An Environmental Registry of Ontario (ERO) post on Oct. 16 seeks public input on legislation that would restore 15 parcels of land that were redesignated or removed from Ontario’s Greenbelt in late 2022.
If the Greenbelt Statute Law Amendment Act, 2023 is passed, it would ensure any future boundary changes are made through an open, public, and transparent legislative process.
The proposal is open for public comment until Nov. 30, 2023.
The proposal hopes to rectify a controversial Dec. 2022 order in which the provincial government removed or redesignated 15 areas of land. Totalling approximately 7,400 acres from the edge of Ontario’s Greenbelt. That decision prompted heavy scrutiny of the provincial government. Scrutiny came from the public, news media, and probes by the RCMP and Auditor General regarding various alleged abuses.
The ERO proposal (019-7739), introduced by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, says the government has acknowledged that the process for the 2022 Greenbelt removals was too fast and not sufficiently transparent.
Legislative amendments
In response to feedback from Indigenous communities, the public, municipalities, and other stakeholders the government has introduced proposed legislative amendments that would:
- Add 15 sites back to the Greenbelt that were removed/redesignated in December 2022 by incorporating the description of the Greenbelt Area and Oak Ridges Moraine Area boundaries directly into the legislation.
- Eliminate the authority to add or remove lands to/from the Greenbelt Area and Oak Ridges Moraine Area by regulation. So that any future amendments to these Areas would require legislative change to the Greenbelt Act or the Oak Ridges Moraine Conservation Act.
- Revoke the existing Greenbelt Area boundary regulation and the existing regulation that designates the Oak Ridges Moraine Area.
- Undo the redesignation of lands as “settlement area” in the Oak Ridges Moraine Conservation Plan.
- Provide for a concurrent amendment to the Greenbelt Plan’s land use schedules to restore the same protections to lands that they had before the 2022 amendment.
- Continue to provide that no plan amendments can be made that would reduce the total area in the Greenbelt Plan.
- Reverse the repeal of the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve Act, 2005.
- Restore the same protections for easements and covenants on the lands in the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve that they had before the 2022 amendment; and
- Strengthen immunity provisions.
This proposal says this bill would fulfill the government’s commitment to fully restore these lands. And provide protections to the Greenbelt moving forward.
To comment visit www.ero.ontario.ca/ notice/019-7739.
