My comment concerns Schedule…

My comment concerns Schedule 10 of Bill 66: The 'Open for Business Bylaw'. The difficulty in land use planning is to resolve competing interests centered on a given property. Existing homes, businesses and industry will have aligned, neutral or conflicting interests to a proposed 'new-use' in the neighbourhood in a whole variety of matters, from water-use to effluent, from sound and light creation to the effect on traffic, from building height, footprint, building setbacks and the aesthetic of the neighbourhood to stormwater management and flood control. Currently a municipality receives a site plan application and sends it to its own Planners who review it, and send it onwards to other concerned agencies for further comment. There are many results to this process. Sometimes the application is rejected, sometimes bylaw amendments are sought and then are granted or rejected, sometimes the application must be reworked and resubmitted. In that process, local businesses, industry and citizens also have the right to stand up and make written or verbal comment. In some cases, where interests conflict, groups will advocate for or challenge the approval of a bylaw amendment or other such approval. With the switch from the OMB to the LPAT, every attempt is now made to resolve things in the municipality without using expensive and time-intensive processes such as the OMB. It is a delicate balance and I can see wanting to make it 'less exhaustive' and more conducive to business. But what this proposed planning tool may do is to entirely circumvent the ability of any adjacent interests, be they citizenry or businesses, farms or industry, to have any say in the matter. Another truth is that our municipalities are governed by humans, and humans make mistakes: they may not personally have any stake in the proposal or surrounding area and may not take the duty of care to observe all the salient details. With your law, public consultation with regards to the proposal is not required and as a result, there may be no oversight by concerned parties. Involved is only the proponent, the municipal politicians and planner, some county officials and your Ministry. Except for the proponent, nobody else inside the process has a personal vested interest in it and therefore, there is no-one to look at it with a critical eye. If you want to make Ontario open for business, there are other ways to do it than a crass work-around. The respect for the rights of all stakeholders are the reason we like to call Ontario and Canada home.