It’s back to the drawing board for Huntingwood Trails developers after council refused their application for a zoning bylaw and Official Plan amendment this week.
During council’s committee of the whole meeting on Feb. 5, councillors got a look at the application, which is for a 69-unit residential development at 5 Silver Creek Drive.
The refusal comes on the heels of the provincial government making changes to the Planning Act that says municipalities must make decisions on applications within 120 days of them being received.
With the Nottawasaga Valley Conservation Authority, peer reviewer Natural Resource Solutions Inc. and the Ministry of Transportation all raising concerns on the file, councillors said on Monday they had no choice but to refuse the application on the advice of staff, despite pleas from the developer to keep working on it.
“The province, in its wisdom, decided municipalities were too slow in rubber-stamping planning applications and gave us these very tight timelines,” said Mayor Yvonne Hamlin. “I feel like municipalities have no choice. We either approve or don’t approve. The timelines are very clear.”
“I support the recommendation of our staff,” she said.
The 69-unit residential development was to be comprised of 48 townhouses, 14 semi-detached homes and seven single detached homes. The land is split into three sections of zoning currently: rural, environmentally protected and deferred residential. The zoning amendments would have the zoning changed to environmentally protected, residential second density and residential third density.
Several Planning Act applications have been submitted for the property over the last 15 years. Most recently, following three years at the Ontario Land Tribunal, the previous iteration of the plans for 100 units was approved in 2022.
The property was also the subject of an Ontario Land Tribunal appeal in 2014, which resulted in a decision to allow development on the site outside of the wetland footprint.
In processing the current application, the town received comments from three agencies suggesting issues.
The Ministry of Transportation said the plans would be detrimental to future planning for a Highway 26 bypass and would limit route planning options. Natural Resource Solutions Inc., who was procured by the town to peer review the heritage aspects of the application, concluded that municipal and provincial natural heritage policies were not adequately addressed, that updates to the environmental impact study were required and that further identification of natural heritage features and demonstration of no negative impacts were required on the file.
The Nottawasaga Valley Conservation Authority raised concerns about provincial natural hazard policies not being adequately addressed, as well as concerns about the feasibility of watercourse crossing. They suggested the application was premature and noted they were not supportive of approval.
Four residents attended Monday’s meeting to express their concerns about the proposed development. Concerns mainly echoed about 15 emails received by the town in writing prior to the meeting, and focused on negative impacts to Silver Creek wetland, biodiversity and habitat loss, public health and safety, increased traffic and a lack of buffering to existing residential development.
“It’s so obvious there are so many gaps and errors in their reports,” said resident Chris Mifflin during public comments. “Are there any avenues for the town to recover money when an applicant clearly puts forward inadequate reports?”
The town’s planning manager Lindsay Ayers clarified that all the peer review fees incurred by the town while the costs associated with processing an application are paid by the developer through a contingency budget.
“If the contingency budget drops down to zero, we request additional money to cover any and all costs that are associated with that development review,” said Ayers.
Mark Yarranton, president of KLM Planning Partners Inc. who spoke as an agent for the developer, said the developer was “shocked” to receive notice on Jan. 30 that the town would be recommending a refusal of the application.
“Prior to this email, my client had not been provided with the comments from town departments and external agencies,” said Yarranton. “The comments were received less than a week before the report was scheduled to be heard.”
“We do not agree with a number of the opinions and conclusions, nor the recommendation,” he said.
Yarrington requested council reconsider the recommendation to refuse, suggesting the developer would like an opportunity to work with the town on the application.
“For the town to conclude that it’s appropriate we go away, resolve issues and reapply is also impractical from our perspective,” he said. “This is counterproductive.”
Hamlin responded to Yarranton’s comments at the end of discussion.
“The sad part of this if you have a development application where there are substantial technical matters to be resolved, is there’s nothing in the legislation that allows municipalities to take a pause with the developer’s agreement to keep working on it,” she said. “It’s either we approve, or we don’t approve.”
“I’m sympathetic with the applicant’s position, but I think that particular representation should be made to the province,” she said.
Council voted unanimously in favour of refusing the application, and that 50 per cent of the application fees associated with the file be returned to the developer. Hamlin put forward an amendment, pending solicitor advice, to add that the fees would only be refunded should no Ontario Land Tribunal appeal be filed by the developer, which was also passed by a unanimous vote.
Coun. Steve Perry was absent. The decision will need to be ratified at the next regular meeting of council before going into effect.
The developer can reapply with a new application at a future time, and also has the option of appealing to the Ontario Land Tribunal within 20 days of a decision.
With files from Erika Engel.
UPDATE: The decision was ratified by a unanimous council vote at their Feb. 21 meeting. Hamlin's amendment was not included in the motion passed, as per solicitor advice.