Five communities Premier Doug Ford’s government promised to repay for costs they incurred because of the Greenbelt scandal say they are still waiting for the Progressive Conservatives to make good on their pledge years later.
That has opposition MPPs slamming the PCs for failing to live up to their word, saying the province is “downloading” the cost of the controversy onto municipal taxpayers in those communities.
Documents obtained by CBC News through a Freedom of Information request show the province was aware that the cities and towns said they were owed approximately $850,000 in lost staff time and legal and consulting fees as of September 2024.
The communities — Durham Region, Pickering, Grimsby, Guelph, and Wellington County — say the costs were incurred as a result of Ford’s decision to open parts of the Greenbelt for development in 2022, and then his reversal of the unpopular decision nearly a year later.
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The briefing note intended for senior civil servants and then-minister of municipal affairs Paul Calandra summarizes the community requests and restates the minister’s commitment from a year earlier.
“In recognition of the costs incurred by municipalities arising out of this decision, the province will work with impacted municipalities to assist with related planning and staffing costs,” Calandra said in an Oct. 2023 statement, adding that he would review submitted costs.
Just over five months after he released that statement, the briefing note concludes, Calandra gave civil servants direction. It’s not clear what the specifics of that order were, but the document says based on it, “the ministry has not done any proactive outreach to municipalities to solicit cost submissions.”
“No decision has been made on reimbursement to these municipal costs,” the briefing note says.
The province did not respond to a request for comment on the status of the reimbursement or to clarify the nature of the minister’s directive to the civil service.
The Greenbelt has been the subject of scandal for the Ford government since 2022, when it announced it would swap 15 pieces of land from the protected area and open them up for development. Reports from the auditor general and integrity commissioner found the process to select lands was rushed and favoured certain developers.
The property owners with land removed from the Greenbelt stood to see their land value rise by $8.3 billion, the auditor general found in her own Greenbelt investigation.
In September 2023, Ford reversed course after heated public outcry and the RCMP continues to investigate the matter.
A month later, Calandra said municipalities would be compensated for costs related to the Greenbelt reversal. Durham Region, Pickering, Grimsby, Guelph, and Wellington County all confirmed to CBC News in recent weeks that they have not been reimbursed by the province, in brief statements.
At the time, Pickering Mayor Kevin Ashe wrote to Calandra making the case for reimbursement.
“While we appreciate the province’s reconsideration and commitment to preserving the integrity of the Greenbelt, we cannot overlook the significant amount of resources that have already been expended by our municipality in anticipation of housing development, sometimes at the direction of the province itself,” Ashe wrote in 2023.
In a statement this week, a spokesperson for Pickering says while the city has not been reimbursed, it has received money to help build new housing.
“The City has received more than $15 million from the Province through the Building Faster Fund, for which it is very appreciative,” said Mark Guinto in a statement.
The briefing note summarizes the requests for reimbursement, breaking down the individual asks by community.
Pickering said it was out more than $360,000 in direct legal and consulting costs in addition to staff time. Durham Region said it incurred $322,000 in “direct and indirect costs.” Grimsby said it spent $82,000 for “staff and consulting time participating in the provincial process for the removals.”
Guelph and Wellington County said they incurred costs from reversals of their official plan decisions resulting from the provincial policy. Guelph estimated that cost it nearly $64,000 in labour and an engineering study.
Wellington County had not provided details on their costs, the briefing note says.
The briefing note also says Ottawa and Hamilton told the government they incurred costs, but did not provide detailed submissions. Ottawa told CBC News it never made a formal claim for the cash. Hamilton did not respond to a request for comment.
Opposition critics slammed the government for making the promise to pay the communities back publicly, but never following through privately.
Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner said communities are already dealing with the impact of decades of provincial downloads, but he considers this another shifting of costs from Ontario to local taxpayers.
“Now they’re downloading the cost of their scandals onto municipalities, which is completely unfair,” he said. “Especially to those residents who may be seeing their property taxes go up or services cut because cash-strapped municipalities are having to deal with downloading from the provinces.”
NDP municipal affairs critic Jeff Burch said the government’s pledge was “disingenuous” and called on the province to live up to its commitment.
“It was clearly dishonest because if the intent to make municipalities whole for the government’s mistake was sincere, they wouldn’t have made municipalities come back and beg for the money,” he said.
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Burch, who is a former St. Catharines city councillor and budget chief, said every cent counts when it comes to delivering local services. All of the communities would have felt the impact of this spending, which could have been directed elsewhere, he added.
“It really is a kick in the teeth to municipalities that are struggling with budgets and trying not to raise property taxes on folks,” Burch said.
Interim Liberal Leader John Fraser said the amount of money in question is a “rounding error on a rounding error” in the province’s $244-billion budget. Ontario can easily afford to pay back the communities and should immediately, he said.
“It’s not the money,” he said. “It’s the fact that you owed it. You said you’d pay it back, and then you didn’t.”
