Summary: Residents of The Kingsway-Sunnylea neighborhood raised funds to hire a lawyer and planner to contest a development proposal by local developer. The original plan for an eight-storey building was replaced with an 18-storey proposal, bypassing the city's planning process.
Despite a petition signed by over 700 residents, the KPRI and residents raising and spending $50,000 on legal/planning fees to act as a Party along with the City at the OLT, the City’s legal and planner efforts resulted in a settlement for three 14-storey towers.
Many residents find this inappropriate.
The case highlights concerns over the Ontario Land Tribunal's favoring of developers and the need for significant financial resources to ensure community voices are heard in development disputes.
The Details
Dear Neighbour,
In 2022, a local developer appealed a 2016 non-decision by the City of Toronto for an eight-storey building at the southwest corner of Prince Edward Drive North and Dundas Street West.
Rather than bringing the original application to the Ontario Land Tribunal (OLT), as is common practice, the developer replaced it with an 18-storey proposal, and took that application to the OLT, which is within their rights. This is not in the interest of local residents, as it bypasses the City of Toronto planning process almost entirely.
This meant the final decision about the largest development application in our community’s history would not be made by our elected officials, but by an unelected appeal board – staffed by political appointees – which sides with development interests over 90% of the time. Source: NewmarketToday
For the past two years, KPRI poured countless hours, and nearly $50,000 in legal and land-use planning fees, into defending our community against a development proposal Ward-Three Councillor Amber Morley initially referred to as “egregious.”
Reflecting this was a petition against the proposal signed by over 700 residents of the Kingsway-Sunnylea area.
The KPRI initially took Party status alongside the City in contesting the development at the OLT.
As time unfolded, much expensive correspondence surged back and forth. We had to retain both a lawyer and a planner to even appear before the tribunal with a voice. Eventually we were knocked out of the running, as all our $50,000 of raised funds had been spent. We then had to demote ourselves to a participant tier of involvement, which means you get to write a letter and that’s it. Both sides read it...or they don't. No power. No influence.
After all the money raised and time spent, the outcome of these proceedings was City Council approving settling with the developer on a three-tower, 14-storey building, which we believe remains highly inappropriate for this site.
Although the Ontario Land Tribunal has not, as yet, approved the settlement proposal, it appears all that’s left is a formality of final processing of the details.
We are disappointed in our provincial and municipal governments, for several reasons. We believe
the City of Toronto should have argued to send this “appeal” back to the beginning of the land use planning process, forcing the developer to consult in a more meaningful way with the community. KPRI raised these concerns to no avail.
the Ford government’s Ontario Land Tribunal process is undemocratic and favours development interests. KPRI raised these concerns with MP Christine Hogarth and were told she was powerless to make change (despite the Ford government having built the OLT and being responsible for its administration). We believe the OLT process needs to be revised to provide more than lip service to community consultation.
City Council could have achieved a better deal with the developer had they advocated more firmly for the suggested 10-storey configuration submitted by KPRI’s planner. In the words of one of KPRI’s experts: “It certainly (appears) the city has not taken a strong position to support their own policies and design guidelines specifically put in place to protect your community.”
We are dissatisfied Councillor Morley motioned to accept this settlement which, while certainly better than the original 18 storey proposal, was hardly a seismic change to the original plan. The Councillor has some level of influence to persuade the city lawyers to be more firm with the developer, and she also has the ability to refuse the settlement offer if she feels the neighborhood is ill served. The provincial representative wrings her hands and advises she is not allowed to voice.
We believe the provincial and municipal officials failed our community on this appeal. The Ontario Land Tribunal process is inherently undemocratic. The effort put forth by the City of Toronto was insufficient.
While the City and OLT will say this is “good planning” in it’s decision to serve a broader community, we the existing community consider it not to be good community planning and that the voice and continuing interests of our community are consistently marginalized.
The truly galling aspect is the uneasy feeling that one has to spend profligate sums of money — usually over $100,000 for these size of developments — to hire independent lawyers and planners just to be sure the neighborhood voice is heard. There's a yawning gulf here, and neighborhood trust and goodwill are disappearing into it.
In closing, we leave you with an important word of caution.
Our community will continue to change. Change is part of progress. In this case, understanding the need for housing development in Toronto, KPRI supported building heights more than 50% more than zoning by-laws.
We believe this was a reasonable accommodation, but that there should be a limit – and in our view that limit was exceeded. Existing neighborhoods deserve and are worthy of enforceable protection from dislocating and glaring overdevelopment.
If we want to have any voice in how our community evolves, we must speak up in greater numbers than we do today. Is this work fun? No. It’s time-consuming, painstaking, and usually, thankless. But it’s critical if we want to have any input in how The Kingsway evolves over time.
Developers currently have outsized influence in Ontario – and their concern is often profit – not the impact on you or your community.
If you haven’t already, we hope you will consider joining KPRI, so we can continue our effort to advocate for responsible development in The Kingsway.
Don't think this can't happen to you. Join the ratepayers so you at least have a fighting chance of being heard.