The provincial government is proposing changes to legislation that are "disturbing" and "destructive," according to Ontario Federation of Agriculture (OFA) board director and area farmer Paul Maurice.
The OFA, which represents 38,000 of the 45,000 farmers in the province, is raising concerns about proposed changes to the Provincial Policy Statement (PPS) and Bill 97, Helping Homebuyers, Protecting Tenants Act, 2023.
“I have to say that when we found out about this proposed legislation coming through,” Maurice recently told Tiny Township council, “we – the board at OFA and a pile of farmers across this province – were in awe, to be able to see what is being proposed and the damage that this would actually cause to the agriculture community throughout the province.”
His presentation referenced rural planner Wayne Caldwell, whom the Lafontaine farmer said had called the changes "disturbing" and "destructive."
The PPS is proposing multi-lot residential development be permitted on rural lands, as well as severances on agricultural land for residential lots.
According to Maurice, Caldwell had estimated if the policy is approved, then up to 171,000 severances could happen across the province, reducing farm production and causing difficulty in moving farm equipment in a safe and proper manner.
“Ontario’s farmland is a scarce resource, making up less than five per cent of the land base in the province," Maurice said.
“The 2021 Census shows us that we are losing 319 acres per day in the province to development of some type; something that we are extremely concerned about. We grow over 200 crops in the province, something that we must be extremely proud of.”
“I have no idea how this proposed piece of legislation was thought up; I have no idea of who was consulted to bring this on, but it is something that is very disturbing to us as farmers because it’s just not cohesive,” added Maurice.
The OFA wants to meets with the province to find a resolution acceptable to the farming community.
“We’ve never received so many requests to see where we stand on this issue because a lot of planning departments just don’t have a clue of how to handle this and the impact that it’s going to have,” said Maurice.
Tiny Township acting planning and development director Kris Menzies explained that what the province was attempting to do was consolidate two documents planners rely on – the current PPS, as well as the Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe – into one overriding planning policy for the province.
The staff report highlighted roughly 10 areas of the 2023 PPS: growth targets; intensification; settlement areas; rural areas and rural lands in municipalities; employment areas; agriculture; energy conservation, air quality and climate change; sewage, water and stormwater; natural heritage; and others.
“A rural area in planning,” said Menzies, “is defined as something other than a settlement area or something other than agriculture; it’s everything else. Subdivisions can happen in rural areas.”
The report also recommends that the province permit partial services for settlement expansion areas.
A strong request was for new residential lot creation policies to be deleted “as the creation of additional residential lots in agricultural areas does not protect agricultural areas”.
Other recommendations included changing part of the seasonal dwelling policy as Menzies stated there was difficulty to define what ‘seasonal’ meant in different contexts.
Members of the public can send comments regarding the 2023 PPS proposed policy on the Environmental Registry of Ontario website.
