Council asked to fund more planning staff amid unprecedented development
Eight new planners and nine other related staff would help respond to ‘extraordinary’ growth.

TheStar.com
Jan. 11, 2017
Jennifer Pagliaro

To keep pace with the unprecedented new development in the city, council has been asked to approve 17 temporary staff positions for its planning department.

The planning-and-growth-management committee agreed with staff recommendations Wednesday afternoon, asking for approval for the new positions, which include eight planners to deal with new building proposals.

But that investment will still leave the division with far fewer planners on average per capita, compared to Mississauga, Hamilton and Vancouver.

A recent survey conducted by the union representing planners of a third of that workforce found a severe lack of resources compromised their ability to properly build a livable city.

“I think it’s very important that we acknowledge the planning staff, the frontline planning staff, from what we can tell here have essentially been carrying on their backs — volunteering overtime — the burden of historically high growth in the city of Toronto matched with an austerity agenda which prevented us from having the staff in place to manage that historically high growth,” Councillor Gord Perks said Wednesday.

While city planners conduct studies to outline how the city or specific neighbourhoods or streets should grow or be designed, a bulk of their work is devoted to responding to individual applications to alter existing buildings or construct new condos and office towers.

The 17 new positions, representing a total $4.7 million for two years, would be funded by application fees from developers now held in a reserve fund, which can only be used for that purpose, the city’s chief planner Jennifer Keesmaat told committee.

No taxpayer money would be spent.

The term of the temporary positions would end March 2019.

The eight new planners will be allocated to work on applications in areas of the city that are under the most development pressure, Keesmaat said. These include downtown, Yonge-Eglinton and North York.

Both Keesmaat and councillors have indicated those planners will quickly be overwhelmed with work.

“I could say, without a whole lot of exaggeration, you could put them all in the North York Centre and they would be kept very busy,” said Willowdale Councillor John Filion.

Keesmaat earlier told budget committee that the city would need to hire 32 new planners to bring the number of planners up to an average per capita, compared to Mississauga, Hamilton and Vancouver.

According to staff the number of applications the city has received has increased by 27 per cent in the last year years, from 3,763 in 2013 to 4,790 applications last year. The complexity of the applications has also increased, staff said, and they require more time to work through.

“It could be that we are in front of you again a year from now suggesting that there need to be further additions, because it was an even higher volume in 2017,” Keesmaat told planning committee on Wednesday.

The reserve fund for development application review holds $10.6 million.

Council will consider the recommendations at a meeting Jan. 31.