The uproar over the Greenbelt theft has died down to a seething anger, despite Doug Ford's promise to restore it. There is ongoing anger over the fact that he lied to us, anger over his apology for having made "a mistake," anger that he was willing to overlook the environmental depredation that his theft would have enabled, anger over his clumsy attempt to reward wealthy developers, and anger over the still extant Bill 23, which, among other things, saddles municipalities with the development charges formerly paid by those rich developers.
People know that Ford will do anything he can get away with. He has lost their trust. And, as the following letters attest, they intend on never letting go of the lessons learned about the nature of this government.
Doug Ford cancels controversial $8.28-billion Greenbelt land swap: ‘It was a mistake,’ Sept. 21Now that Premier Doug Ford is on the road to redemption, he should seriously consider completing the journey and resign his position, not only for himself, but for the benefit of his party and also the people of Ontario.
Patricia Steward, East York
Ford made a number of mistakes that require correction
Mistakes are made by honest, well-intentioned people. Ignorant, selfish Premier Doug Ford hasn’t an honest bone in his body.
This government wastes everyone’s energy trying to undo his destructive decisions. Next task: stop the sell-off of Ontario Place and the destruction of our Science Centre.
Douglas Buck, Toronto
Do you believe Ford?
Doug Ford cancels controversial $8.28-billion Greenbelt land swap: ‘It was a mistake,’ Sept. 21
Now that Premier Doug Ford is on the road to redemption, he should seriously consider completing the journey and resign his position, not only for himself, but for the benefit of his party and also the people of Ontario.
Patricia Steward, East York
Ford made a number of mistakes that require correction
Mistakes are made by honest, well-intentioned people. Ignorant, selfish Premier Doug Ford hasn’t an honest bone in his body.
This government wastes everyone’s energy trying to undo his destructive decisions. Next task: stop the sell-off of Ontario Place and the destruction of our Science Centre.
Douglas Buck, Toronto
Do you believe Ford?
It was NOT a mistake. It was a gambit.
Premier Doug Ford tried to get the land out for development, hoping to get away with it, thus opening the door for more removals and other donor-developer-friendly activity.
He backed down, as he has done before, because — and only because — there was press coverage, resistance, criticism, and negative polling results.
Ford has had to promise — again — to leave the Greenbelt alone. Kind of like the kid who promises this time, for sure, to keep his hands out of the cookie jar.
Do you believe him?
Keep an eye on Ford. Look around to see what else has been done in the background while this was going on in front of our eyes.
Graeme Elliott, Toronto
Are health-care privatization and highway schemes mistakes too?
There is no mistake about it, Premier Doug Ford’s scheme on the Greenbelt was deliberate not an inadvertent mistake. Just like his scheme to privatize health care and his scheme to still greatly benefit his developer friends by building highways 413 and the Bradford bypass both going through Greenbelt lands and waterways.
Ford would be well advised to reverse himself again and cancel both of these schemes.
Paul Kahnert, Markham
Bill 23 is just a new taxpayer subsidy to development companies
As Doug Ford’s Greenbelt reversal is celebrated, other ‘misguided’ planning policies remain concerns, Sept. 22
The Star rightly lists development charges supported by municipalities as “misguided.”
Development charges for roads, sewers, schools, libraries etc. were paid by developers for growth related infrastructure. Now under Bill 23 there is a $1 billion hole in municipalities’ cash flow according to the Association of Municipalities Ontario.
If municipalities and boards of education cannot pay this extra cost, development is compromised.
Bill 23 is a barrier to orderly land use planning.
Clearly this is a new subsidy paid by taxpayers to development companies.
This shows where Premier Doug Ford’s interest is allowing “folks” to pay for future growth. The development sector has the means to pay for growth related infrastructure.
David Godley, retired land use planner, Mississauga
On a slightly different topic, and one I missed.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.reuters.com/business/energy/ontario-plans-more-nuclear-reactors-meet-rising-electricity-demand-2023-07-07/
- Ontario plans to build three new small modular reactors (SMRs) to help meet rising electricity demand, the provincial government said on Friday, increasing its bet on the new nuclear technology Canada is counting on to help reduce emissions.
This has all the trappings of another Progressive Conservative boondoggle. SMRs sound like a great idea but nobody has ever built one. At least the CANDU reactors are a proven technology.
Of course, no one has ever heard of cost and time overruns in building a nuclear reactor.
Doug and his merry band cancelled 700+ renewable projects back in 2019 costing the Ontario taxpayer about $231 million. Most of those would likely be on lsine by now.
Four years later, PCs have, apparently, noticed a need for more electricity and have sprung into action settling on a vapourware SMR project which if everything goes perfectly will produce power in 10 or 12 years.
Good trade–off.
BTW, do we have the expertise anymore to build a nuclear reactor? As far as I know the only people to have actually commissoned o functioning civilian nuclear reactor in 10 or 15 years have been the Chinese and the Russians.
Thanks for the link, Anon. I have heard of the concept of small nuclear reactors, and was aware that they do not yet exist. I think the Ford 'plan' is yet another indictment of his ineptitude and unfitness for office. As you mention, all of the green projects he cancelled would likely have been online now, and at a much lower cost, both fiscally and environmentally.
DeleteI suppose it should not be surprising that a "big-idea' guy like Ford would come up with yet another costly scheme that will not meet the needs of the people he is supposed to be serving.