just like Quebec. Freezing Hamilton's urban boundary is a first step in asserting provincial and local control over how we will develop.

Quebec has control over it's immigration levels, so should Ontario. If we did have this control we would not be subject to the whims of the Federal government - we could design a made-in-Ontario population plan that meets the needs of Ontario. Instead we have too many new settlers causing all sort of growing pains from staff shortages in medical care, housing shortages, congested roads, and infrastructure that has not kept pace with the population growth.
Ontario needs to control it's population growth, not the federal government.

In summary, freezing Hamilton's urban boundary is a wise planning decision that will benefit the tax payer and help the city to operate with a more efficient budget. It will force other levels of government to start actually planning in a careful, conservative manner, how we will develop, instead of a blind reckless goal of increasing our population as fast as possible, for no apparent reason.