By Kevin Werner, News Staff
As the Ontario Municipal Board hearing on the areotropolis slowly continued at the Hamilton Convention Centre last week, across the street at city hall, a Hamilton councillor urged his colleagues to reverse their original decision that approved creating the airport employment growth district around the airport.
“We need to start rationalizing the decision,” said Ward 1 councillor Brian McHattie, an opponent of the 2010 decision to create the AEGD lands.
“We have to re-think that areotropolis decision. The legal costs will be astronomical. It’s a dog’s breakfast. We need to get out of the OMB case.”
McHattie said a recent report about rural land management policy called Food and Farming: An Action Plan 2021, details the loss of prime agricultural land to residential development in urban areas, including Hamilton. By designating about 2,500-acres of land for commercial and employment development around the Hamilton Airport, it means less property for agricultural.
“We didn’t have this report when we made the decision about the areotropolis,” he said.
But his colleagues refused to reconsider the decision last week.
“You have been consistently against it,” said Government Issues Committee chair Terry Whitehead.
The controversial AEGD has been in the planning stages since 2004. City officials have projected that by 2031 it will create 24,300 direct jobs, and 11,500 spin-off jobs. It is expected to create about $66 million in new tax revenue for the city.
Opponents argue the job projects are wildly inflated, and despite the economic projections, the AEGD is nothing more than an urban boundary expansion that will mean more expensive residential development on valuable prime agricultural land. It was why there was a call by local environmental groups to get involved in an already complex OMB process.
Meanwhile, another 16 companies and individuals joined about 15 other parties in the OMB’s third pre-hearing on the areotropolis. There were also about 40 individuals given participant status for the hearing, that will focus on phase one of the AEGD secondary plan, scheduled for nine days starting May 23 at the McMaster Learning Centre on King Street. The participants have until April 16 to provide their submissions to the OMB on phase 1.
The OMB will also hold a pre-hearing for phase 2 of the AEGD decision in the future to allow residents to become participants for that part of the hearing.
A participant is allowed to provide information to the OMB on how the issue affects the homeowner. But being a party to an OMB case involves taking part in questioning witnesses, providing evidence, and enduring any decisions the board may make.
The OMB decision is critical for landowners both inside the AEGD area and outside of it. It will affect the landowners within the land who want to use their property for commercial and retail purposes, and for landowners outside who are looking at residential development. The OMB debate will also involved whether to expand the urban boundary around the airport, which will affect areas such as Twenty Road, Elfrida, and Book Road, where landowners are looking at being included in the expansion.
The added parties and participants were allowed after the city re-posted the notice for the hearing. Flamborough resident Victor Veri revealed last fall the city didn’t properly inform the public about the hearing. The notice was originally posted in November 2010. In an earlier pre-hearing last December, the OMB agreed the city didn’t post the notice to all Hamilton residents. It also allowed Veri to become a participant in the OMB case.
The new parties to the process include the ‘Elfrida Landowners’, identified as Multi-Area Development Inc., Paletta International Corporation, Mud and First Inc., DiCenzo Holdings Inc., Artstone Holdings Limited; the ‘Twenty Road Landowners’, include Carmen Chiaravalle, John Edward Demik, Elanie Vyn.
Environment Hamilton and Hamiltonians for Progressive Developer are also challenging the AEGD decision.
Complicating the AEGD OMB hearing is a parallel hearing involving the city’s urban Official Plan.
The Elfrida area and its 2,800 acres have been identified by the city’s own growth plans for future residential and commercial development. The province removed the area in the city’s own urban Official Plan. The city and the landowners are appealing the decision to the OMB in a separate case. There has been talk of consolidating both hearings, but so far both cases are moving along independently of each other.
