The Developers' Friend

Wetlands, or marshes, fens, bogs, and swamps, are the link between land and water. Wetlands include trees, grasses, shrubs, moss, and other plants that require at least some water coverage. Wetlands provide an abundance of essential ecosystem services, including:

1. Water storage, storm protection, and flood mitigation
2. Water purification through retention of nutrients, sediments, and pollutants
3. Groundwater recharge
4. Essential habitat for many plants and animals, including over 90 percent of the roughly 200 Great Lakes  fish species that occur in the Great Lakes
5. Shoreline stabilization and erosion control.

Excerpted from Wetlands Destruction

If one were to think of the provincial premier most inimical to the environment, one would naturally think of  Alberta's Jason Kenney. His unwholesome addiction to bitumen is an ongoing exercise in flagrant disregard for the future of our planet.

However, hiding under the cover of our current pandemic is another who is proving that a Tory leopard cannot change its spots: Ontario Premier Doug Ford. While earlier earning praise for his apparently compassionate response to this public health crisis, it is clear he is now reverting to form with a vision for sensitive wetlands that is chilling.

Toronto’s conservation authority is pushing back against the Doug Ford government, urging the public to get involved after the province ordered it to issue a permit allowing a developer to level and fill with soil a provincially significant wetland in Pickering.

In a statement issued Friday afternoon, the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority said it was being forced to issue the permit “under duress” and “would ordinarily decline permission of such a permit.” It added that its only option was to add conditions to the permit to “lessen negative impacts” —conditions the developer is now challenging.

Friday’s move is the latest in the province’s attacks on the authority of conservation authorities, which included a rewrite of legislation last fall intended to rein them in. The development of the Duffins Creek Wetland — approved through a ministerial zoning order (MZO) — has become the first test of the new conservation authority regulations.

Anyone who has done even a modest amount of research on climate change know that with rising levels of water 'baked into' our collective future, the preservation of wetlands is a key tool in our survival arsenal. Yet Mr. Ford seems far more dedicated not only to the survival, but to the financial elevation, of  his friends.

An MZO is a tool that allows Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing Steve Clark to fast-track developments by overriding local zoning rules.

So far this year, the province has approved 33 MZOs. A handful of them are on land that is deemed environmentally sensitive, and according to the current provincial legislation would normally be untouchable.

“TRCA’s Board of Directors must now, under duress, adhere to the Province’s legally mandated directive, which conflicts with TRCA’s mandate to further the conservation, development, and management of natural resources in watersheds within our jurisdiction,” the TRCA said ....

On Thursday evening, the province passed a regulation ordering the TRCA to issue a permit to developer by March 12 to allow them to “to carry out part of a development project” on the 22-hectare Duffins Creek wetland at Squires Beach Road and Bayly Street just south of Highway 401.

That part of the development project, entailing the filling in of the wetlands with soil in preparation for its development, beggars belief, Fortunately, there are those refusing to accept this as a fait accompli.

“If this law passes, the minster can just waltz in with one of his developer friends and wipe away all restrictions on developments,” said Tim Gray, executive director with Environmental Defense, about the proposed changes to the Planning Act.

Gray’s organization is one of three environmental groups that has filed a lawsuit against the province, contending the Pickering MZO was a breach of provincial policy.

“Nothing that is currently protected by planning rules in Ontario — wetlands, river valleys, forests, endangered species habitat — is protected now,” added Gray.

And the Ford government is feeling the pressure:

 In confidential documents leaked to the media this week, the government expressed concern that the groups’ lawsuit had grounds and there was a risk the MZO could be found to be illegal.

“In the absence of the proposed amendments to the Planning Act, 1990 — and in particular the proposal for retroactive application — there is a moderately high risk that the MZO would be found to have contravened the Planning Act.”

It is difficult to know how all of this will ultimately play out. With any luck, however, as we gradually emerge from the pandemic, Ford and his cronies will realize that their actions are facing increasing scrutiny. With a provincial election not all that far off, that should give all of them real pause.