Part of the Ontario government’s plans to address the housing crisis was to break up the 1.5 million new homes needed among the various municipalities in the province. Each municipality would be obligated to build an amount of the total housing in exchange for funds.
Every municipality in the province signed on except for one. Newmarket Mayor John Taylor refused to sign the province’s pledge, bringing the criticism of Premier Ford on him. He was often cited by the Premier as being an example of nimbyism in the province and not being on ‘Team Ontario’. Is this the case though? Well according to Mayor Taylor, there is a very good reason for his refusing to sign the pledge.
According to Mayor Taylor, along with many other Mayors in the 905, with Bill 23’s elimination of development charges, they have lost the financial resources to ensure the supporting infrastructure for these new houses is built as well. For Newmarket in particular, it is a question of wastewater and how to dispose of the waste from thousands of new homes, safely. We had Mayor Taylor on to discuss Bill 23 when it was first signed into law, and many of his criticisms pointed to the loss of funding for needed infrastructure around the 905. As the urgency to build grows, how are we going to ensure that the infrastructure to support that growth is met?
This Episode is brought to you by Graham Agnew of Dominion Lending
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Nicholas Paul: sound editing.