Making it easy: Orillia opens for business

NRU
July 30, 2014
By Edward LaRusic

The City of Orillia is hoping its new comprehensive zoning by-law, with its customer friendly approach, will send a message that Orillia is open for business as the city seeks to intensify.

Councillor Linda Murray said that the new by-law - passed by Orillia council June 2 - sends a message that Orillia is “open for business.”

“We’re trying to streamline the process, and make it easier for people to develop in Orillia,” Murray said. “Our staff are listening to what developers have said can be a very cumbersome and lengthy process.”
Councillor Tony Madden agrees.

“[The new zoning by-law] makes it easier to do business in Orillia. It makes it clearer and better to understand what the rules and regulations are, and it lays out a bit more of a customer friendly approach to developing and living in Orillia.”

Orillia senior planner Andrea Woodrow told NRU that with the approval of the city’s official plan last year, it was time to being the process of updating the zoning by-law.

“We’re required to update our zoning by-law no later than three years after our official plan is updated.

The city’s official plan was approved by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing back in [March] 2011 and subsequently by the OMB in August 2013.”

The update to the official plan - which Orillia council approved in November, 2010 - reflects new provincial policy such as the Places to Grow Act and the Lake Simcoe Protection Plan. Among other changes, the new official plan identifies specific areas where the city wants to direct intensification.

To help implement that plan, the new zoning by-law, Woodrow said, takes a different approach than the previous one, adopted in 2005.

“We are now pre-zoning for higher density uses in intensification areas. Uses such as townhouses and apartment dwellings are now permitted as-of-right in the new zoning bylaw along major arterials where public transit is accessible... We’re hoping that will help us meet our intensification targets as set out in the growth plan.”

Under Amendment 1 of the Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe, Orillia is expected to grow from its 2011 population of 30,586 residents to 41,000 residents by 2031.

Woodrow said that new by-law encourages mixed-use, allowing up to four-storey developments as-of-right in most areas of the downtown.

Another new feature of the zoning by-law is the creation of overlays to help implement the policies of the Lake Simcoe Protection Plan. Woodrow said the city has used this approach to create a development buffer for its shoreline.

“We applied [the overlays] to properties abutting Lake Simcoe... We’ve also taken a proactive approach and done a shoreline overlay zone in the Lake Couchiching area as well... Essentially, it recognizes that there are some vacant lots that existed prior to the Lake Simcoe Protection Plan, and also allows for some expansion and recognition of existing buildings and structures.”

Woodrow noted that in consulting the public about the new zoning by-law, Orillia went above and beyond the requirements of having one open house and one statutory meeting under the Planning Act. The city had three public information sessions and two statutory public meetings.

Assisting staff in creating the new comprehensive zoning bylaw was consultant MHBC, which was retained earlier in the process.

The next step, she said, is working through four site-specific appeals of the new zoning by-law that have been fi led.

“Two are with respect to the shoreline buffer overlay for Lake Simcoe, one is for the shoreline buffer on Lake Couchiching, and one is with respect to the scope of permitted uses on a property.”

One of those appeals is by Orillia councillor Patrick Kehoe, who owns lands along the shoreline. He said that some of the lands near the shoreline that were conveyed to adjacent property owners back in the 1980s are impacted by the new shoreline buffers.

“Because of the change to the setback from the shoreline, the properties that were previous conveyed are unusable.”

Woodrow said that a date had not been set for an Ontario Municipal Board hearing, but expressed hope that the appeals would be resolved without a hearing.