'Keep your hands off the people's Greenbelt': Hundreds rally in downtown Guelph against provincial housing bills

Guelph protest one of many across the province over the weekend calling on Ford government to change course on controversial bills

Guelphmercury.com
Dec. 6, 2022

Hundreds took to the streets of downtown Guelph Sunday, calling on the provincial government to change course on housing bills critics say will do nothing to get affordable housing built, but instead leave municipalities cash strapped and environmentally sensitive lands devastated.

The Guelph edition of the Keep the Greenbelt rally was one of many over the weekend, urging Premier Doug Ford to do away with Bill 109 More Homes for Everyone Act, which received royal assent this past April; Bill 23 More Homes Built Faster Act, which was tabled the day after October’s municipal election; and Bill 39 Better Municipal Governance Act, which is set to give Ontario’s cities’ mayors more power.

Much of Sunday’s protest rallied around the proposed removal of lands from the Greenbelt, opening them up for development.

“Doug Ford, I say keep your Greenbelt promise. Keep your hands off the people’s Greenbelt -- this is our Greenbelt, it’s not the Greenbelt of Doug Ford’s developer friends,” Mike Schreiner, Guelph’s MPP and provincial Green Party leader, told the crowd gathered at York Road Park Dec. 4, ahead of a march up to city hall.

On Nov. 29, Schreiner called on the province’s integrity commissioner to investigate Ford, along with Municipal Affairs Minister Steve Clark, over recent land deals in parts of the Greenbelt now slated for removal.

“This bill is about five or six people turning millions into billions. Who loans somebody $100 million at 21 per cent interest if they are not tipped off that they’re going to be able to develop when that’s not supposed to be developed?” Schreiner said, referring to the purchase of land north of Vaughan last year by TACC Developments, owned by PC Party donor Silvio De Gasperis, as was first revealed by the Globe and Mail.

Coun. Phil Allt also spoke at Sunday’s rally, saying while the bills need to be repealed, they are all part of a larger problem coming from Queen’s Park.

“This isn’t just about the Greenbelt, this isn’t just about affordable housing -- this is about our future and our kids’ and our grandkids’ future,” the Ward 3 councillor said.

“People I know believe democracy works, I know democracy works, you know democracy works and that it matters to all of us. You better believe it. I know I can rely upon my MPP Mike Schreiner to stand up for democracy, even if Mike and I are from different political affiliations. We are united in a love for democracy.”

Behind the scenes
While numerous residents have expressed their displeasure with the Ford government’s recent housing bills, be it events like Sunday’s rally or through social media, Guelph’s city council has also spoken out against the legislation, having unanimously approved a motion saying as much last month.

Speaking with the Mercury Tribune prior to Sunday’s protest, Mayor Cam Guthrie said he is doing what he can to ensure Guelph comes out on the other side of the bills, in whatever form that may be.

The mayor said there is one thing all sides agree on: more housing is needed in Guelph and across the province. The problem is how recent legislation was introduced, with no consultations with the parties they would impact.

“It looks like it will increase property taxes to the existing tax base, and that completely flies in the face of growth paying for growth,” Guthrie said, referring to part of Bill 23 that would exempt developers from development charges for certain types of builds.

Municipalities, he said, were left in the dark for more than a month about what exactly the province was doing about funds they rely on to help build and maintain infrastructure for new housing developments.

This changed somewhat last week when Guthrie, in his now former role as head of the Ontario Big City Mayors’ Caucus, received a letter from Clark stating the province was “committing to ensuring municipalities are kept whole for any impact to their ability to fund housing enabling infrastructure because of Bill 23.” What exactly that means, and what falls under “housing enabling infrastructure” was not expanded upon.

The letter also pointed to the federal government’s $4-billion housing accelerator fund as a way to perhaps recoup some of those losses. However, Guthrie said he was told by the federal government that this fund “is not meant to, nor will it fill any type of waiving of development fees.”

As it currently stands, Guthrie said, “it leaves the financial gap, trying to make municipalities whole to cover the waiving of development charges or fees solely on either the province or the municipal tax base, which at the end of the day, there is only one taxpayer.”

Both Guthrie and Schreiner have told the Mercury Tribune that while Bill 23 itself has passed through its three readings in the Ontario legislature, the regulations that would implement its components still need to be determined.

“We can still put pressure on the Ford government to backtrack, especially on their proposal to open the Greenbelt for development,” Schreiner previously said.

Public commenting on those regulations had been set to end at the end of November, but saw extensions ranging from this month through to next last week.

As for Bill 23, Guthrie said he is “going to fight tooth and nail until the end of my days to try to figure out how we can get this changed,” but if it does become law then it would be best to move forward.

“If the government does not change it, I am not going to continue to waste my time and energy and resources on something that I know is not going to be changed,” he said.

“I don’t think it’s wise for us at that point, whenever that point arrives, to continue to spin our tires on something when instead we could be putting our energy into figuring out the best path forward to build the houses that people need, because whether Bill 23 remains the same or is changed or is deleted, there’s still 1.5 million homes that need to be built.”