Screen Shot of County Council Oct 3
A request from South Bruce Peninsula’s council will now be considered by other Bruce County lower-tier municipalities regarding soil and water testing and land use.
Bruce County council, and the municipalities in the county were circulated with the resolution that asked all Bruce County municipalities to thoroughly review the proposed new provisions in the draft official plan (OP).
Councillor Jay Kirkland, who is mayor of South Bruce Peninsula, says that the county’s OP should mirror the Provincial Planning Statement, meaning that it only needs high-level policy.
The change would prevent the county from being too restrictive or overly technical, particularly on issues such as water protection, nitrate studies and land use.
“In talking with other municipalities, there’s certain things that each municipality has that raises concerns with the Official Plan,” said Kirkland. “I do understand there is a disconnect from the province on those things and the province needs to figure this out… If they want to figure it out through their policy statement, that’s where it needs to be so that it’s [province]-wide. It’s not just Bruce County being specific, and I understand that there’s a couple other municipalities with a concern on this disconnect from the provincial policy statement to our Official Plan.
Councillor Don Murray gave his support to accepting the motion, but not before voicing his concerns about leaving the regulation to the province.
“I’m hesitant of having the province take it over. I look back to the fiasco of the Green Energy Act. They took it over and then all of a sudden they took it all over and we had no say and it tore some communities apart,” he said, before adding, “I understand where you’re coming from but I hope there’s some solution that we can all come to to work together here on this nitrate system. There was some concerns at my council last night about it, on lot severance and how it works, so I’m hoping we can find something but I’m hesitant on having provincial government rule on it province-wide.”
Manager of Land Use Planning Jack Van Dorp shared with council that if county staff receives objections to policies, it is then reported back to council, and council directs staff to then come up with solutions.
During community feedback sessions on the Official Plan that took place October 2-4th, only a few concerns were raised.
While the Provincial Planning Statement directs municipalities to protect, maintain, and, where possible, improve groundwater resources from negative impacts of development, the South Bruce Peninsula resolution says the municipalities in Bruce County, “have separate and distinct ideologies relating to planning matters,” and that a more high level, generalized plan, would allow “The municipalities to shape their own futures, tailor development as each municipality sees fit and to accept the liability for planning decisions at the local level without upper tier restrictions while still depending on County planning staff to provide planning services for the lower tier municipalities.”
Says Kirkland, “Let the province decide on how to deal with this water protection. Is it through our conservation authorities? Is it through Niagara escarpment? There’s multiple ways to take care of it. I don’t think we at Bruce County should be doing it. …Our OP should be broad. And then more specific in each municipality.”
With receiving the resolution from South Bruce Peninsula, the county’s other lower-tier municipalities will be discussing the resolution at their respective council meetings.
South Bruce Peninsula adopted the resolution at their meeting on September 17th.
