(re-submitting without…

(re-submitting without personal information so this can be posted)

To Michael Helfinger
Senior Policy Advisor
Ontario Ministry of Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade

Dear Mr. Helfinger,

We are writing to express our strenuous opposition to Bill 66, Restoring Ontario’s Competitiveness Act, and most specifically Schedule 10. Many other sections of this proposed Act give enough cause for concern that we believe the entire Bill should be scrapped.

Schedule 10 is a direct assault on the ever-diminishing natural world that gives us life. It undermines the work of so many Ontarians and successive governments to protect our water, our green spaces, our farm land, our wildlife and, in the end, our quality of life... indeed, the things that bring business investment and skilled workers to Ontario in the first place.

Schedule 10 would allow municipalities, with the permission of the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, to proceed with developments that otherwise would contravene some of the most important environmental protection laws we have in Ontario, including:

Section 39 of the Clean Water Act, 2006.
Section 20 of the Great Lakes Protection Act, 2015.
Section 7 of the Greenbelt Act, 2005.
Section 6 of the Lake Simcoe Protection Act, 2008.
Section 7 of the Oak Ridges Moraine Conservation Act, 2001.
Section 13 of the Ontario Planning and Development Act, 1994.
Subsection 14 (1) of the Places to Grow Act, 2005.
Section 12 of the Resource Recovery and Circular Economy Act, 2016.

Making matters worse, the proposed legislation specifies that no notice or hearing is required prior to the passing of an open-for-business planning by-law. This is undemocratic and underhanded, and not in keeping with the Ontario we know and love, and the Ontario our ancestors fought for.

We cannot let untrammeled development in the pursuit of profit destroy the very systems that provide for life. It is illogical. And we are not anti-development or anti-business. Development and business can adapt. Development and business can build up on brownfield sites, for example; many Ontario towns and cities would love to have more development in their inner cores. Why not create policies, including transit and inter-city transportation, to support that?

For the sake of ourselves and future generations, please revoke Bill 66 and start again with new policies where they make sense.