‘High risk’ breaches on sensitive lands of the Niagara Escarpment | Daily News Byte

Ontario’s tools to protect the environment are being neglected and ignored by Premier Doug Ford’s government, turning them into illusions, the province’s top watchdog says.

In an exclusive interview with Torstar, auditor general Bonnie Lysyk urged Ontarians to “connect the dots” between several pieces of legislation and regulatory bodies that together paint a picture of what’s happening in Ontario in during a major push to increase housing development.

He pointed to his audits of the Niagara Escarpment Commission and Ontario’s Environmental Bill of Rights, which were accompanied by new pro-development legislation, including bills 109 and 23, which eroded some environmental protections.

In the case of the escarpment commission, which oversees sensitive lands in Hamilton and Niagara, Lysyk found a nearly fourfold increase in “high-risk” violations of provincial regulations — including clear-cutting of trees, illegal construction or diverted waterways – causing serious damage to the environment.

Although the government supports the work of the 40-year-old commission and its governing law, Lysyk found that the agency was so understaffed and underfunded that it lacked the capacity to monitor and police these violations. . And in many cases, the staff’s advice is rejected by its commissioners.

“We see in the environment area, there are a lot of pieces of legislation out there where we see it’s not being implemented. But they’re out there,” Lysyk said. “So it creates optics that Ontario is doing more in the area of environment and in some cases, based on the audits we’ve done over the past number of years, we see that’s not the case.”

Unfocused, underfunded and understaffed

A November 30 value-for-money audit by the escarpment commission found the agency was underfunded, understaffed and green-lighted development on protected land not allowed under the Niagara Escarpment Planning and Development Act .

To ensure the escarpment — a ribbon of sensitive lands in the middle of Ontario’s Greenbelt from Queenston to Tobermory and a UNESCO-designated biosphere — is protected, the commission and the province need to return to the agency’s original intent and guidance its law, he said.

“They need to focus again on what was intended when the law itself was drafted. And that is why we emphasize that it is their responsibility to carry out, but you can only carry out if you get support from the ministry in terms of funding and in terms of prioritizing escarpment protection,” Lysyk said.

The audit echoed internal commission reports showing a dramatic increase in “high-risk” violations of the law that the commission was unable to act on because of insufficient enforcement staff.

There were 156 high-risk offenses in the past five years, an almost four-fold increase from 16 in 2016-17 to 61 in 2020-21.

The commission asked the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, which fully funds the arms-length agency, to help investigate just five of those high-risk cases. However, the ministry did not investigate four of those requests, saying the commission’s staff needed to provide more information.

The report also found that the commission – made up of local politicians and public appointees – has approved 98.9 percent of development applications over the past five years, including those that violate the escarpment law, even though staff recommended that the commission deny the request.

This includes allowing a Niagara-on-the-Lake property to import 20,000 square meters of fill, such as soil, sand and gravel, to level a field to create a vineyard, even though it says of the plan that only topsoil can be added to crops or pasture.

The audit made 23 recommendations to improve the escarpment commission, from increased funding to better conflict-of-interest training for commissioners. However, in many cases, the ministry said it would not address those recommendations until 2027, when the next official review of the escarpment law is scheduled.

Lysyk said his office tries to influence positive improvement but cannot implement change. It is up to the commission and the ministry to follow his recommendations.

“I think we have to respect that process. Do we want the recommendations in the Niagara Escarpment case to be implemented quickly? Yes, we will. Do we think they will? Based on the responses to the report, it doesn’t appear that way,” he said.

“I think we remain hopeful that at some point those recommendations will resonate and find their time to be implemented, whether it’s 2027 or before that.”

For those working and monitoring the escarpment, more urgent action is needed.

“We can do some restoration work when land is damaged in some ways, but the reality is that you can’t completely restore sensitive lands to what they were before if they’re severely impacted,” said Mike McDonald, CEO of the Bruce Trail Conservation Authority, which traces the popular hiking corridor on the escarpment.

For those submitting development applications, staff shortages cause long delays. The average time to complete an application, which can include everything from repairing a septic system to constructing a new building, is 216 days.

According to the commission’s February report, the escarpment is facing increasing pressure from rising land prices in southern Ontario. Landowners try to increase the value of their property by developing it, although not always within what is allowed by law.

Like McDonald, Lysyk said many of the issues the commission audit found could be addressed with better funding of the ministry and increased staffing. But the audit also found that the commission and the ministry “are not fully able to provide the necessary leadership, resources and actions to preserve the escarpment and adjacent lands as a continuous natural environment, and to ensure that all development is compatible with that environment.”

In its response to the audit, the ministry said it is “committed to continuing its efforts to provide leadership for the Niagara Escarpment Plan,” and will continue to work with the commission to “assess and establish the necessary staff and resources financially.”

“The findings of this report identify significant challenges facing the ministry,” the response said.

Niagara Escarpment Commission chair and former Niagara Falls Tory MP Rob Nicholson was unavailable for an interview for this story.

A commission spokesperson said in an email that the commission remains committed to maintaining and enhancing the Niagara Escarpment, but is primarily focused on “striking the balance” between development, protection and public use of the escarpment.

“Population growth, development pressure, and other economic realities in the area have made this a more complex and challenging task,” the commission’s statement said. “We will continue to work with the Ministry to identify innovative approaches to program delivery, and to make improvements to regulations and legislation that will help better protect the Niagara Escarpment.”

A pattern of behavior

Lysyk said the escarpment commission audit is just one of several investigations that, taken together, show a pattern of failure in Ontario to properly use legislation designed to protect the environment.

Among those was a Dec. 7 report on Ontario’s Environmental Bill of Rights, or EBR Act, that found the government bypassed a public consultation requirement before passing laws that would have an impact on the environment.

Lysyk’s report points to Bill 109, the More Homes for Everyone Act, “which makes significant changes to the environment … that could affect community greenspace.”

The report says the bill was passed two weeks before the legally required minimum 30-day consultation period, “limiting the rights of Ontarians to provide feedback and have their comments considered before a decision is made. ”

At the same time, the provincial government passed Bill 23, the More Homes Built Faster Act, which opens up some of the Greenbelt to housing development and makes changes that conservation authorities say threaten sensitive wetlands.

There, too, Lysyk said public consultations were cut short.

“One would expect by the time it gets to third reading that there has been full consultation,” Lysyk said. “Based on our preliminary view of that, it’s hard to believe that there was a full consultation because of the limited timeline from when the bill was introduced to when it was finalized.”

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