Doug Ford’s Masterclass in Cronyism

Despite widespread opposition from Ontario’s business community, municipalities, environmental organizations, and Indigenous groups, Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservatives (PCs) are forging ahead with their plan to develop sensitive lands in the Niagara Escarpment and Oak Ridges Moraine.

Having done away with protections for 7,400 acres of land, the PCs now face an uphill battle justifying their move to the public. A safeguard for farmland, cultural heritage, and recreation, in addition to forests, wetlands, waterways, and other key ecosystems, the Greenbelt transcends the left-right paradigm to bring together a broad coalition of stakeholders — including many that typically align with the Progressive Conservatives. 

The Greenbelt encompasses more than 810,000 hectares and provides the Greater Golden Horseshoe Area (GGHA) $3.2 billion annually in ecosystem services, most importantly water filtration, flood mitigation, and carbon sequestration. As the population of the GGHA is set to surpass 14 million by 2040, protecting the natural capital that keeps residents healthy has to be a top priority.

The Greenbelt also functions as an integral part of Ontario’s agricultural system, protecting farmers’ commercial crops while supporting direct-to-market agri-food opportunities. Encroachment into this highly productive farmland — some of the best in all of Canada — will do nothing but make the province more susceptible to food insecurity and supply chain disruptions.

Ford’s PCs have pointed to Ontario’s worsening housing crisis and the federal government’s ambitious immigration targets as reasons for his government’s flip-flop on the Greenbelt, but these arguments fail to hold up under scrutiny. After all, the PC’s own hand-picked Housing Affordability Task Force made clear that there’s more than enough space in existing neighbourhoods and pre-zoned “greenfields” to accommodate Ontario’s growing population without the need for more car-dependant, emission-heavy sprawl in the Greenbelt.

Ford’s justification is further undermined by the fact that only 50,000 homes are slated for construction in the recently-opened lands — a fraction of the 1.5 million homes the PCs are targeting over the next decade. 

If opening up the Greenbelt was truly about lowering housing costs — rather than rewarding party donors that stand to make millions from building high-income neighbourhoods — the PCs wouldn’t be pushing inefficient sprawl. And while Ford and Steve Clark, the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, have vehemently denied tipping developers off ahead of the decision, it’s obvious that this is not the case.

At a time when urban densification has become an economic and environmental imperative, there is simply no reasonable argument for the province forcing sprawl upon municipalities — especially when it comes at the cost of protected land.

Sprawling cities are far more expensive to maintain, requiring either minimized public services or an increased tax burden. Neither of these options are attractive, yet the PCs seem hellbent on making Ontarians choose between them.