Doug Ford’s government issued dozens of special orders designed to fast-track LTC homes and housing. That hasn’t happened, a Star analysis reveals

Thestar.com
Nov. 6, 2023

At the height of the pandemic, they were heralded by the Doug Ford government as a useful tool to speed up the construction of much-needed housing and long-term-care facilities.

But in the midst of a deepening scandal over the Greenbelt, the provincial government now says it will review the use of minister’s zoning orders (known as MZOs) that are designed to fast-track development by bypassing local planning rules  especially those where work hasn’t started yet. Former housing minister Steve Clark issued more than 100 orders between 2019 and 2023.

The Star analyzed the progress made on MZOs that were issued in the first two full years of the Ford government and found that the tool has done little to achieve the original goals after almost four years. In fact, in some cases the special orders may have even further delayed projects, raising questions about their usefulness as a way to speed development.

“It hasn’t moved anything sooner,” said Sue Sherban, a councillor in Whitchurch-Stouffville who has opposed the three MZOs that have come to her town. “It just added more layers of bureaucracy in the mix in trying to get land developed that wasn’t ready to be developed.”

Focus has shifted to MZOs following the Ford government’s stunning reversal of the Greenbelt land swap  now under investigation by the RCMP  and its decision to force cities to sprawl by expanding their urban boundaries. Last month, the provincial auditor general confirmed it was launching a review of the zoning orders, as is Housing Minister Paul Calandra.

In 2019 and 2020, there were 39 MZOs issued. Of these, the Star focused on 28 zoning orders: nine for long-term-care facilities and 19 for housing.

Out of those, only four have been completed or are nearing completion, all of them built with a more efficient modular or prefabricated construction at the request of local municipalities.

It took the Star weeks to collect the most recent reports and updates from planning staff in 18 municipalities. Only council and staff in Kawartha Lakes declined to give the most recent planning information for an extensive subdivision, requested by Craft Developments, despite it being public information.

The province, which checks in quarterly to track progress on MZOs, according to municipalities, does not make its updates public.

The Star also found:

• Out of the MZOs the Star looked at, five were issued on surplus lands owned by the province for LTC facilities or residential homes. They have seen no movement since they were issued in 2020. Planning officials in Vaughan, Aurora, Toronto, Hamilton and Mississauga told the Star they have not received any site plans or applications for development on the provincial lands since the MZOs were granted.
• MZOs for at least five large housing developments, including those in Caledon, Stouffville and Innisfil, are significantly delayed due to sewage and waste-water servicing capacity limits, because the zoning orders were issued for land outside the city boundaries, for which there are no immediate plans for vital infrastructure.
• The remaining orders are moving slowly through the various stages of the planning process, with some no further ahead than the original subdivision plans used to get the initial approval, according to politicians in several municipalities. In most cases, those MZOs have done nothing to add to housing, but have helped developers bypass Ontario Land Tribunal hearings or gain permission to build on environmentally sensitive lands

 

“It was supposed to fast track to stimulate the economy, create affordable housing and jobs, but it really hasn’t,” said Pickering councillor Maurice Brenner, who has seen several orders come to his city. “Zoning orders may have given developers approvals, but it hasn’t really moved anything along in any meaningful way.”

The province didn’t answer questions about why there has been no progress on development on provincial land. It also didn’t answer what criteria the housing minister would use to assess the MZOs in his review.

In a statement, Alexandru Cioban, a spokesperson for Calandra, said the zoning orders have “helped support construction of approximately 117,000 housing units” and “accelerate the creation of 5,500” long-term-care beds.

Cioban also said “this tool only kick-starts the approvals process by cutting red tape,” while it’s the municipality that maintains control over “site plan approvals, building permits, and other processes, and remains responsible for getting projects through to the finish line.”

But development takes time. Even with all the paperwork and approvals in place, getting development ready for a build can take a minimum of two to three years, said Marty Stollar, a developer who also a former mayor of Lindsay.

“No one really in the industry thinks zoning orders would actually speed (development) up,” said Stollar, adding that there are actually those MZOs that do legitimately accelerate the process, as well as “the gratuitous MZOs that literally do nothing to speed up development.”

Stollar said several of the latter are simply a tool to increase the value of the land.

When building homes on undeveloped land in an urban or rural area, it can take up to a decade to get pipes into the ground, municipal officials say. Building an LTC facility can take on average 36 months once a site and financing have been secured.

But even with MZOs, there’s no way to compel developers to move ahead with a project, since there are no timelines or deadlines specified on the orders themselves, municipal officials say.

One of the first zoning orders issued by the Ford government in 2019  endorsed by the local council  was to create a long-term-care facility with 224 beds in Clarington, just outside the boundary of Bowmanville.

“The intent of a zoning order is to go straight to approval,” said Amanda Tapp, manager in Clarington’s planning department, adding that the town had only just recently issued the building permit.

“When you look at the timeline, one could wonder, is this tool really doing what it’s supposed to do? This is 2019 but they didn’t get approval until 2023?” said Tapp. “There were three full years of dormancy. We can’t really force anyone to come in with an application faster.”

On its website, Durham Christian Homes, which is behind this long-term-care project, said it will be completed by 2025  six years after it received the zoning order. They didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Equally confounding has been the lack of progress on developments on lands owned by the province itself. On Aug. 12, 2020, the province issued six zoning orders on its surplus lands to build a mix of homes and long-term-care facilities.

Five of those municipalities told the Star they have not received any site plan applications for the project. Infrastructure Ontario site said in an email that the transactions haven’t closed yet and the negotiations are still ongoing.

One of those properties was 50-100 Bloomington Rd. in Aurora, a 40-acre parcel of land on which the province said it would build a long-term-care facility and residential housing. At the time, the MZO was issued without notifying the local council, leading to a public war of words between the Mayor Tom Mrakas and then-housing minister Steve Clark.

But since then, “nothing’s really happened,” said Marco Ramunno, director of planning for Aurora. He said the property was put up for sale, but “no developer tied it up.”

“The province still owns it … and we have no formal application for long-term-care facility or residential housing,” said Ramunno, who added that the town had always envisioned it as parkland.

An MZO issued for Toronto’s Dominion Foundry site may have actually slowed development, which includes affordable housing. It’s currently being used as a parking lot.

In Toronto, the province issued an MZO to build three towers on the historic Dominion Foundry site on Eastern Avenue in 2020, and soon after began demolition of two of the buildings as public opposition mounted. A legal decision put a halt to the demolition, and eventually the property was sold by the province for just over $101 million to a company owned by Andrew de Gasperis of Aspen Ridge Homes, which did not respond to requests for comment by deadline.

But that hasn’t spurred any new housing, said NDP MPP Kristyn Wong-Tam, who was a Toronto councillor when the MZO was issued. “The entire site has been turned into a parking lot … and as far as we can tell, it’s going to be there for several years,” said Wong-Tam. “This tells you that they weren’t in such a rush to build.”

Wong-Tam said for the Dominion site, “the MZO probably delayed this project even more,” as it led to a legal battle, with the court weighing in with specific requirements.

She said the plan, which includes some affordable housing, hasn’t moved forward since then and local residents are eager to see it come to life.

Issuing MZOs where there is no infrastructure or servicing has done little to speed development projects.

One of the first MZOs was issued for a 160-bed long-term-care facility and seniors home just outside Barrie city limits. At the time, local planning staff opposed the development but Innisfil council approved it. Since 2019, there has been no movement on the facility, with planning staff in Barrie and Innisfil instead working on a servicing agreement to see who would be on the hook for the project.

In 2020, developer Shakir Rehmatullah, the founder and president of Flato received several MZOs to build homes in large subdivisions outside the urban boundaries of both Markham and Stouffville. The projects together are expected to provide thousands of homes.

According to Dwayne Tapp, director of development services for the Town of Whitchurch-Stouffville, while the zoning orders helped get the development into the queue, they “didn’t take into account servicing.”

“That process takes a lot of time, so without having sewer and water to the site, we are not in a position where we can issue building permits,” said Tapp.

He said the landowners are assessing how much it will cost them to put in sewage infrastructure, but estimates it will take at least three to four years to get completed. Rehmatullah did not respond to requests for comment.

Two large housing projects in southern Caledon, which received zoning orders in 2020 to fast-track large housing plans are also stalled due to limited infrastructure.

Tara Buonpensiero, director, regional planning in Peel, said the two zoning orders were issued in Caledon in 2020 in Mayfield West and the Bolton expansion when both road and wastewater services “were not adequate to facilitate immediate development on those sites.”

Three years later, “environmental assessments and engineering work still need to be undertaken.”

In fact, the only housing built from the MZOs issued in 2020 were part of Toronto’s modular housing initiative, which aimed to create 1,000 homes for homeless people and chronic shelter users. In 2020, two zoning orders were requested for modular homes. Both were completed within a year. Since then, the city has requested several other MZOs for modular homes which have been completed.

Modular housing can be built faster, as it’s prefabricated, permanent housing constructed in a factory, and assembled on site.

Modular construction was also used in two long-term-care facilities in Ajax and Mississauga which received MZOs in 2020. The Ajax facility opened up in 2022 after 18 months and phase one of a long-term-care home in Mississauga with 630 beds is scheduled to open next week.

The lack of progress on MZOs comes as little surprise to former mayor and developer Stollar.

“Freeing more land approved for development does literally nothing to accelerate the creation of new housing,” he said, adding that high housing prices and a shortage of labour will delay any development further.

“It doesn’t really matter how much land is available for development, the industry isn’t going to build a home until they have buyers for it.”