NANTICOKE—The hotly-debated potential Nanticoke development of 15,000 residential units, spearheaded by developer Empire Homes, may be delayed. It appears Haldimand County’s Minister’s Zoning Order (MZO) request, submitted in 2022 to the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing (MMAH), could be invalid following changes to provincial policy regarding MZOs.
Opposing the local MZO request was a central focus of Mayor Shelley Ann Bentley and MPP Bobbi Ann Brady’s election campaigns in 2022. MZOs became a hot-button issue provincially last fall when Ontario’s acting auditor general Nick Stravropoulos investigated the province’s use of MZOs. He reported that Doug Ford’s Conservative government had issued 44 MZOs from March 2019 to March 2021 – up from an average of just one per year previously.
After unofficial reports the local MZO was being tabled due to those changes, it was confirmed to The Press by a Haldimand councillor last week, who shared, “Just received an email from our CAO (Cathy Case). Appears there is a new framework for filing MZO requests. Our County MZO application is no longer valid. Staff are reviewing the new process and are expected to have a report for Council in June.”
Ward 4 Councillor Marie Trainer also reached out, indicating she would love to share her thoughts, but “all of Council has been asked to hold our opinion till the June report is released.”
A request to the County for clarification on why the MZO request would be invalid, and what options they are now considering, yielded the following response.
“We don’t have any updates to share at this time, however, staff hope to bring forward a report to the June 18, 2024 Council in Committee meeting with the most up-to-date information on MZO-related matters. Any impacts to the Nanticoke MZO – as they relate to the MMAH’s MZO policy framework – will be shared in that report,” said County representative Kyra Hayes.
MPP Bobbi Ann Brady shared, “It’s no surprise to me that that MZO request would be invalid at this point, because the government is changing the entire framework of how MZOs work.”
Brady indicated that in discussion with Minister of MMAH Paul Calandra about her petition to have the MZO withdrawn, she had been made aware of the decision.
“Historically, MZOs have been used for needs like long-term care, hospitals, schools. All of a sudden they were on a completely different path for accelerated development and that’s not what an MZO has traditionally been used for. I think in his wisdom Paul Calandra has said ‘wait a minute here, we have got to reign this in.’ I firmly believe that he will,” said Brady.
On the County’s options moving forward, Brady said, “They would have to start from scratch and put forward a new application, but I would suspect that they would have to wait until the new framework is released. You could put forward a request at this time, but why would you if you don’t know if you qualify for the new framework?”
She added, “While this government is under investigation by the RCMP, I maintain that another stroke of the pen on an MZO of this magnitude, for a project that MZOs typically are not used for, would not be good public relations.”
