Frontenac County Official Plan – squeezed from both ends

Jeff Green | Oct 01, 2014

A dispute between Frontenac County Planner Joe Gallivan and South Frontenac Planner Lindsay Mills was played out once again on Monday night (September 22) at the Verona Lions Hall.
The occasion was the official public meeting on the third, and presumably final, draft of the Frontenac County Official Plan (OP), which is slated for a final vote by Frontenac County Council on October 15.
The issues raised by Mills, and supported by members of South Frontenac Council and Mayor Gary Davison, centre on specific wording in some of the clauses in the document.
Once passed, and approved by the Ministry of Municipal Affairs, the County OP will be the background document to which all of the local township plans will need to conform.
This represents a change from current practice, wherein the local OPs are approved directly by the Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs, an arrangement that has been frustrating to many local councils, because it
leads to delays, and the ministry is seen as being unyielding and too intent on imposing urban planning reality onto rural Ontario.
The reason this is such an issue for the county, the townships and residents, is that the County and township OPs are fundamental documents that ultimately determine the kinds of residential and commercial development
that will be permitted, in which locations, and under what conditions.
At the meeting in Verona, there were environmentalists, developers, and homeowners in attendance. Almost 100 people were there, and not because of the entertainment value of planning talk, but because of the ultimate implications for the future of Frontenac County.
Lindsay Mills’ concerns with the third draft are the same as they were with both of the previous drafts. “The document is too detailed and intrudes into local planning responsibilities in many areas,” Mills wrote.
A prime example of this is the statement in the document that waterfront development be subject to a 30 metre setback from the shoreline.
This is a concept that has been entrenched in the South Frontenac Plan since 2003, so there would seem to be no problem. However, Mills said that in the South Frontenac plan the setback is a norm; it can be altered with the permission of the township’s committee of adjustment.
“By making it a requirement in the County OP, there will be no more leeway for circumstances where the setback is too restrictive,” Mills said.
He also said that in some cases the wording in the document is vague and could ultimately be open to much interpretation.
If Joe Gallivan only had to work out his differences with Lindsay Mills and South Frontenac Council, he might be able to. However when the plan was sent to the Ministry of Municipal Affairs for comment, the ministry suggested a number of changes. Some of them are easy enough to accommodate, but others would make the county plan more prescriptive than it already is.
This puts Gallivan, and the county, into a difficult position. South Frontenac will oppose the plan unless Gallivan pulls back the detailed, prescriptive language in the plan, and the ministry will not approve it if he
does not add more restrictions. This reality was noted by Lindsay Mills in his comments, but that did not convince him to alter his demands.
Through it all, Joe Gallivan remains optimistic about prospects for the document to be approved by the County in October and for the ministry to look favourably on it in the end. He said that if the ministry does not yield in the end, the county can appeal to the Ontario Municipal Board, and he said he is confident the county’s arguments will stand up.
The public meeting leaves a number of questions unanswered. Given everything that has happened, it is unlikely that the mayor of South Frontenac will support the County OP on October 15. The County may approve it anyway because there are likely enough councilors who will support it for it to pass. The ministry, in spite of Joe Gallivan’s optimism, will likely demand further changes, which will lead to an OMB hearing.
That is when the opposition from South Frontenac will become a real problem for Frontenac County. The County needs to present a united front to the OMB in order to win an appeal. The trouble is, there is no sense that an accommodation between Frontenac County and South Frontenac is any closer now than it was after the earlier drafts of the OP were tabled.