How the Doug Ford government's Greenbelt bill aims to quash $120M lawsuit
CBC
New legislation tabled by Premier Doug Ford's government to return land to Ontario's Greenbelt also seeks to shut down a developer's $120-million lawsuit that began before the Progressive Conservatives took office.
The government's bill, the Greenbelt Statute Law Amendment Act, would stop all landowners whose Greenbelt properties were selected for housing development from taking any future legal action against the province, cabinet ministers and government staff in response to Ford's U-turn.
But the bill also aims to quash a specific legal action that was launched in 2017: a lawsuit by Minotar Holdings Inc. claiming that land it owns in Markham should never have been put in the Greenbelt in the first place.
Last November, Ford's government removed 15 hectares of Minotar's land from the Greenbelt — along with 14 other parcels across the protected area. Last month, facing growing backlash over the moves, the premier reversed course, meaning the company will no longer be permitted to build on the property.
The new legislation not only prohibits Minotar from seeking damages from the government over Ford's reversal, it also explicitly bars it from taking any further action in the lawsuit it began six years ago.
A lawyer for the company says the Minotar property is being unjustly lumped together with the 14 other parcels, all of which were picked for removal from the Greenbelt by a senior political staffer in Ford's government.
"Its removal from the Greenbelt was the result of a careful review by staff at the government, not the result of a political process," lawyer Jonathan Lisus said in an interview.
Ontario's auditor general and integrity commissioner found the government's process for choosing sites favoured certain developers who had direct access to the housing minister's chief of staff. Lisus says those concerns do not apply to the Minotar property.
The Minotar Holdings land is located north of Major Mackenzie Drive between Kennedy Road and McCowan Road. It was the only one of the 15 properties removed from the Greenbelt last November that was recommended by provincial civil servants, according to the investigations by both the integrity commissioner and auditor general.
Their reports concluded that all other parcels were picked by Ryan Amato, chief of staff to the then-minister of municipal affairs and housing, Steve Clark.
The reports slammed the government for giving preferential treatment to well-connected developers. The auditor estimated the moves boosted the value of the selected land by some $8.3 billion, and both Amato and Clark resigned in the wake of the scandal.
The integrity commissioner's report describes the Minotar property as "entirely unique" among the parcels selected for removal from the Greenbelt, and says ministry staff "had been very familiar" with it because of the ongoing lawsuit.
"When they received direction that the government wanted to proceed with removing specific sites, ministry officials proposed the government consider including this 37-acre site, which had been the subject of litigation for several years and had been scheduled for trial," says integrity commissioner J. David Wake in his report.
When the Ford government removed the Minotar site from the Greenbelt last November, the company agreed to settle the lawsuit, and it was officially terminated by consent in March of this year.
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