Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s office has issued a memo announcing the creation of a working group to implement most of the recommendations contained in a report on the protected Greenbelt written by Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk.
The memo, authored by Mr. Ford’s chief of staff and the cabinet secretary, instructs the ministers’ and deputy ministers’ chiefs of staff to include options and risks in all submissions to cabinet regarding the recommendations.“A comprehensive response to the report is a top priority and a working group is being established to support implementation,” the memo said. It also reminds senior government workers that they must follow “rules regarding conflict of interest and political activity.”
The Ontario government has previously indicated it will be taking steps to implement 14 of the 15 recommendations that came from Ms. Lysyk. According to Mr. Ford, the recommendation to review the decision to open up approximately 7,400 acres from 15 sites of the Greenbelt will not be revisited.
In December 2022, Ontario amended the Greenbelt Plan and area boundary, and removed or redesignated 7,400 Greenbelt acres across 15 sites for housing construction. The Greenbelt itself spans 2 million acres of protected farmland, wetlands, and woodlands, and surrounds the Greater Golden Horseshoe region in Southern Ontario. The Greenbelt lands were created in 2005 to permanently protect some of the most productive farmland in Canada.
In her report, the auditor general stated the selection of sites, which took place rapidly over a three-week period, was “not transparent, objective, or fully informed.”
“While approximately 500 Greenbelt-removal requests had been submitted to the ministry in the 17 years since the Greenbelt was established, the assessment was limited to 22 specific sites, 21 of which had been identified and provided to the Greenbelt Project Team directly by the housing minister’s political staff,” said Ms. Lysyk’s report.
The auditor general said that “prominent” developers provided information on two proposed sites to be removed from the Greenbelt to the chief of staff for the housing minister, Steven Clark, at a function held by the Building Industry and Land Development Association on Sept. 14, 2022.
“Subsequently, one of the same developers provided the housing minister’s chief of staff with more information and requests to remove three additional sites, including a land site associated with a third developer,” said her report.
These five sites, which were ultimately removed from the Greenbelt, accounted for 92 percent of the acres opened for development in December 2022, according to Ms. Lysyk.
Review
Mr. Ford has requested that the integrity commissioner review the actions taken by Mr. Clark’s chief of staff, Ryan Amato. The request is being reviewed.
Both Mr. Clark and Mr. Ford said they did not have contact with developers and did not benefit from the decision to select land to be removed. They both denied having detailed knowledge of the lands being removed or swapped from the Greenbelt prior to cabinet’s involvement.
The report also stated that 19 of the 22 proposed sites did not meet the one initial environmental/agricultural criterion because they included Natural Heritage System lands or a Specialty Crop designation.
Before the sites were proposed to cabinet for removal from the Greenbelt, that criterion was dropped, said Ms. Lysyk’s report.
She said, “Alterations were made to four of the proposed site selections so they would meet the criterion that sites must be at the edge of the existing Greenbelt.”
The auditor general raised concerns about confidentiality agreements, which the memo addressed.
“We also ask that during this period, all instances where confidentiality agreements are proposed be flagged for cabinet office and/or Treasury Board Secretariat, who will bring these matters to our attention,” it said.
“Please ensure adherence to records retention requirements, including the documentation of materials received by third parties and only use government emails for work related matters.”
The Canadian Press contributed to this report.
