The Council of the…

The Council of the Corporation of Tay Valley Township passed the following motion directing staff to express Council’s concerns with Bill 66, Restoring Ontario’s Competitiveness Act:

“THAT, staff be directed to provide comments on Bill 66, Restoring Ontario’s Competitiveness Act through the Ontario Regulatory Registry, that express concern with:
• its potential to allow development that would impact the safety of drinking water;
• its lack of transparency in notifying the public or allowing appeals; and
• its potential to impact the ecosystem services (green infrastructure) provided by the Greenbelt (including climate change mitigation, flood and drought attenuation, etc.) that would be orders of magnitude more expensive to provide through engineered grey infrastructure; and
• to provide suggestions of other less harmful ways of streamlining development approvals.”

Council is particularly concerned about the removal of the provisions of Section 39 of the Clean Water Act with respect to “open-for-business” zoning by-laws. Section 39 requires land use planning decisions to protect drinking water safety and the health of Ontario residents. Council does not want Tay Valley residents travelling to other parts of the province and being made ill from water contamination because source water protection plans were weakened by an open-for-business zoning by-law.

Council members remember the Walkerton tragedy and do not want to see it repeated.
The Walkerton inquiry specifically identified overzealous provincial deregulation, budget cuts and staffing reductions as major contributing factors that resulted in the deaths of seven persons, and debilitating (and in many cases, persistent) illnesses in thousands of other residents after drinking contaminated municipal water.

Other concerns Council has about Bill 66 include its impact on agricultural land. Food security was identified as priority in the recent Lanark County Vital Signs report that provided a community “check-up” by measuring the vitality of the County and identifying significant trends in a range of areas significant to quality of life.

Council also expressed concern about the potential for Bill 66 to degrade the ecosystem services – such as filtering air and water pollution, providing drinking water, reducing climate change, etc. – provided by the Greenbelt protected areas (including the Oak Ridges Moraine, etc.). The ecosystem services provided by the Greenbelt extend to eastern Ontario as well as southern Ontario (e.g., reduced air pollution).

Tay Valley Council is committed to openness and transparency in government. Council is concerned that Bill 66 proposes to allow a Council to pass an “open for business” by-law without public notice or consultation and that the by-law cannot subsequently be appealed to the Local Planning Area Tribunal.

Finally, Council suggests that if streamlining job-creating projects is the goal of Bill 66, there are other ways of achieving that goal. The provincial government could explore changes to the Environmental Compliance Approvals process to reduce the review time for projects (e.g., the approval required for a septic system greater than 10,000l/day). Currently a Professional Engineer provides a design to the Ministry of Environment to be approved and 8 months to a year later, a Ministry staff Professional Engineer approves the design. Why not simply accept the qualifications of the Professional Engineer who designed the system and issue an approval?

Council also suggests that the government consider extending similar streamlining procedures to affordable housing development projects to address the housing crisis afflicting millennials, seniors and homeless residents of Ontario.

Thank you for the opportunity to comment.