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A wee nudge
Aregional homebuilder bought 13 acres in Picton a couple of years ago. He had planned to build affordable homes—a mix of detached, semi-detached and townhomes. All were to be priced at under $300,000. In a market desperate for new homes, this was welcome news. It is vacant land. On the edge of the town. Water, sewer, roads. Ready to go.
It isn’t that straightforward, however. It never is.
It turns out that a small part of the land is considered Environmentally Protected. This means studies. And delays. Delays measured by seasons not days and weeks. The builder now figures, judging by the pace of the approvals process so far, it will be three to five years before he can start to dig. If at all. He has no way of knowing if the project will still be viable then.
It is a project this community needs. As real estate broker and Picton councillor Treat Hull found in his analysis, presented in this column last week, the supply of homes described as affordable has almost entirely dried up in Prince Edward County. This is a terrible trend that threatens our schools, healthcare and recreational services. It is fundamentally changing our community.
To be clear, it isn’t altruism driving this builder to invest in an affordable housing project at the edge of town in Picton—but neither does this wee project fit neatly into his development firm’s wheelhouse. It would be far easier for him to keep his head down and build out an array of projects in Belleville and Quinte West.
But he knows it could ease the pressure in this community, and that this is a good thing. Folks generally want to help when presented with the opportunity to do so. It is a problem when we compel them to wade through a swamp of regulation, study and indecision in order to serve our need. It tends to thwart good intentions.
His project is on the shelf for now. It is too hard to build homes in the County.
Ironically, it would be much easier for this and other builders to construct solar panels or industrial wind turbines on this site. First, he wouldn’t need municipal approval—the province has so completely neutered local government’s authority to govern where or how these massive industrial developments are imposed on communities, that we, and Shire Hall, are bystanders as they destroy roads and natural habitat.
Second, if he were an industrial wind developer, the builder could simply bypass any environmental snags by applying for a permit to harm, harass and kill endangered species from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (MNRF). These folks give these killing permits away like Shriners handing out candy canes in the Bloomfield Christmas Parade. Of the more than 3,000 times MNRF has been asked for a permit to kill endangered species since 2013, none has ever been denied.
If everyone who asks, gets a kill permit— what’s the point? Is there is any scrutiny at all?
Meanwhile, regulations that are easily bypassed by renewable energy developers, are effectively strangling new affordable home building—something that might actually provide some benefit to this community.
We need to fix this. We need protections restored for endangered species and safeguards for sensitive natural habitats. If ever such regulations were needed, it is to stop the reckless and depraved indifference of industrial wind and solar developers. Folks who defy local authorities when ordered to stop destroying roads and the places endangered species live.
But the safeguards need to be a bit more elastic in our towns and villages—places where we can reverse the decline of the County’s population, where we can build homes that working folks can afford.
There is not a species residing or stopping by the edge of Picton whose viability can’t be mitigated by some simple measures. So let’s prescribe these steps and move on. This week.
This is more than a council issue—this is on all of us. Our elected officials are reluctant to disrupt the provincial order—even after it has proved to be costly and damaging to County interests.
Folks on council know the challenges in building homes in the County. They’ve heard it a hundred times before. They know it is harder and more expensive to build new homes in the County than anywhere else in the region. They also understand the critical need. They can see the trend toward a shrinking population and the threat it poses.
But they need a push—a nudge from residents that they get serious about clearing away the obstructions in the way of new homebuilding in the County.
It is coming on three years that Mayor Robert Quaiff assured builders that the County was open for business. Important steps have been taken. Much more needs to be enacted.
But folks looking for affordable homes in the County can’t wait three to five years. And by then the crisis will have become much worse.
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