Background Material

The application for Westhill development is on land purchased by Joseph Lebovic in 1985. At the time, he was completing a development of seventeen luxury homes when adjacent land went on the market.

An Official Plan Designation was obtained in 1995. Bob Rae was in power and was concerned about the Moraine. The province determined a golf course development would be acceptable.

The application was filed in January 2008. Complete supporting documentation was not. When the plan came to a Public Planning Meeting on March 4th 2008, the developer had already filed a request for a hearing with the Ontario Municipal Board.

There is a timeline imposed by the province for municipalities to make decisions on applications. If a decision is not made within three months an applicant has the right to an OMB hearing.

It take the decision out of the hands of the municipality. If a decision is controversial, some politicians are happy to have the OMB take the blame.

The report that came before Council on March 4th 2008. was a position paper for the town to take to an OMB hearing already scheduled.

Every agency with responsibility to comment had done so favourably. Town staff still had serious concerns. They recommended approval in principle.That means outstanding matters still have to be resolved. It gives authority to staff and developer to continue to work together on the project. Outright refusal is seldom sustainable.

The Town's position to put before the Ontario Municipal Board was the issue voted in
Council on March 4th.2008

The Ontario Municipal Board has the authority to set aside a municipal decision.

It is wise to have all t's crossed and i's dotted for such a hearing. Decisions are based on hard evidence.

Lawyers, engineers, planners. hydrologists and multiple other disciplines are involved in such an exercise. . It takes weeks. It costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. Taxpayer dollars.

I did not vote in favour of a golf course development on March 4th.2008. I voted in favour of taking a properly prepared position before the Board. To ensure, if approval was granted every aspect of the development would be scrutinised and every detail would be as it should to warrant nothng detrimental.

The fact is, despite arguments to the contrary by silly willies, people still have property rights in Canada.

Despite massive manuals of red tape and regulations and armies of bureaucrats,the only way a government can ensure land, not otherwise unsuitable for development, will not be developed, is to buy it out of the private sector into the public sector.

Bob Rae couldn't even think about that with the massive deficits he had on hand.

Dalton Mc Guinty did it in Richmond Hill. He bought Moraine land with subdivision services already in the ground. Imagine the price of that. Now the same government is in a frenzy to find new taxes to pay for deficits they created.

There is no guarantee that at some point in the future when memory has faded , it's surprising how quickly that happens, some other government, sufficiently hard pressed for resources, might reverse that decision.Those hard services have not likely been dug out of the ground. Or the capacity of the York Durham trunk sewer reversed.

It won't be the first asinine and insanely expensive decision made in history by politicians to quieten noisy nutbars .