Comment
Piercing MDS
It was wrong for Prince Edward County. It has likely caused more problems for farmland owners than shielded them. Now the province is giving municipalities an off-ramp. Shire Hall should take it.
Minimum Distance Separation (MDS) is a tangled and cumbersome set of calculations and measurements designed to do one thing: reduce complaints about cow poo. That’s it.
In an agricultural community, it was absurd on its face. In practice, it was much worse. The scheme involves drawing arbitrary circles around livestock barns based on near-incomprehensible geometry. Such aroma buffers, it was reasoned, would bring peace to the countryside. (Training cows to defecate inside circles, of course, was the trickier bit.)
In any event, MDS has been prone to bad outcomes and unintended consequences. How could it have done otherwise? MDS—used in one way—blocks new homes arising in the aroma circle around a livestock barn. In this way, the idea goes, the prospective countryside homebuilder may be spared the odour of the output of cows, pigs and horses. (Of course, the animals are mobile, so they are oblivious to the MDS circle that seeks to bind them and their buttholes. And, of course, farmers may spread manure right up to their property line without transgressing MDS rules. Best not to get bogged down by the contradictions that define MDS.)
But, in truth, MDS wasn’t about protecting new neighbours at all. Rather, this nest of rules was an artificial construct designed to save farmland owners from the potential of folks building nearby and one day griping about the smell. (Shit Complaint Amelioration Technique might have been jazzier than MDS? “Quick, hide the barn; the Man from SCAT is here.”)
The problem was, and is, that MDS restricts farmers too. Another set of MDS circles prohibits new barns or livestock structures from being erected in the arbitrary buffer zone of an existing home. It turns out the aroma dome works both ways. For some farmers, MDS has prevented them from expanding their farm operations due to a neighbouring house. Some have sold and relocated to less entangled jurisdictions.
MDS has contributed to the destruction of our farm heritage. In March 2008, your columnist witnessed the demolition of a nearly 200-year-old barn in Hillier. The massive structure was as impressive as it was solid. A Loyalist soldier had built it on land granted to him for his service in the resistance to the American Revolution. One could feel the centuries of stories, of lives lived, anchored by this structure.
Then it was destroyed by MDS.
It was a cool late-summer morning. The elderly farmland owners fought back tears as they watched the spectacle from their car. Shire Hall had advised them that the only way to divide their land for their children’s benefit was to level the barn. MDS rules.
There are stories like this sprinkled across the County every year. Countryside building permits are regularly blocked because of a barn. Because of MDS. These rules surely cause much more conflict than they have soothed.
MDS rules have since been modified to give barn owners the option of declaring the building ‘dry storage,’ thus enabling a neighbour’s home to be constructed. But this option means they can never keep a horse, a goat or any livestock whatsoever. Why would anyone do this? Even when you have a brilliant relationship with your neighbour, why would you diminish the future use of your barn? Because of MDS? No.
This week Council is expected to pass a motion expressing its displeasure with provincial legislation aimed at building more homes in Ontario. Councillor John Hirsch is spearheading the pushback, rightly complaining the province is venturing into what has been municipal jurisdiction. Bills 23 and 97—and the regulations that flow from them—are Queen’s Park’s response to decades of foot-dragging by local governments. The province wants more homes built. It sees municipalities as impediments to its ambition. Because they are.
Shire Hall ignored housing in this community for 15 years—even as demand soared and housing supply dwindled. As a result, prices skyrocketed. Today only wealthy folks may live here. Dozens of recommendations aimed at streamlining housebuilding— by fixing the demand-supply imbalance in the County—were relegated to a dusty shelf. Eight years later, most remain unrealized.
Bills 23 and 97 are the consequences of inaction and foot-dragging by local governments such as Shire Hall. Yes, mistakes will occur. Illegitimate profits made. Poor choices cast in concrete.
But it is wrong to put the responsibility at the province’s feet without first acknowledging how we got here, and the local government’s role in this mess. Rather than posturing through motions that won’t be heard, Council may find it more productive to look for opportunities in this legislation.
Among the provisions of Bill 97, which mostly updates the Provincial Policy Statement (PPS), is one that replaces the phrase “shall comply with” as it relates to MDS with “shall consider.” This change is meant to give rural municipalities such as the County the latitude to build more homes on land that MDS restrictions would otherwise block. Same for barns.
Shire Hall should take this exit ramp to extract itself from the MDS web it spun in 2008.
There was a simple solution then. It remains available today. Post signs at the three bridges into the County—proclaiming this an agricultural community. Expect farm fragrances.
Done.
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