‘Very positive’: Ontario to table bill to speed up home building

A controversial housing bill put forth by London MPP and housing minister Rob Flack would defer development charges, CTV’s Brent Lale has the details.

Elgin-Middlesex-London MPP Rob Flack, Ontario’s Housing Minister, has introduced legislation intended to speed up the construction of new homes.

“I’ve certainly provided direction to our staff to bring forward, options for accelerating projects that can be built in 2025 which that report is now gone to planning committee,” said London Mayor Josh Morgan.

“This is very positive. Like the government of Ontario, the city of London is committed to building homes, streamlining processes, removing red tape and getting places for people to live right here in our city.”

Flack admitted the province isn’t currently on track to meet its goal of getting 1.5 million homes built over 10 years, conceding there are challenges.

“We’ve got some pretty strong headwinds,” Flack said at a press conference to announce his bill.

“It’s a goal. But frankly, I’m focused more on — and our team is focused on — the next 12 to 24 months, because if it stays the way it is now, we’ll never get there. We have to make immediate changes.”

Flack’s bill would reduce the scope and number of studies municipalities can require for new developments, speed up certain minor variances and standardize and streamline fees developers pay that municipalities use to fund housing-enabling infrastructure such as water and sewer lines.

As well, it would allow municipalities to more easily reduce development charges, allow residential builders to pay those fees at the time of occupancy instead of when a permit is issued, and exempt long-term care homes from the fees in order to spur their development.

“Even just from a building perspective it gives a little bit more confidence, a little bit more certainty,” said Jared Zaifman, CEO of the London Home Builders Association.

“Not having to shell out potentially up to $50,000 in that case in London on a single-family home for the first development charge on a new construction for a single detached home can make a big difference and help in that process.”

Flack said that process works.

“When you take a look at the examples of Mayor [Stephen] Del Duca and and Mayor [Carrolyn] Parrish in Mississauga,” said Flack.

“We’re not telling municipalities they have to lower the DC’s (development charges), we’re not legislating that but we’re saying, take a look at those examples. Mississauga alone has 11,700 starts this year. They cut the DC’s in half and made it, payable at occupancy. So, we’re seeing results.”

However the DC’s are paid up front for a reason. They help fund infrastructure needed to support the builds. If the charges are not collected until after occupancy, it brings the question, who is going to cover the funding gap until those charges are collected?

“This is an area where we don’t have all the details yet. but often with legislation, it’s tabled,” said Morgan.

“There’s regulations associated with it, so we’ll watch that closely. Development Charges are how we fund infrastructure to build those homes. If the government is going to make adjustments to that, we just need to make sure we answer the infrastructure question at the same time.”

Flack said at the end of 2023 there was more than $10 billion in reserve DC accounts.

“We also announced today another $400 million for infrastructure through the Housing Water Systems Fund and Municipal Housing Infrastructure Fund (MHIP),” said Flack.

Also included in the government’s announcement was a plan to streamline and improve planning and delivery for transit-oriented communities, creating more jobs and housing options near transit.

London has already been ahead of the game as they prepare for bus rapid transit (BRT).

“We’re already aligned with the province on housing intensity along transit lines and transit corridors,” said Morgan.

“Certainly this is no different from what we’ve already approved and are doing in the City of London. We’ve even created a new incentive program along those transit corridors to spur more development and more intense development, so we’re, maybe ahead of the curve on that a little bit.”

The bill would also extend the power for granting Minister’s Zoning Orders (MZOs), which override municipal bylaws, beyond the municipal affairs and housing minister to include the minister of infrastructure when it comes to transit-oriented communities.

It is a tool the province’s auditor general has raised concerns with in the past, noting that the province’s process for MZOs can give the appearance of preferential treatment for some requests. The Progressive Conservative government used MZOs 114 times from 2019 to 2023, which is a 17-fold increase in usage from the previous 20 years, the auditor found.

Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie said the use of MZOs should be curtailed, not expanded.

“You don’t need another minister’s hands in the Ministerial Zoning Orders,” she said.

“We’ve seen this government’s track record, and we’ve seen the abuse that there can be, and this is just yet another opportunity by broadening the power and increasing the number of ministers who can now issue MZOs. This is a really huge concern.”

Infrastructure Minister Kinga Surma said the move will help get more housing built.

“We’re just trying to be more efficient, but we’ll also continue working with the hard working (Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing) staff,” she said.

“We want to be flexible. We want to be nimble. I have MZOs that I’d like to issue this year.”

The bill would also cap the number of affordable units a municipality can require in certain residential developments at five per cent in order to make projects more viable, but Crombie said it would lead to a reduction in the availability of affordable housing.

As well, the bill would standardize construction requirements and provide clarity that municipalities can’t create construction standards beyond the building code. Developers and builders have expressed frustration at municipalities that create additional requirements, such as Toronto’s green building standard.

“At a time when there are so many challenges facing the residential construction industry, these changes are necessary and essential as they will simplify the approvals process and make the homebuilding process more efficient,” Richard Lyall, president of the Residential Construction Council of Ontario, said of the bill as a whole.

- with files from Canadian Press