PRESERVATION OF AGRICULTURAL LANDS SOCIETY (PALS) (Established 1976)
Submission to the Standing Committee on General Government
re Bill 135, The Greenbelt Act
By Dr. John Bacher (PhD), Researcher PALS. February 2, 2005
The Preservation of Agricultural Lands Society (PALS) welcomes this opportunity to make a presentation regarding Bill 135. Our involvement in farmland preservation and related issues since 1976, gives us an excellent perspective regarding the need for this proposed new initiative.
1. Recent Historical Experience Shows Why Greenbelt Act is Needed
At the outset, PALS wishes to highlight some of what we believe are the historical reasons for the development of the Greenbelt legislation, the key one being an unfortunate weakening of the Ontario Planning Act in 1996. This came about less than a year after the demise of the Niagara Tender Fruit Land Program in June 1995, which would have provided for the purchase of restrictive covenants throughout the Niagara tender fruit growing area. The program would have eased the financial difficulties of growers farming the most expensive land for agricultural crops in Canada, and protected the land "in perpetuity".
Up until 1996, the 1994 Planning Act had provided that there would be no expansions of urban settlements onto speciality crop land- without exception. These policies were intended to strengthen the policies of the Niagara Regional Policy Plan. The Niagara Official Plan, through its Appendix B ( inserted into the plan by an order of the Ontario Municipal Board), provides that such boundaries when adjacent to the unique Niagara grape and tender fruit lands should be considered "permanent."
Following the weakening of the Planning Act, the OMB made the worst decision for the fate of the unique Niagara Fruit Lands since the Niagara Policy Plan was approved in 1981. Ignoring the provisions of Appendix B, it permitted an 550 acre expansion of the urban settlement area of the Town of Pelham. This decision has been cited as a justification for others who may wish to encroach upon the unique fruit lands, especially in St. Catharines, and for some already allowed urban uses.
At the same time that the Planning Act was being gutted, the Provincial Government paradoxically moved to strengthen land use policies impacting upon the Oak Rides Moraine. Key provisions of the new Oak Ridges Moraine Protection Act made it more difficult to expand urban boundaries of urban settlements within its borders. Most significantly, the act imposed a 10 year moratorium on such expansions.
2. Current Situation Shows Need for Moraine Type Protections Throughout Greenbelt
The current situation shows the need to have similar planning protections to those of the Oak Ridges Moraine Protection Act for other comparable unique and significant landscapes around the province. The ten year moratorium for the Moraine should also be applied to the comparably hydrologically - significant Niagara Escarpment. The Niagara Escarpment like the Oak Ridges feature, is an important stream recharge and headwaters area .
The Niagara Escarpment Commission Planning Area is now facing several urban expansion requests. Likewise the Escarpment Link Lands, 850 acres in the Burlington area close to the Niagara Escarpment, are facing strong pressures for urban expansion. One of the strongest features of the proposed Greenbelt expansion Act is that it will prevent urban expansions onto these agricultural areas that buffer the Niagara Escarpment.
The Niagara Fruit Belt, a much smaller area than the Niagara Escarpment, is also unique and very much threatened by urbanization. Like the Niagara Escarpment it needs special protections that are designed to prevent urban expansions forever. This is provided for in the Greenbelt Draft Plan- strong protection that is only provided to one other agricultural area, the Holland Marsh.
The Government is to be commended for its decision to restore the permanent protection for the Niagara Fruit Belt which was removed in 1995 with disastrous results. This protection is also provided in the draft Provincial Policy Statement, which is expected to become part of the new Planning Act in the Spring of this year.
The Government deserves particular commendation for its decision, in the draft Greenbelt Plan, to extend the Niagara Fruit Belt area to include most of the shadow fruit belt south of the Niagara Escarpment. As Dr. Leonard Gertler's work for the Niagara Escarpment illustrates, this area is increasingly important for grape growing. One of PALS greatest achievements in 1978 was to persuade the Ontario Municipal Board to remove 1,200 acres of grape land from the Thorold urban zoning boundary in this shadow fruit belt immediately south of Lake Gibson.
3. Greenbelt Boundaries Should Extend to Urban Zoning Boundaries.
One important limitation of the proposed Greenbelt, is that St. Catharines is the only large city, in excess of 100,000 population, where the Greenbelt boundaries come up against the urban zoning boundary. All the other large municipalities, Hamilton, Richmond Hill, Brampton, Milton, Oshawa, Pickering, etc., are allowed more than ample room for future urban expansions.
Other cities in the Greenbelt should be restricted in the same manner as St. Catharines. That is because , as the work of the Neptis foundation illustrates in comparing the existing zoned urban growth boundary in the greater Greenbelt area, with the anticipated urban growth over the next 30 years, there is more than enough land to accommodate all of the expected urban growth. If this designated urban boundary was to be frozen, there would still be, 30 years later, very little actual increase in urban densities. It is clear that the unprotected lands next to GTA urban boundaries will allow for far too much development in the GTA area, a great deal of it better by agro-climatic measurements than the lands inside the proposed Greenbelt..
In response to our criticisms of these large urban boundaries within the Greenbelt, government representatives have said that they challenge Neptis figures. We have not seen any actual data to back this claim up. On the contrary, we have seen lots of information to show that these calculations are in fact, a conservative understatement of urban boundary capacities.
In speaking with Neptis, they note that their figures omit certain land uses, such as quarries, which over time will likely be redeveloped for urban uses. From our observation they also fail to detail the considerable amount of dry industrially- zoned land scattered throughout the countryside. The Neptis figures, and in fact all figures, do not attempt to calculate the amount land that will be redeveloped through brownfield rehabilitation. They also fail to establish the amount of over-zoned industrial land, which over time, will be more appropriately re-zoned as 'Residential'.
Urban boundaries throughout Ontario need to stay where they are. Governments should have the courage to simply say this. If the draft Provincial Policy Statement actually means what it appears to say, it would be impossible to have any urban expansions. That is because to justify any urban expansion proponents would have to show that a municipality had increased its urban densities. The only way that such densities can be increased- a process that would take about four decades to achieve - is to prohibit future urban expansions.
4. Greenbelt Weak in Everything but Restricting Urban Expansions.
Apart from its proposed restrictions on urban expansions, particularly for "specialty "croplands such as Niagara, the Greenbelt Act is a very weak piece of legislation. The only area of threatened countryside to receive stronger zoning protection in terms of current uses would be the Escarpment Link lands. These presumably will become part of the Escarpment Rural official plan designation. The actual zoning of every other chunk of the new "protected countryside" is left to the quite varied strengths and weaknesses of local official plans and zoning by-laws.
The weakness of the Greenbelt Act in terms of countryside zoning is epitomized by the invitation given to municipalities to expand their permissive "Rural" planning designations. This is going in exactly the wrong direction. The Greenbelt Act and the Provincial Policy Statement should prohibit such zones of bad planning throughout the countryside.
In addition to permitting low density sprawl within the actual defined Greenbelt limits, the continued existence of the permissive "Rural" zones threaten better land use planning on the higher capability "Good" agricultural areas. In such circumstances, protections on "Good" agricultural lands can be removed through arguments, based on biased expert testimony, and that of land owners seeking development approvals, that their lands are actually pockets of poor land.
5. More Programs Needed for Land Stewardship.
The actual zoning weakness of the Greenbelt legislation in terms of what it permits landowners to do under existing by-laws (virtually nothing is changed) illustrates why more positive programs are needed for landowners to encourage good land stewardship. Since the government is not prepared to have stronger tree by-laws, to significantly expand the development control permit system of the Niagara Escarpment Commission, and prohibit site alterations, it should develop positive programs with landowners to make the Greenbelt legislation work.
One area of positive land stewardship would be to restore the level of the agricultural tax rebate from the Province, as it existed in 1990. This rebate is very important for the future of agriculture in Ontario. If it were ever to be eliminated completely, agriculture would simply be abandoned in large parts of Ontario in favour of rural estates. As it stands now, rural communities have lost significant revenues from farm land taxes i.e. 75%, which is only partly made up through special provincial funding payments.
The Christian Farmers Federation of Ontario has argued eloquently for environmental payments for agriculture. This would see such much needed programs as paying farmers, for instance, to establish and maintain forested buffer belts along streams.
The area of environmental farm payments is extremely complex and interesting. PALS would like to draw attention to the need to restore one of these payment measures the Niagara Tender Fruit Lands Program. It was canceled on the day the first payments were to go out to growers.
Programs to purchase restrictive covenants (also termed conservation easements) on farmland in the United States are frequently done in situations of high cost land for agriculture ( as opposed to urban development on estate lots). At such high prices for farmland, farming is frequently a losing proposition. Niagara is the only area in Canada where agricultural land is sold to farmers at such prices.
The Niagara Tender Fruit Land Program had a large number of farmers who wanted to participate in it. The cost was affordable to the Provincial treasury, even in difficult financial times. One of the main reasons it was killed, aside from a lack of commitment to fruit land preservation and a determination to cut costs in each Ministry, was for the very reason the Christian Farmers believe that environmental payments should be made. The government of the day was concerned that it would lead to more programs, for instance, to protect streams by paying farmers for such measures as restoring forests along streams.
6. Greenbelt a Modest First Step
The proposed Greenbelt Act should be viewed as a modest first step towards better land use planning. It is to be hoped that over the next few years the Greenbelt will be expanded, its zoning powers strengthened and that more programs for environmental payments directed towards farmers will be developed - especially a revival of the Niagara Tender Fruit Lands Program in an expanded form to include grape lands, in order to protect these unique and much threatened lands "in perpetuity".