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Richmond Hill Mayor Dave Barrow is fed up with the Ontario Municipal Board and is encouraging Richmond Hill residents to call local MPPs to defend their town from the provincial agency and developers.
He later described this plea he made at Monday’s committee meeting as “more of a rant”, but one that reflected an underlying feeling of frustration and concern for Richmond Hill, as more local development matters head to the provincial land tribunal for a ruling.
The mayor’s outspoken comments came following an OMB decision that will allow Haulover Investments Ltd. to build a two-tower apartment complex, with a base of six storeys and towers of 28 and 24 storeys each, on the southeast corner of Yonge Street and 16th Avenue.
According to the town’s new official plan, that height and density is reserved for development farther south around Hwy. 7, in what is regarded as a regional centre in the town’s new official plan.
However, it appears the town can’t defend such building restrictions, as its official plan is also before the OMB, following York Region’s failure to formally approve the plan during the allotted 180 days.
This resulted in developers working together to take the town’s plan to the board, placing years of work by town staff and input from residents into limbo.
According to the yet-to-be-approved official plan, 28 storeys is eight storeys higher than what is permitted in the proposed location, across from Hillcrest Mall.
According to the town’s old official plan, the proposed Haulover development would be 20 storeys more than permitted in that spot.
“I find, if you read the OMB decision (allowing the development), it goes back and forth with what the new and old plans can allow, through this is ridiculous cherry picking by the board,” Mr. Barrow said Tuesday.
The OMB decision states certain strengths of the new official plan can’t apply to the application because it’s not approved, but then the new plan is referenced to allow certain aspects of the same development bid, he complains.
“It becomes very frustrating and now I’m afraid we are subject to any outcome at OMB, as there is no sense that anything we have done as a council or a community, is remotely considered,” Mr. Barrow said.
“While 20 storeys may have been arrived at as a result of public consultation, the board seriously doubts if many of those being consulted recognize the fact that 20 storeys represents a variable measurement, OMB member Sylvia Sutherland stated in the board’s report on the Haulover site application. “A metre is a metre is a metre. A storey in one building isn’t necessarily a storey in another. It is an arbitrary and variable measurement.”
But based on the decision, it’s appears as if the town didn’t participate in the hearing, Mr. Barrow said.
Ontario Bill 51 was instituted in 2006 to strengthen the position of municipalities before the OMB.
With this bill still in place, Mr. Barrow describes the OMB’s Haulover  approval as an error in logic.
The mayor sent the decision to Richmond Hill MPP Reza Moridi and Oak Ridges-Markham MPP Helena Jaczek, urging them to take action.
He is also calling on you to lobby elected officials with e-mail, letters, Twitter and Facebook messages, to seek some kind of OMB reform.
Mr. Moridi said he has spoken with Mr. Barrow on the issue and understands the mayor’s frustration.
“The mayor is in charge and wants to protect the town, so when the decision doesn’t conform to either (official) plan, I know that is upsetting,” Mr. Moridi said yesterday.
The MPP said he will raise the concerns with Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing Kathleen Wynne and the Attorney General John Gerretsen, both of whom he said, oversee the provincial board.