Proposed Planning Act, City of Toronto Act, 2006, and Municipal Act, 2001 Changes (Schedules 4, 9, and 12 of Bill 185 - the proposed Bill 185, Cutting Red Tape to Build More Homes Act, 2024)

The Cutting Red Tape to Build More Homes Act, 2024 ('Bill 185') was introduced in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario on April 10, 2024, and received Royal Assent on June 6, 2024.

The Schedule 12 of Bill 185 made various changes to the Planning Act, specifically:

Reduce Parking Minimums

• Provided that there is no minimum parking requirement for lands, buildings or structures within Protected Major Transit Station Areas and Major Transit Station Areas, noting that:
  • This change does not apply to bicycle parking, and
  • Where parking is provided in a new development, requirements to provide accessible parking spaces under the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) apply.

Enhancing Framework for Additional Residential Units (ARUs)

• Enhanced Minister’s regulation-making authority to remove zoning barriers to building small multi-unit residential. This change could help create additional residential units, such as basement suites, by eliminating barriers including maximum lot coverage and limits on bedrooms allowed per lot​.

Community Infrastructure and Housing Accelerator (CIHA)

• Removed the Community Infrastructure and Housing Accelerator (CIHA) tool from the Planning Act by repealing s. 34.1 of the Act to avoid unnecessary duplication with a revised and transparent process for requesting and issuing minister’s zoning orders.
• Provided transition rules to permit CIHA orders that have been made prior to the passage of Bill 185 to continue functioning as municipal zoning by-laws.

 “Use It or Lose It” Tools

• Stalled developments can limit a municipality’s progress in meeting provincial housing targets. For example, seven municipalities have reported that 70,000 units have remained inactive for at least two years. Ontario has made changes to create a new “use it or lose it” tool to enhance and expand a municipality’s ability to address this obstacle and to support the efficient allocation of housing-enabling infrastructure.
• Changes:
  • Create a new municipal servicing management tool which explicitly authorizes municipalities to adopt policies by by-law (where they do not already exist) to formalize how water and sewage servicing of an approved development is managed to enable servicing capacity to be allocated / reallocated to other projects if the approved development has not proceeded after a specified timeline and the servicing is needed elsewhere in the service area.
    • Should municipalities adopt such a by-law, the by-law is not appealable to the Ontario Land Tribunal.
  • Created Minister’s regulation-making authority to enable the Minister to provide exemptions for individual or classes of approved developments.
  • Enhanced lapsing authority for approvals of draft plans of subdivision/condominiums and site plan to facilitate the efficient use of housing-enabling infrastructure and accelerate housing development.
  • Specifically:
    • For subdivision / condominium approvals:
      • Require approval authorities to impose a lapsing condition for all draft subdivision/ condominium approvals; and,
      • Created Minister’s regulation-making authority to set timelines for lapsing provisions and establish exemptions from lapsing provisions.  
    • For site plan control approvals:
      • Enabled a municipal “authorized person” to apply a lapsing condition when approving a new site plan control application​.
      • Created Minister’s regulation-making authority to set timelines for lapsing provisions and establish exemptions from lapsing provisions. 

Third Party Appeals

• Limited appeal rights for official plans, official plan amendments, zoning by-laws, and zoning by-law amendments to help communities get quicker planning approvals for housing projects, reduce building costs, and in some cases reduce project delays by up to 18 months while continuing to ensure that appeal rights are maintained for:
  • Landowners (if the official plan/zoning by-law matter applies to the lands),
  • Landowners and operators of facilities that are subject to an Environmental Compliance Approval under section 9 of the Environmental Protection Act (air, noise, vibrations) and/or are registered on the Environmental Activity and Sector Registry for air emissions AND are within an “area of employment” AND are within 300 metres of the land subject to the planning matter,
  • Landowners and facility operators who hold an Aggregate Resources Act license or permit for sites within 300 metres of the land subject to the planning matter,
  • NAV Canada and, within specified areas, certain owners or operators of an airport as defined in subsection 3 (1) of the Aeronautics Act (Canada),
  • Public hospitals.

Fee Refund Provisions

• Removed the fee refund provisions from the Planning Act and City of Toronto Act, 2006 for zoning by-law amendment and site plan control applications to speed up local decisions that support more housing.

Municipal Pre-Application Process

• Made pre-application consultation voluntary at the discretion of the applicant.
• Allowed an applicant to challenge complete application requirements to the Ontario Land Tribunal at any time, rather than only having a time-limited window once a municipality rejects an application as not being “complete.”

Settlement Area Boundary Expansions

• Allowed applicants to appeal a municipality’s refusal or failure to make a decision on a privately requested official plan or zoning by-law amendment that would change the boundary of an "area of settlement,“ outside of the Greenbelt Area. 

Facilitating Standardized Housing Designs

• Created regulation-making authority that enables: 
  • The establishment of criteria to facilitate planning approvals for standardized housing. These changes only apply on certain specified urban residential lands with full municipal servicing outside of the Greenbelt Area.
  • The identification of elements of the Planning Act and / or City of Toronto Act, 2006 that can be overridden and / or certain planning barriers that could be removed if the criteria are met.

 Upper-Tier Planning Responsibilities

• Provided flexibility for bringing the changes to remove planning responsibilities from specified upper-tier municipalities into force separately.
• Identified July 1, 2024, as the effective date of the upper-tier planning changes for Peel Region, Halton Region and York Region.
  • The upper-tier planning changes for the remaining four municipalities (i.e., Waterloo, Durham and Niagara Regions, and Simcoe County) will come into force at a later date(s), upon proclamation.

Expedited Approval Process for Community Service Facility Projects

• Created regulation-making authority to enable a streamlined approvals pathway for prescribed class(es) of “community service facility” projects (e.g. public K-12 schools, hospitals and long-term care facilities) that support the creation of complete communities outside of the Greenbelt Area.

Exempt Universities from the Planning Act

• Exempted publicly-assisted universities from the Planning Act and planning provisions of the City of Toronto Act, 2006.

City of Toronto Act, 2006 Amendment

Schedule 4 of Bill 185 also made amendments to the City of Toronto Act, 2006 related to several of the above-noted matters.

Municipal Act, 2001 Amendment

Schedule 9 of Bill 185 also made amendments to the Municipal Act, 2001 to provide that a municipality may, by by-law, adopt a policy providing for the allocation of water supply and sewage capacity.

The legislation provides more detail on all the reforms and can be viewed in the below ‘Supporting materials’ section of this notice.