Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s office has issued a memo announcing the creation of a working group to implement most of the recommendations contained in a report on the protected Greenbelt written by Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk.
The memo, authored by Mr. Ford’s chief of staff and the cabinet secretary, instructs the ministers’ and deputy ministers’ chiefs of staff to include options and risks in all submissions to cabinet regarding the recommendations.“A comprehensive response to the report is a top priority and a working group is being established to support implementation,” the memo said. It also reminds senior government workers that they must follow “rules regarding conflict of interest and political activity.”
The Ontario government has previously indicated it will be taking steps to implement 14 of the 15 recommendations that came from Ms. Lysyk. According to Mr. Ford, the recommendation to review the decision to open up approximately 7,400 acres from 15 sites of the Greenbelt will not be revisited.
In December 2022, Ontario amended the Greenbelt Plan and area boundary, and removed or redesignated 7,400 Greenbelt acres across 15 sites for housing construction. The Greenbelt itself spans 2 million acres of protected farmland, wetlands, and woodlands, and surrounds the Greater Golden Horseshoe region in Southern Ontario. The Greenbelt lands were created in 2005 to permanently protect some of the most productive farmland in Canada.
In her report, the auditor general stated the selection of sites, which took place rapidly over a three-week period, was “not transparent, objective, or fully informed.”
“While approximately 500 Greenbelt-removal requests had been submitted to the ministry in the 17 years since the Greenbelt was established, the assessment was limited to 22 specific sites, 21 of which had been identified and provided to the Greenbelt Project Team directly by the housing minister’s political staff,” said Ms. Lysyk’s report.
