Ontario’s globally respected efforts on land use and watershed planning are being decimated by the provincial government’s ill-considered actions to address the housing crisis. Worse, those actions extend to destroying democratic and legal norms. 

Watershed security, the sound protection of our aquatic resources, safeguards regional ecological integrity, social wellbeing, and economic vitality, and was well served across South-central Ontario from the 1940s. 

Key initiatives included the creation of conservation authorities to protect natural resources on a watershed basis and the Provincial Policy Statement (now the Provincial Planning Statement, but still noted as the PPS) which among other priorities directs planning authorities to use the watershed as the ecologically meaningful scale for integrated planning and to protect, improve or restore the quality and quantity of water in planning and permitting. 

Additional environmental safeguards included creating special planning areas such as the Greenbelt to limit the incursion of urban sprawl across the landscape; A Place to Grow, the growth plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe, which encouraged density over sprawl; and a supporting cast of acts and regulations on aggregates, drinking water, environmental assessment, species at risk, and more.

All have had their vision to balance the protection of environmental health with development significantly narrowed in a panicked response to the housing crisis. For the most part, legislative change was bundled in omnibus bills with proposed amendments to as many as 40 acts, yet which seemed to somehow ignore the increasing climate and biodiversity crises.

Consultation was limited. Well-reasoned concerns were ignored. So the mandate and role of conservation authorities were bulldozed; the classification of new provincially significant wetland was made arduous if not impossible; regional planning is being abolished; density targets have been slashed; many aspects of permitting were moved to voluntary checklists; the protection of species at risk is now known as pay to slay; and aggregate operations have essentially been declared welcome anywhere.

Significant negative impacts of what now passes for planning include increased sprawl development that swallows up greenspace and agricultural lands; reduced natural heritage, thereby impacting normal stream flow, erosion, flooding, and both aquatic and terrestrial biodiversity; and increased hard surfaces that will wash more pollutants into our receiving waters, including road salt, and increase stream temperature.

In addition, the provincial government’s use of Minister Zoning Orders to short-circuit normal municipal planning is rampant; it has imposed sprawl growth on municipalities that want compact communities; and it keeps trying to kill the Greenbelt by both legal and more nefarious means.

As if all this is not bad enough, the government has sanctioned strong mayor powers, in which less than a majority of municipal councillors can approve development, making a mockery of democracy. And, in a crowning act of despotism, the province has made it virtually impossible for the public to appeal municipal approvals to the Ontario Land Tribunal. 

It is hard to see a higher purpose in all this chaos. Will new communities have access to greenspace and adequate supplies of potable water? Will their design and form reduce or aggravate greenhouse gas emissions? Will those among us seeking to start families want to live there, and can they afford to? 

Clearly, Ontario’s Housing Action Plan is a disaster for the environment, democracy, and historic legal rights, and must be revamped. 

While the Province should pursue a new vision for development that is sustainable and democratic, the Ontario Headwaters Institute believes that it is more important than ever for our municipalities to meet their obligations under the Provincial Planning Statement to protect, improve, or restore the quality and quantity of water by integrating land use and watershed planning.

Toward that end, we are putting forward a draft Municipal Charter for Watershed Security, with eight high-level suggested actions. You can see the Charter, as well as access a public survey on it, at www.ontarioheadwaters.ca. 

If you subscribe to our newsletter while there, we will update you on the survey and proposed next steps.

Andrew McCammon is the executive director of the Ontario Headwaters Institute

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