Date: June 8, 2009

Amendments that would have ensured that the Growing Durham planning document were in accordance to the Provincial Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe, 2006, were defeated by Regional Council. The award winning, Provincial Growth Plan aims to curtail urban sprawl, protect farmland and create more sustainable and transit supportive communities.. The Town of Ajax, when commenting on the Regional document, has raised a number of concerns that Growing Durham does not achieve the goals and does not conform with the provincial document. The Province in a letter to the Region, dated May 25, 2009, expressed their concerns as follows; that employment numbers are higher than provincial numbers, that certain existing and designated lands have been excluded from the supply analysis and that certain infrastructure has been netted out of greenfield density calculations, which results in an overestimation of the need for additional land to accommodate future growth.

An amendment to delete the proposed urban expansion of lands within Northeast Pickering until a subsequent review of Durham’s Official Plan, subject to a completed Watershed Study for Carruthers Creek, a completed Agricultural Impact Assessment and a completed Fiscal and Infrastructure analysis, was defeated on a vote of 8 - 16. All Ajax Councillor’s supported this amendment brought forth by Mayor Parish. The letter from the Province articulates the concern that these lands are not contiguous to any existing urban areas and there has been no analysis of costs for servicing. The Toronto Region Conservation Authority had earlier raised concerns that these lands are in the headwaters of the Carruthers Creek and that a completed watershed study be in place prior to these lands being developed due to the potential of downstream impacts such as flooding and erosion which could result in a number of potentially expensive infrastructure/watershed restoration projects should further development take place beyond the current urban boundary. In addition these lands are prime agricultural lands and no analysis has been made in that regard.

Other amendments, which would have brought the plan into conformity, were to remove Schedule F which designates lands beyond the Provincial planning time frame of 2031, to utilize the Provincial employment number of 350,000 instead of the Region’s 375,000, to amend the definition of gross density to adhere to the province’s definition and to ensure that contiguous development was a fundamental prerequisite of growth were also defeated.

The Province, in their letter of May 25th, indicated that outstanding issues would need to be resolved through the approval process in order to ensure conformity with the Growth Plan.