Transcript - Committee Rejects Cheapside Apartment Plan - Planning and Environment Committee

Committee Rejects Cheapside Apartment Plan - Planning and Environment Committee - March 10, 2026

of heat. Good afternoon folks. It's 100 p.m. and I'll call the fifth meeting of the planning and environment committee to order. Please check the city website for additional meeting detail information. The city of London is situated on the traditional lands of the Anesnabek, Hoden, Ocean, Lenipewok, and Adawan. We honor and respect the history, languages, and the culture of the diverse indigenous people who call this territory home. The city of London is currently home to many First Nations, Matei, and Inuit. Today, as representatives of the people of the city of London, we are grateful to have the opportunity to work and live in this territory. The City of London's commit to making every effort to provide alternate formats and communication supports for meetings upon request. To make a request specific to this meeting, please contact PAC PEC atlondon.ca or 519661-2489 extension2425. At this time, I'll look for any disclosures of pecuniary interest. Seeing none, I'll move on to consent items. We have four. I'll look to committee uh for uh uh direction on this. I haven't had heard any requests for any of these pulled. So, would someone like to uh make a motion to move it? Councelor Hillier has uh uh moved the consent items with councelor Cuddy um seconding it. So I'll look for uh questions or discussion. Uh councelor Stevenson. Thank you. I just had a question regarding 2.2 and the development at 455 Hibbury A North. I think in reading the report um that the development proposal that we approved at planning is uh okay to go ahead even with this TPA in force. I just want to confirm that just to be 110% sure. I'll go staff uh through the chair. The tree uh removal permit has expired and so um the tree matter will be re-reviewed through the subsequent site plan. So the tree protection area uh would not apply. Councelor, no that's good. Thank you. Look for other comments or questions. Councelor Privile. Thank you sir chaf uh on the on the building annual report 4.4 for the year- end deficits and uh mitigation. Can you I know there it states there you know in terms of the downturn in terms of the deficit but what actions can be taken or what actions uh can be taken to be more proactive thanks sorry councelor I'll go staff through the chair to the counselor the uh the review go is an annual review that uh the budget numbers and so on are reviewed on a on a monthly by-month basis if we see fluctuations or an downturn in the revenue or the expenses. Uh there would be the opportunity to reexamine the fee structure and uh obviously if we have vacancies that that would be something else that we could look at councelor. So again thank you and that would be done gradually through the year we wouldn't be waiting for annual reports anything like this when we see it we address it we introduce the proactive actions correct staff through the chair that is correct counselor. Okay, thank you for that and thank you for the answers regarding the director and I will follow up on the uh on the other part of uh sorry uh inspections but thank you no more questions look for other questions comments from committee and visiting counselors seeing none I'll just uh from the chair uh just a quick question regarding um 2.1 um we operate on a pretty much a break even uh standpoint. Can you confirm that through the chair? The the process in regards to our building permit fees are to cover the costs uh of the service and we don't uh we tried to break even. Correct. And so this past year we actually exceeded the break even point. Um but my understanding is in the prior years we were kind of under the break break even point. So this is kind of rounding rounding it out. Is that true? That is correct. We have a reserve fund that basically is is set up to uh cushion um lean years, let's say. Um that um budget is uh set at 100% of our costs. Um we've pulled from that revenue or that budget uh to cover revenue or yeah pulled from that uh reserve account to cover costs for the last two years. And basically we are at about a 30% coverage of our total cost. So we we're we're under um we we still have money to add to the reserve. Right. Thank you. The reason I bring that up, I just want people to understand our building permit fees are not uh a way to just create extra revenue. They're just as a break even point recovering the cost for processing those permits. Uh that's it from me. If there's any other comments or questions from committee members or councilors, then I I'll call the vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay, moving on to scheduled items. We have 10. So, as we've done in the past, I'll look for a mover and a seconder to open and close the public participation meetings that we can use at each event. Councelor Cuddy, you'll move that. I'll look for a seconder. Councelor Stevenson. Um, so we will use the mover and seconder for opening closing of all the 10 items. Uh, 3.1 this is regarding uh 174 Wellington Road. Um, and I'll open the vote to open the public participation meeting. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Uh, thank you. So the would the city like to comment on this or would you like me to directly go to the the public through the chair? Please go to the public if you want. Thank you. All right. So I'll go to the the public. Would anyone like to to uh comment on this particular item? Please go to the mic. I'm here to talk about 174 Wellington. Please, ma'am. Uh before you go, please give us your name and you have five minutes. My name is Anamaria Velas. I'm here to talk to about 174 Wellington. That's a beautiful, beautiful house. And even though there's been uh construction there now for a while as it comes to fruition, I can't help but think that that whole design was such a mistake. There's absolutely no reason why the city had to spend so much tax dollars on widening a bridge, riding that section of Wellington Street when rapid transit works so well in the downtown with the older streets and narrow streets. And this house was always admired uh every time I went by. I don't understand why you can't modify your designs and um and keep that house intact. It's really hard to understand as the as everything is coming finishing up and coming together why the city felt they had to do what they did just to put a few buses on Wellington Street. And it's not too late to to reconfigure that area to preserve that house. It's a spectacular house, complimentary to the city and complimentary to whatever gateway you guys are planning cuz right now the gateway is just a highway and I can't imagine it being charming um or any or how that house can contribute to a lovely gateway into the downtown core. So the the so the qu the ask is to reconfigure your plans, work that house into the gateway cuz it's worth preserving. And as this project moves forward, it becomes clear every single day that this design didn't have to happen. It was kind of a big waste of tax dollars money. And and the rapid transit works well in all parts of the city. It wasn't necessary. And you can redeem yourself for wasting taxpayer dollars by preserving this beautiful house on 174 Wellington. I'll look for other speakers. Clerk, do we have anyone online? No. I don't see anyone coming to the microphone. So, I'll call the vote to close the ppm. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. So, I'll put this on the floor for committee members. Councelor Cuddy. Thank you, Chair. I'll move the staff recommendation. I'll look for a seconder. Deputy Mayor Lewis. I have a motion moved and seconded. Look for any comments or questions. Seeing none, I'll call vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay. Moving on to 3.2. This is regarding um 788 to 790 Dundas Street. Um we'll uh open the vote to open the public particip Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay. I'll uh see if the applicant would like to uh address the committee. Please, ma'am, give us your name and you have five minutes. Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is Heather Garrett. I'm with the Linka Pamo Limited and I'm here on behalf of the uh property owner. Um I first want to thank Heritage staff. We work always well with them and we've read their uh staff report and we agree. So we are here for any questions that you may have. Thank you. Thank you. I'll look for other comments or questions or comments from the public. I'll ask clerk if there's anyone online. There's nobody online. I don't see anyone approaching the microphone. So, we'll call the vote to close the PE. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay. Moving on to uh 535 to 537 Talbert Street and 105 Ken Street. This is 3.3. Um, we'll open the vote for a public participation meeting to open. Do we have to vote on it? Chair, we didn't vote on that last. Oh, we're moving a little too quickly. You're good. Thank you. Thanks, counselor. And I'll I'll move the staff recommendation. Chair. Okay. So, councelor K. We're back at 3.2. Sorry, folks. Um, back at 3.2. Uh, deputy mayor seconds conversation. questions or comments on that property? Now, I'll call the vote on that. Closing the vote. Motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. And now moving on to 3.3. This is regarding 535 537 Talbot Street, 105 Kent Street. Um, we'll open we'll call the vote on opening the PPM. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. And u please sir, give us your name and you have 5 minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chair. John Fleming of City Planning Solutions and I'm representing uh Triricar Properties today. Um I'm here for both 3.4 or sorry 3.3 and 3.4 and in both cases we've re reviewed the report and we are in support of staff's recommendation. Uh would like to thank both Mr. GU and Mr. Greg Wall for uh helping us navigate through this process and their professional um work on this this file. Thank you. Thank you. Oh, go to the public. It's anime. Hold on a second. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Okay, let let me introduce you. Well, I can introduce myself. Well, no, actually, uh, I'll do that. Okay. Well, so, Miss Velastro, please go ahead. You have 5 minutes. Um, I just find it outrageous that TriRiccar is building a building on this site and then all of a sudden the the public has an opportunity to comment whether they want these houses demolished or not when this the building has already been approved. It is just a sad state of affairs and a mockery of the public process when these buildings have a glorious history. Um, and they were part of the Bankers Row historical national historical site and yet this never came up when the city was reszoning this block for highrises. And now we're like in the saddest pathetic way. We're giving 5 minutes to talk about buildings that are going to be demolished. There's no no way to stop it. And if you read the report, you'll see the heritage planners didn't even do an assessment on the heritage value of these buildings because it's already a done deal. and the the best they could do is salvage building materials to be used elsewhere. I can't think of a sadder, pathetic um planning proposal and the fact that it's so insulting to members of the public who are given 5 minutes after this has already been approved. It's just a statement on this committee. It's on it's a constant problem. It's a statement on this committee that they don't show the public any respect. And my guess you guys are hear about a building in your neighborhood. So get prepared. Chances are your voice will be completely silenced. Okay. Just when people came in, there's notification to the front. There's no applauding and no booing. um just so everyone has a chance to uh give their thoughts openly without uh pressure from from anyone. So please refrain from that as we move through the day. Um I'll look for other speakers. Is there anyone online? No. Okay. So I'll call the vote to closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay. Um we'll put this item on the floor for committee. Councelor Cuddi. Yes, Chair. I'll move the staff recommendation. Okay. I'll look for a seconder. Deputy Mayor Lewis seconds. comments or uh questions? Seeing none, uh we'll call the vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. Moving on to 3.4. This is regarding 513 to 531 Talbot Street. and we'll open the uh vote to open the ppm. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. I'll look for the applicant. Uh oh, Mr. Fleming, you indicated before you that Yeah. So, please go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll just say that I'm here for any questions you may have and um just ditto from my last comments. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Mastro, you have 5 minutes. Please go ahead. So, this is connected to the buildings that are going to be demolished. Those buildings were from the mid 1800s. They had a glorious history, a very famed um people that lived there, including uh link to UN Western University. This is a done deal. I'm just here to um take my five minutes to show um to tell this committee that it is the rudest and most pathetic um public consultation imaginable. We're given 5 minutes. We were never given an opportunity to discuss this or put in our comments when the decision was being made to reszone this area. We were completely not consulted and now we have an opportunity to to speak our mind. Um because legally they have to give the public 5 minutes. It doesn't matter if the decision's already been made to de to de demolish these buildings. Legally they have to give you 5 minutes. But don't get your hopes up. They're not going to listen to you. We'll look for other speakers. Ask if there's anyone online. Okay, I'll open the vote to close the ppm. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. I'll put this on the floor for committee members. Councelor Cuddi. Thank you, chair. I'll move the staff recommendation. Thank you. I'll look for a seconder. Deputy mayor seconds questions or comments. So I just from the chair I just want to ask a couple of questions. Um our um community advisory committee which looks at heritage. They looked at these properties reading a report that was earlier in the consent items and my understanding is that um they recommended not listing this as a heritage property cuz it's not a heritage property and it was every time this is listed so we consider it and I just want the confirmation that our advisory committee did not recommend this for heritage desertation. Is that true? Thank you through the chair. Uh that's correct. So, the CACP was consulted on this in their last meeting in February and uh that that's correct that the uh agreed with the staff report and did not uh recommend um this be listed or designated. Thanks. Thank you. And then on top of that, our our heritage staff also look at this um as with the other properties. And uh I believe is there's nine criteria met one of nine. Um and uh the in the report or in the rec staff recommendation again it was not recommended by our heritage staff for uh consideration. Can you confirm that please? Thank you. Yes. Through the chair. That's that's correct. Thank you very much. Thank you. Those are the only questions I had from the chair. I'll look for councelor Po. Thank you sir chair to the staff. Uh I heard a relation that uh these properties were part of the banker's row but I don't know if anyone of you can respond to my question. I believe banker row was the one on ride out between Dundas and Duffren. If you can please confirm that. Thank you. I'll go staff. Uh thank you through the chair. Uh yes, Bankers Row is on Ride Out Street uh at the northwest corner of Ride Out and Queens Avenue. That is a national historic site. It is part four designated and also in the downtown heritage conservation district. Thank you counselor. Thank you for that. So I will have a followup. So the currently the last two points that we were discussing at this committee, they are not part of the bankers row. Is that correct? Go staff through the chair. Yes, that's correct. They are not related to bankers row. We don't have any historical information that suggests that they are bankers row. The national historic site recognition does not uh extend to include these properties on Talbot Street. Thank you, councelor. Okay. Thank you, staff. No more questions. Thank you, chair. Okay. I'll look for other comments or questions from visiting counselors or committee members. Seeing none, we'll call the vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. Moving on to 325 Grey Street. This is item 3.5. I will call the vote to open the public participation meeting. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. And I'll look to the applicant of the applicant length to comment. Please ma'am, give us your name and you have 5 minutes. Thank you, chair. And good afternoon, everyone. My name is Aaliyah Richards. I'm a planner with Zelinka Pamo Limited representing the property owner and proponent of the zoning bylaw amendment application. I'd like to extend my thanks to staff for processing this application. We have reviewed the staff report and are in agreeance with the recommendation. Um as this this proposal is supported by all levels of current land use planning policies which encourage gentle intensification in areas such as this within an existing building in a well-connected and builtup area of the city. Um as such we request that the committee endorse the staff recommendation for approval. And I'm available to answer any questions you may have. Thank you. Thank you. Look for other members of the public like to address the committee. Yes. Please ma'am give us your name and you have 5 minutes. Good afternoon. My name is Kazim Chik. I am direct uh neighbor of that uh 325 Grey Street uh new uh constructed building and uh I already uh contacted Miss Haynes and my u my world representative um Mr. Ferrer to ask some questions and to have some comments. Um so I was encouraged to come here today and speak up. I don't want to be confrontational. I worked for so many years with uh housing um department fighting for building more housing for people and uh I know that building used to be owned by um few people before it was uh developed last summer and last summer was built But my um I have nothing against this to be built. It's just my concern is because my um the entry for for that building is facing exactly my backyard and um I have already experienced um hardship because my fence was destroyed um during the plowing. I know this is nothing to do with um city to deal with but my concern was I couldn't even find um anybody's contact. It's a privacy act. So nobody gave me anything in order to have a discussion with the owner of the building to have some future steps in order to maybe build proper um division so the cars will not be destroying my property and also I will be um divided from that property in the sense that fumes from cars because this is the um when it it's built This is the car parking lot. So it lowers value of my house definitely. I will not be able to sit in my backyard at the back where where I used to because of the fumes because of the noise pollution. I check with the bylaws. So um again I don't want to be confrontational. I just want to have a discussion how um how we can uh work together with this um property owner in order to protect my rights because my um property as I said value goes down when uh the value of the new building it goes it will go up. I know they applied for right now they are forplex they applied for additional um use of um basement apartments and uh at this point they have free 3.5 parking spots approved but there is already more cars parking than free. So for me this doesn't make sense. Maybe city can give them more um permission to park more more cars but maybe in a different way so they destroy they don't destroy my property. We have winter in Canada heavy winters every year and uh even if I um to fix that uh fence right now I assume it will be the same problem in the future. I I see already six mailboxes. I have not seen any notification before this building was built up. I just heard um people, construction people being there and working the whole summer making noises. I didn't realize that this will cost me um damage of my property. I have a pictures. I don't know who to pass it on but I plea that the owner of this property contacts me and uh we can have a discussion how to fix that uh problem for future. Again I have nothing against people who want to allow other people to make a living. Okay. Here you represent maybe we can have a discussion after. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. I'll look for other speakers. Miss Vstro, please go ahead. You have 5 minutes. I think this woman is asking that this application be sent back until they can work out a better uh arrangement with this property owner. But my guess is you're just going to rubber stamp it. But I think that's what she's asking for. She's asking that it not be approved until there's an opportunity for her and the and the property owner to work something out to protect her property. Oh my I want I want some resolution for me. Thank you ma'am to feel safe. I I'll bring up your issue. Don't worry when we finish. I don't know who to give the pictures. Thank you. I'll look for other speakers. I'll ask clerk if there's anyone online. I don't see anyone approaching the makerphone. So I'll call the vote to close the ppm. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. So before I go to committee, I'm just going to There are some concerns raised there. I want to go to staff. Uh snow plowing, um some privacy, car fumes, etc. Uh where are those issues uh dealt with? there's an opportunity uh for staff and the applicant to work um uh for those concerns. Um so through the chair because there's only six units proposed, it will not be going through site plan. Um and it is um a civil matter that will need to be generally worked out between the applicant um and the member of the public. and we did advise um that they work with um legal services or um bylaw enforcement as well. Thank you. So I'll go to uh committee now councelor Kite. Thank you chair. Um I'll move the staff recommendation on how I'll have some questions for the applicant after. Okay. Thank you. I'll look for a seconder. Deputy Mayor Lewis seconds. I'll look for comments or questions from committee members or visiting uh counselors. Councelor Cuddi. Thank you, Chair. I have a question for the applicant. Ma'am, I'm I'm wondering, is this the first time you've heard of this issue? So, I'll go to the applicant. It is. Um and I can certainly contact the property owner about these and and see if we can't come to a resolution about um some of the issues being experienced. Council, thank you. and and chair um and thank you um chair. I'm I'm a little distressed after hearing from the resident as to um the issues that that she's going to face with the construction. So, I'm going to support this, but I'm going to I'm going to ask the applicant um uh respectfully if you can really push this forward and um I think what I'll Thank you, Chair. That's all. Thank you. Thank you. Um councelor Frank. Thank you all. uh echo councelor Cuddi's remarks and encourage um the consultant to ask applicant to to submit something in writing to the council's public agenda letting us know how they plan to um address those concerns. And additionally, I just had one question through the chair to staff. Um the mapping kind of looks like the bottom area, this uh south end of the property. I don't know, it's green space and there's like the green blob. I'm not sure if that's a tree protection area, but I just wanted to go through the chair to staff to understand if that is a tree protection area or just a green blob on the map. I'll go staff. Through the chair, I don't believe it's a tree protection area. I do believe it's acting as their amenity space for the property. Council sir, thank you. Yes. Um I was just curious because uh my understanding based on what the resident shared um sounds like the snow is piling up against the fence, but if the trees that are appearing to be on the map remain there, I would be um curious as to how the snow would be able to pile up given that it looks like there's a buffering of trees. So I'm just um not sure if the trees have been taken down. Uh but perhaps between now and council, I'll I'll have a chat with staff to just make sure that that green space has been maintained and still there. Thank you. I'll look for other comments or questions. Council Perol. Thank you sir chair. I will go to the applicant but it has to do actually with this with the speaker with the neighbor when the submission is done in writing and maybe I missed it. Maybe she mentioned it but I was just curious if she lives on the gray street or if she lives on the water and it's backing to it. So if you can please add I don't need the answer now but when you when you do the submission if you can please include it. I would be curious to look at the map and go to the premises. Thank you. Yeah certainly. Thank you. Look for other comments or questions. We have a motion moved and a second. I'll call the vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Moving on to 3.6. This is regarding 6712 James Street. And I'll open the vote to open the public participation meeting. Thank you. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. Um, just wondering if the city would like to uh comment before I go to the public on this. Okay. All right. No through the chair. No, we don't have anything to add. Okay. Thank you. So, I'll go to the public. Uh, Mrs. Velastro, please go ahead. You have 5 minutes. Um, this housing develop development is literally sandwiched in an intersection. It's on a wedge, a green a green space. Now, that's a wedge between two major streets. The houses that are being built here have almost have a strip of green space and it is literally between two sandwiched between two intersections. It is it is a a design by somebody who is maximizing the land, not really providing housing that would be beneficial to anyone that's going to live there. being sandwiched between two busy streets on a wedge between an intersection. And it's it's just so obvious that they're just trying to maximize a piece of land and cram in as much housing without giving in people really any breathing space between taking in exhaust from heavy traffic and not giving them any relief to escape that because there is a busy road in the front of the house and there's a busy road immediately behind the house. And I just see it as just poor quality housing. And my hope is that it fails because anyone who buys this house is not going to get a return on their investments. And I really hope I am sure that it will be rubber stamped at this committee. But my hope is that no one falls victim to a housing that is going to be bad for them. They're not going to get a return on it because it's just a terrible concept for for living space. I'll look for other speakers. I'll ask clerk if there's anyone online. Nobody online. I don't see anybody else approaching the mic. So, call the vote to close the ppm. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. So I'll put this on the floor for committee members. Uh Deputy Mayor Lewis. Uh so I'm prepared to move it. Uh chair. Um I'm also prepared to move an amendment that councelor Hopkins wants to make. I'll let her speak to it and then I'll move it. Um but if there's a seconder for the main motion, uh I'll put the main motion on the floor. Um then I'd like to ask that you go to the ward counselor so that we can hear from her and I'll move the amendment she wants to make. Okay, councelor Cuddi is indicating uh he'll second it and uh councelor Hopkins uh please go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for recognizing me. I am the ward counselor for this development. Uh this development is uh to me a development that is uh the city of London owns this property. It's 11 units and it is designed for true affordable home ownership. That's something that I am very supportive of. I do agree with Miss Velastro when it comes to the busy street. This is a very busy street. We are putting in, in fact, we're upgrading the pedestrian crossing to be flashing lights. There's a school nearby as well. So, as we develop this area, it will um uh be a busy area. So, um the pedestrian crossing is very important as well as the walkway which is going to go to the back of this property and connect uh to the next property which are town houses that this committee or maybe the previous council approved a number of years ago for development of town houses and then there's the Lambeath school right next to it. So that walkway is really important to allow for for um students to enter the school as opposed to going down the street and then onto James and then up into the school. So the pedestrian crossing, the walkway, things like that I think are very very important. Uh there were a couple concerns from the public and maybe through you I'll just ask staff. The the two um concerns are around the storm water management. This area is lowlying. There's a lot of water. Uh so my first question through you to staff would be how is it going to be managed? I know we had the townhouse complex a number of years ago. It was a um a conversation, but I think we need to have a further conversation on how those lands were managed and how this land will be managed. I'll go to staff. Thank you through the chair. Um so this particular site currently drains unc uncontrolled towards uh the south property line and then eventually James Street. In proposed conditions uh the storm water will be directed to the south property line but we we're going to be installing a new storm water system which is a swale storm sewer and multiple catch basins that will intercept those flows and direct them to Campbell Street the appropriate outlet. Um we are aware of the ongoing uh flooding issues in the area but that is west of this site uh more directly related to uh the school in behind. Uh so the the city stormwater staff have been dealing with those issues with the school board and the private owner. Um but uh what we can say today is the development of our subject site will not have any negative impacts on on the ongoing flooding issues of that particular area. Uh thank you for that. Um the clerk has just advised me like if you're speaking you know um maybe towards your amendment or the amendment that you wish the committee to put on the floor. Um, might be good if we do that first and then you can go ahead or are you would you like some questions answered to set that up? I'll give me some guidance here. I was going to get to the trees and the amendment that I would like um the committee to deal with would be the trees. That's the second issue that I've heard from the community. So, with that, I'd like to um um bring forward the amendment. Uh and do you do I need to read the amendment? Well, I'll go to I'll go to committee member who's going to put the put the amendment on. Um, council or deputy mayor Lewis, I understand you wish to put that amendment forward. Uh, yes. And so, uh, the amendment uh, on behalf of councelor uh, Hopkins that I'm prepared to move is that the motion be amended to add a new clause to read as follows. that civic administration be directed to use best efforts to offset the anticipated tree loss resulting from the development of 6712 James Street by undertaking enhanced tree planting initiatives on suitable cityowned lands associated with the municipal housing and industrial development projects. Thank you. I'll look for a seconder for that. Councelor Cuddi has seconded and councelor we can go back to you got the second set. Uh I want to thank the committee uh for bringing this forward. It is important. there are quite a few number of trees. There's no site plan process. This will go to an RFB. Uh I think it's really good that we um sort of deal uh or provide opportunities in other parts of the city to do more tree planting. So I am hoping the committee will support this. I am supportive. It is true affordable housing. It is also um important that when we develop these lands, we improve the the the storm water management, the the flooding issues. And I just want to um make note that I always appreciate chipo of the temps uh for their comments on in these planning applications as well. So, thank you. Thank you. Okay. So, on the amendment, I'll look for uh further questions or comments from committee or visiting counselors. Uh, councelor Cuddi. Um, just want to uh thank um the counselor for bringing this forward. I think it's a good improvement and I'm very grateful to to you to do this and I'll be supportive. Seeing no other comments or questions, uh we'll open the vote on the amendment. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. So I'll need a a new mover and seconder on the amended motion. Uh Deputy Mayor Lewis, seconded by Councelor Cuddy. So now to the main motion as amended. Um comments or questions from committee or visiting counselors? Uh councelor Hopkins? Uh my thanks to the committee and also my thanks to city staff for the work that you've done on this. Thank you. Thank you. Seeing no other comments or questions, we'll call the vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay, moving on to 3.7. This is regarding 724 York Street. Uh, I'll call the vote to open the ppm. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay, I'll look for um members of the public that would like to uh comment as Oh, sorry applicant. Sorry. Uh please uh go ahead, give us your name and you have five minutes. Thank you. Good afternoon. Um, my name is Olia Alchett and I'm a planner with SPML LTD and uh I'm here on behalf of the applicant and owner for the subject site. We have uh reviewed the planners report and we are in full support of the recommendation. Happy to answer any questions that may arise. Thank you. Thank you. I'll look for other members of the public that'd like to address us. Ask clerk if there's anyone online. There is nobody online. I don't see anyone approaching the microphone, so we'll call the vote to close the ppm. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay, I'll put this item on the floor for committee. Uh, Deputy Mayor Lewis, I'll move the staff recommendation. And Council, Deputy Mayor moves the staff recommendation. Councelor Cuddy seconds. Comments or questions from committee or visiting counselors. I'll call the vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay, moving on to 3.8. This is regarding 929 Cheapside Street. I'll open the vote to open the public participation meeting. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. So, I'll look uh to the applicant. Please sir give us your name and you have five minutes through you Mr. Chair. Uh I'm Adam Lru. I'm a planner here at Monteth Brown Planning Consultants. We're here be on behalf of the applicant uh proponent. Uh we just wanted to say that we've worked with city staff. We thank city staff for reviewing the application. We've completed numerous technical studies involving a a well-designed art architects, landscape architects, traffic engineers, and civil engineers uh to come up with the proposed design. Uh we're supportive of the motion as we have proposed which features an exterior sideyard setback of 0.5 meters, a lot coverage of 50%, landscape open space of 20% and uh encroachments for balconies and architectural features of 0 m to the exterior yard uh sideyard lot line. Uh, thank you for allowing us to speak on the application and we'll be here to answer any questions that councel or the public may have. Thank you. And I'll look for the public. Please, sir, give us your name and you have 5 minutes. All right. My name is Jonathan Wild. Um, so good afternoon. I'm here to speak about the reszoning on 929 cheapite. To be clear from the start, I support housing support in intensification, but our city needs homes. Clearly, this proposal is inappropriate for this location. I'm going to go into a few reasons why I believe that and why a bunch of people here believe that. So, in your own London plan, policy 193 requires compatibility. A six-story building next to one-story single family homes isn't compatible. It's not close. The immediate area is exclusive one and twotory homes. Policy 252 requires contextual fit. This proposal doesn't fit existing low-rise characteristics of the na the neighborhood. Policy 255 requires appropriate transitions. So, we're jumping from one story to six stories. Even their claim of stepping down to four stories on the sides is not an appropriate transition. Four stories is still double the height of what an existing works in this area. Secondly, there's other building types that could work on this lot. This neighborhood has multiple three-story walkup that exist in our neighborhood. They would work well. They provide housing. They fit the context the applicant wants to build. Doubles the height. But they never explained why a three-story wouldn't work here. Three-story building could still provide 35 to 50 units, substantially increasing supply while respecting the neighborhood scale. Parking is in quite inadequate. They're proposing 46 spots for 105 units. That's 044 ratio. Our bylaws shows 050. So that's seven spaces short of minimum. The applicant claims access justifies this, but Route 15's basic bus route. We're not talking the rapid transit on Oxford Street. Their own traffic study acknowledges this is a car dependent neighborhood. Those missing parking spots will spill onto Sterling Street, Barker Street, and surrounding areas. Fourth, being in a primary transit area doesn't override compatibility requirements. Yes, in the London plan you could permit six stories in this place type, but the maximum that's the maximum. So again, policies 193, 252, and 255 still apply when you're directly adjacent to R1 single homes. Their compatible buildings aren't comparable. They'd site different building apartments, village park place, and other apartments to justify this height, but nothing none of those buildings are actually situated beside an R1 zoned single detached home. Finally, our housing crisis doesn't override good planning, right? We need housing absolutely, but we also need contextsensitive development. Three stories would work. add s housing supply while still complying with compatibility, contextual fit and transition. In conclusion, I just want this proposal. We ask that this is, you know, that this violates three of the core London plan policies and provides inadequate parking that would impact residential streets. I'm asking either to refuse this application or let's require substantial revision. Thank you for your time. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. Please, ma'am, give us your name. You have five minutes. My name is Katherine Church. Um, I agree with everything that was just previously said. I'd like to make a little correction. From what I understand, as of March 1st, it's supposed to be one parking spot per unit in the city. Uh, so it falls the parking falls way below what it should be. Uh in addition um at a recent presentation by the developer it I um it was asked if an environmental assessment had been done on the property. The answer was no. It was not needed or required. However, historically there was a commercial building green houses where pesticides would have been used and according to some of the elderly lab uh neighbors, the lot was used potentially as a mechanic shop at some point. The land is potentially a brownfields. For those who don't know what a brownfield is, it's a lot that due to commercial use or industrial use may be contaminated in the ground. According to the government of Ontario documents, when a property that was being used commercially or industrially is being reszoned for res residential use, which I believe in the zoning it had special provisions for a CC1 uh zone as well as a residential zone, that lot um never actually had residential housing on it. It was um sorry. So according to the government of Ontario documents uh when a property that was being used commercial well sorry we already read that this was uh this way if construction is done on the property contaminants can be removed and precautions can be taken to protect the surrounding houses from contamination and dust. Even if the land is now designated R1 or and CC uh CC1 uh it wasn't used for residential purposes. It was used for commercial purposes. This is actually a public health issue and I would like to know if there has been any actual environmental assessments done. uh according to some of the community uh there were pro propositions for building on that property and they it didn't come to fruition because of the issues of contamination. Um so at this point I would like to know why an environmental assessment has not been done. uh local residents will be negatively affected by the proposed construction environmentally, emotionally, physically and now their health is is in question. Uh many are also being asked to take a financial hit in property values while also being charged everinccreasing property taxes. In the last few years, our taxes have doubled. We now pay close to the same amount as houses west of Adelaide Street, which makes no sense. Uh, this neighborhood is being squeezed on all fronts. Um, furthermore, in recent years, the property was fenced off. The fences have been removed and the south facing privacy fence has been allowed to fall into disrepair. It doesn't look like anybody's caring about the property at the moment. And that's uh Okay. I don't know. I That's the end. No, that's fine. Thank you for the Thank you for the opportunity. Yeah. And just just to let folks know that the questions you raise and others might raise, I'll ask them of staff once we're finished the uh the public participation uh time. All right. Thank you. Okay. I'll look for the next speaker. Please, ma'am, give us your name. You have five minutes. My name is Anita Kirchenko. And before I say something, I would like to ask the Carling Heights residents to raise their hands that we're here to oppose the current proposal of 929 just to show that there are a lot of people that care about the current building. Um, my main objection to the building in its in its current form that it goes against the rules that the city put in place to balance the interests of the local residents and to meet the requirements of growth and intensification. Um, I've heard a number of planners uh mention the word gentle intensification and the sixstory building with four times the density does not sound like a good fit for the neighborhood that has pretty much singlestory houses. Uh that's why I'm asking uh the city and the planning committee uh to go back and to if the building is about to be built, please meet the requirements that you have set in place uh to not erode the public trust uh in the public process when it comes to new developments. Uh the other point that is very concerning is the the parking. London is not Copenhagen or any other European city where you can actually rely on public transit. And if you ask anyone in our neighborhood, everyone owns a car unless they just cannot drive. And I'm I'm just confident we'll have the spillovers. There's a a church nearby that people will park on or the streets, our streets that people will park on. And I just don't think it's fair uh to the local residents. Uh so again I'll re reiterate my main point is that the the framework the city uh planning framework is here to balance the interests of local residents and the the goal of the city to grow. Uh so I hope you take it into the consideration you reject the six-story building to be built and we can go to fourstory decked town houses with the parking that is adequate uh for the neighborhood. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you. Uh hello my name is Bella Goayan from beginning thank you everybody from beginning you told that city of London is bilingual so I'm going to address my questions in French are you okay uh just hold on a second yeah I will do in French yeah just please hold on a second I have to consult with the clan then I will do in You speak Polish too? I speak Russian too. So you speak Polish too? No, I speak Armenian, Georgian. So German Ma'am, un unfortunately uh we do not have a translator here. If you had given us a heads up uh to let us know, then we would have arranged to have a translator. From the beginning you told that London is bilingual city. So you had to make sure that people speak French and they understand too. So it's bilingual. You have to speak two languages. Canada is bilingual country and London is bilingual. Your opening was it? Yeah. Okay. So if you want you have five minutes. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Nobody understands. So why I'm talking? So I'm telling you. So from beginning you had to distribute brochures. Traffic is main issue. Property values are going to down. And I lived another late 869 and we had fire at 4:00 in the morning. Fire erupted 2009 14 sorry. So what kind of buildings you are going to build there? What kind people I would like to know also how much city is London of London is paying to developers and how much developers of city of London paying to you to push this. That's not allowed. That's all. That's all. I'll look for the next speaker. Please sir, uh give us your name. You have five minutes. Okay. My name is Steven or um the Canadian Institute of Planners uh website has one constant theme and that's to plan for healthy communities. Planners are there to help protect heritage and neighborhoods. This proposed change in zoning does not protect our neighborhood at all. It does however in an election year provide politicians with a declaration that they have created large numbers of so-called affordable housing units. Rather than hold a developer to standards that weren't just plucked out of the air, but were developed over the years to protect property values, they are prepared to bend and create a special zoning that are 9-7 for anyone who wants to build these affordable housing units. Affordable to whom? Certainly not the neighborhood uh surrounding them. And the dollars for to doors initiative further encourages developers to maximize unit numbers with grants of up to 45,000 per um affordable unit. We know from experience that crowding people into such accommodation will create problems and apartment slums. For example, one city affordable housing project currently has over 10% of the units uninhabitable due to the damage caused by bad tenants and good tenants are afraid to exit their homes. To compound the problem, landlords are virtually handcuffed and can't get rid of bad tenants quickly and easily as the tribunal can take months or even years to evict um somebody from their home. Telling a developer they must shrink the footprint of planned building and yet keep the desired unit count will only exacerbate exacerbate the issue. The R9-7 designation is not planning, it's appeasing. appeasing politicians and developers so that they can claim that they have created mass numbers of housing units uh to rid our streets of the homeless basically out of sight, out of mind. With regards to the parking issue, let's face it, Canada's a in Canada a car is almost a necessity and council has recognized that and just last week requested a change in new construction parking requirements. Now zoning is required one parking space per unit. Yet this planning report ignores that. The question is why? In a neighborhood already facing parking issues with homes designed uh in the aftermath of of World War II, it was never envisioned that a family could own two, three, or even four cars. Certainly, we can find a designated single family property with as many as six to eight cars. This property at 929 Cheapside will have an overflow of cars and local neighbors and streets will suffer consequences. And as a retired con uh condominium property manager, I had 1,400 units under my portfolio. I can tell you that there is inadequate space for snow removal and snow storage. A number of parking spaces will suffer um and will subsequent snowfalls further es um exacerbating the flow of vehicles uh onto the side streets and properties across the road. Uh why do we have setbacks? Setbacks are a buffer between the private zone and the public zone. Uh the city of Toronto's website states that zoning isn't there to ruin your fund. It's there to keep neighbors livable. When planning your building envelope, it's what's left after the setbacks and other constraints are applied. It is a part of the lot where the main building is allowed to exist. If the envelope is too small, you can't build that size of plan, and you must fit the envelope. Do not change the zoning to fit the developer, but insist on existing zoning constraints and tell them to design what fits the envelope. The developers in city hall are trying to pour 2 L of water into a one liter container. The overflow will be damned. In this case, it's the taxpayers who will pay the price of this overflow. The site is too small to accommodate 105 units. Send the plan plan back to the developers and tell them to come back with one which fits the neighborhood and preserves property values. That's what zoning regulations are supposed to do. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. Please, ma'am, give us your name and you have five minutes. My name is Anne Wild. I've lived on Sterling Street for more than 50 years. Um, the developer had a Zoom meeting. The Zoom meeting, um, there was people there that had the ability to speak or send a message through Zoom call. I want to reiterate the majority of us here are all against the building of your property, your developer and his design. Whether you say it's four stories on the side, it's a six-story building. There is not a building from Clark Road all the way to St. George Street that has that demographic and it's an eyesore. We are a family neighborhood. We have a school. We have a church. It's a community. The the mix, it's a mismatch of our units. 77% of your units are onebedroom. You're gearing to Fshaw or Western, so it'll be student housing. This is a family neighborhood. Based on your drawings, the context, the neighborhood. Um, these are wartime homes. Wley Barracks was there. We have somebody that's a veteran. Her husband has lived there his whole tenure. This is an opportunity to go back, redesign, redevelop, or make it housing for people that are single families, not a conglomerate. Your opportunity, you're one block from a school. There's speeding on Cheapside Street. There's speeding on Sterling Street. And what are we going to deal with when there's an overflow of cars in the neighborhood? You've missed the mark of housing for mid-century homes or middle class people living in a neighborhood that they want to have an enjoyment. Sit on your front porch. Do we want to look at that? No. Would you want to look at that? I'm sure not. I think the proposal of 20.6 m, six stories, is an abomination to what this committee sitting here today wants to develop. I'm sure you wouldn't want it in your neighborhood. There's been messages and emails to Susan. She's met people. She's heard our voices. The current homes here are mostly one story. It's a small footprint. They're brick orsided homes and not a mass development. And for me, it's it's a quiet neighborhood. This is not going to make our neighborhood quiet. And notwithstanding that, the the whole development I believe it's it's railroaded through. I've seen what Corley has done in other neighborhoods and he builds the same they build the same footprint and it's not for our area. As my son alluded, you have um your planning policies 193, 252, and 255 have all been addressed. And it's your civic duty as our leaders in our area to deny this building permit and the plans the way it is. You're our voice for developers. You have the insight to make a change and make a difference. Whether it's a three-story walk up, whether it's condos, but these homes here won't see the sun with your building the way it is and having it butt against somebody else's property. I just think it's a travesty. and your proposed zoning change um for a bylaw should be removed. Thank you. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. Please, ma'am, give us your name. You have 5 minutes. Hi there. Um I'm new to this game. I only found out about this a couple days ago. Um my name is Abby Roby and I'm new to the neighborhood. We have lived there a year and three months. Um, and in that year and three months, um, there's been a lot of things that have happened. So, I I agree with everything that they're saying because they've had time and they've done their homework and like I said, I'm new to the to the to this game. Um, but some of the problems that in the year that I have been on Cheapside, so I I'm actually closer to uh Ross. I'm at Ross and Cheapside. So, I'm closer to Metro than I am to where this building is. But here are some of the things that I already know are problem on my property. When it rains, the grade is wrong. So instead of it going to the the little storm sewer which is like 5 ft away from my driveway, it just comes into my driveway. Um we were very sandy soil. Uh one of the things that I also have learned is that we were kind of a dump as well before they built all these things. So I know my backyard is just full of glass. Um but it's sand and it's soil and that's where the water goes, right? And so we've done some improving and and some of the discussions that my daughter and I have had is, you know, I don't want to put more cement because I want the groundwater to go somewhere. Well, you're building a building. It's going to be up against people's houses there. How's the infrastructure for the storm um um water and and sewage going going to to go? How is that going to affect us? So, if there's a repercussion down the road, what I've learned since I've been sitting here for the last hour or two is that uh that's my problem and I have to go through what my insurance or or through legal cost. But I'm a I'm a kind of a proactive kind of person and so you should kind of look and see what all these things are. No one's ever come to my house and asked about, you know, how are things going? I know my income tax, my property tax went up, right? And we just got cheap side paved last year, right? So, people are already coming to my front door. So, if you're if it if what what I'm hearing or what I think I'm taking in is that we might increase the width of Cheapside, which is already horrifically um busy. Um, since I've lived there, um, there's already been three or four accidents, one near miss yesterday. Um, including, um, I bought this house for my son so that he would have a place to be outside. Um, and he just recently passed away, but my nurse got creamed out in front of my house as well because the cars drive on the bike lane. So if you're trying to make it bigger and wider and faster and so when you go around so that you have some way of being able to get out of your driveway, um there's already overflow parking. So when you're putting this huge building with not enough parking spots, um it's just going to affect all the side streets that that are there as well, right? Um, so that's kind of some of the things that I I think of when I hear this. And and yeah, if I if I was looking for a house, I certainly wouldn't have bought a house that's anywhere near a sixstory or a sevenstory or 10story building because they're looking in my backyard, right? And I I want to have a little garden this year and I wouldn't have any sun. Um, so it's just not fair to to these people and it's and whatever's happening out in front of Cheapside is I already feel unsafe and so if the street widens anymore, people are going to be walking on our porches. So is is there going to be more police presence? Uh, is this is all going to be students? They don't they don't um they're not homeowners. They're not family. They're they're not committed to the neighborhoods. the people that have been here forever. So, they're not invested in behaving. They're just in and out. And then someone actually just said, it's really hard to get rid of people when when they damage your your house and stuff. So, anyway, that's that's just my take. Uh like I said, I'm late to the game and my mind is really not in this, but yeah, I have concerns and I I oppose this. I think you should go back and and think about what are you going to what are you going to do? There's got to be some way of protecting the privacy of these people and and yeah, I heard it was a a a nursery there, too. So, I'm sure that the ground is contaminated. Um, okay. Thank you, ma'am. That's your five minutes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. Look for the next speaker. Please, sir, give us your name. You have five minutes. Brian, I've lived on Sterling Street for 70 years. Um, I grew up in the neighborhood, went to the public school and can know it. That's what we called it. Um, but I have seen a lot of development in that neighborhood where the churches, no wood, that used to be a field owned by Taylor's Flowers. The building that was on this lot where the apartment building apparently wants to go, that was Taylor's Flowers as well as down at Belwip Plaza. That was Teller's Flowers. Uh Brley Street, uh when they built all the uh the apartments, town houses, that that was all field. I've watched it built. Same as going down on the other side of her street. Um this neighborhood has always been a quiet neighborhood. If anything could go there, it should be four houses or town houses. Gam Street apartments are two-story walkups. You have a basement and two floors. Look at the size of them. They carry 60 uh units in each building. I know that because I used to deliver newspaper there when I was a kid. Um if anybody, it's a cash cow as far as I'm concerned. Put a six-story apartment building there, it's going to be eight stories by the time you put the maintenance on the top floor. If it's a four uh story, it's still going to be six. It It's not a place for an apartment building. Put an apartment building down Natalie Street where Good Life used to be. That would make more sense. Keep this area as single family dwelling instead of apartment buildings. Thank you. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. Please, sir, give us uh your name. Okay. So I'm the guy who lives literally next door uh behind that property 147 Barker Street. So can you tell me you said you represent the client? Who is your client? Hedge fund, pension fund, rate, who is it? Corly developments. Okay, tell me more about the client. No sir, you you don't need to know that. That's a lot of these a lot of these properties are single lane driveways, which means when you park, if you have two or more vehicles, they have to be parked one behind another. The house next to my property is already a two house, twotory house, which is rented out to five, six, who knows how many college students. When those students have vehicles, four, six vehicles, they start to park on the road, which is fine. Now, when you have single lane, single lane driveways, if you have to move one vehicle, that means you have to back up onto the road. Barker Street is busy is a busy street because everybody drives down Quebec, cut across Oxford Street, drives down Barker, drives across Cheapside, goes down the cemetery and who knows where. So Barker Street is already busy. Uh so when I have to back up out of my driveway, I already have enough to watch out for all kinds of people speeding down Pop Barker Street. Now they want to put how many? 105 unit building. Where are you going to fit those vehicles? Especially when you have the visitors, you have no you have no room for those vehicles. Where are you going to put them? Especially in the winter time. How are you going to do it? Planning, traffic planning, and so on. They didn't they didn't do any assessments. That's just a joke. That's just that to write something to write it off on the paper. Hey, we did the assessment. It can be done. 105 units, 40 extra parking spa spaces. Like the gentleman over there said, this is most for four for four small buildings, maybe like a twotory house, four twostory houses. That's it. Maybe a townhouse. 105 unit hardass. It's insane. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. Would you let me add something? No, you had your chance. Sorry. I'll look for the next speaker. I'll be very brief. What's your name? And you'll find Oh, sorry. Sharon Riley, Clifford Street. It's uh to my reckoning and to a lot of people here, we have an understanding that developers tend to go high and if they come down even a little bit, oh, we'll be happy. Well, guess what? We're not going to be happy. So, if you just lower it one floor or think you can cut corners and that sort of thing, we're not going to be happy. And we may be a quiet, lovely neighborhood with fast cars that run up and down our streets, but we don't forget. We've been this route back in the late 90 early 90s and uh we we didn't have to settle. So I'm just saying don't think you're going to fool us by just lowering small things. It won't happen. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. Okay. Please ma'am give us your name and you have five minutes. Ann Ball. And what I don't understand is why the developer has requested so many bylaw amendments. I think there's like eight or nine already and I think council has already passed them which I don't understand. The front yard depth, the exterior sideyard, the rear yard setback lot coverage, landscaped open space height, the density, the parking ratio, even bicycle parking. All of that has been amended from what the bylaw dictates. Why? And also I would like to add that there have been a couple of new fairly new within a year or two um buildings up on Fanshaw Park Road uh west of Adelaide approaching North Center Road and they back on to subdivisions but one is a threetory and one is a fourstory. Fansaw Park Road is a four-lane busy road. Cheapside is a two-lane busy road. We cannot support a sixfloor building. Probably can't even support a three-floor building. So, I am curious why even sixth floor was considered and I would also like to know why all these amendments were allowed. Thank you. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. Please, sir, give us your name. You have five minutes. Good afternoon. Uh, Brendan Samuels. I live in Ward 4. Actually, this uh development is about a block and a half from my house, so I pass it every day. Um, I want to point out that the staff report, part B, highlights most of the community's concerns, and I think it should be kept. So, I'd ask that you please do not delete uh part B of the staff recommendation. Um, I suggest that you refuse the special provisions because they don't conform to the policies of the London plan, including but not limited to the city building policies and the neighborhood place type policies. Um, I would also ask that as you explore what to do with this uh property along Cheapside, uh, respective of the decision today, I do think there's an opportunity along Cheapside here to provide for gentle density that's consistent with the surrounding neighborhood character. Is there an opportunity to incorporate mixed uses? Um, this site is already zoned commercial and living in the area, we have no coffee shops. We have no sandwich shops like you would see in Old North or Old South or near downtown. If you want to access any of those businesses, you have to go to the commercial zones on Adelaide or Hibbury. Um, is there an opportunity where this development includes something on the ground floor that actually provides an amenity for use by surrounding residents? Uh, and want to just thank everybody for being here today and participating. Thank you. Thank you. Look for the next speaker. Please, sir, give us your name and you have five minutes. Hi, my name is uh Liam Hand. I'm here as a uh as a neighbor of 929 Jeepside. Uh I agree with everything so far. Uh and I just wanted to say there's a there's a lot of other people who agree that could not be here today. Uh and I apologize for not being as well spoken as previous members of the public. Uh it's my first time here. This is my first time speaking in front of this many people. But uh as stated already, a major concern is that the building is not going to have enough parking for every unit. The expectation that most of the residents will not have a vehicle is is quite absurd. The question is where are these cars going to be parking? My wife and I are concerned that these cars will be parking on our street. We'll be adding extra foot traffic uh at all times of the night. Uh we already have a problem with litter that's going to increase. Uh you're going to be taking the few parking spots we use in the summer, having new people who cannot be trusted around our cars, our homes, children, uh most traffic that will not more traffic that will not respect the speed limit and will cause our once safe street to be uh more unsafe for our children to play on. The other concern is that where these cars uh park in the winter, um they're inevit inevitably going to have nowhere to go. Um, there's no parking garage that's been added to the planning. And I'm not saying that's what I'm asking for, but it just seems like it's kind of put on residents to just accept what's going to happen. Um, how can you govern who's going to get the spots that will be available? Um, and what about the church? We're not allowed to park in the church behind my house. Um, are there's going to be tickets issued to those people? Like, where is the enforcement going to be? Uh, it just again seems something that's just going to be put on the residents. So, Thanks for your time. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. I understand there's someone online. Just bear with me. I'm just Oh, okay. Um, please, ma'am, go ahead. Those that are online, I'll be going to you next. Um, please give us your name. You have five minutes. My name is Mackenzie Azido. Uh I live very close to 929 Cheapside Street. Uh you'll have to forgive me. I didn't do a ton of research on this. Uh again, I only learned about this a couple of days ago. And uh I have a lot on my plate. Uh so as a homeowner in the area, um and on the exact street that this is proposed on, um I have concerns um environmental concerns. uh the more you pave over arable soil, I mean it's it's sandy soil out there. It's easy for the water in the area, the rain water to go into the groundwater. It's easy for the water to dissipate, right? We already have problems with flooding on the sides of the streets. So, I don't see why paving over all of that would be a good idea um from an environmental standpoint. There's also a lot of wildlife in the area and giving even less green space to that wildlife probably not a good idea. Um, I also have concerns based on the fact that I do work with homeless youth literally all of the time. I work with YOU, Youth Opportunities Unlimited. I work at the shelter. I work uh also at the hub. Um, and constantly these children are told, "Find housing for $300 for what you get through OW." And it's impossible to find housing for $300. Even just a room in a in a already existing house or an existing apartment. It's impossible to find housing for that amount. Housing costs at least $700 for a single room. Utilities not included. And so these kids are not able to find housing. What we need to do is stop building more buildings and just make the buildings that already exist more affordable. We need affordable housing. And I understand that this is a big thing with the Ontario government, the provincial government. But see, the thing is is that we have a dictator in place, Ford, who is not going to do anything about it. So we need to take it into our own hands municipally to put in rent control to save the people from becoming homeless in the first place. We don't need more buildings in single family home areas. We don't need skyscrapers in these areas. There's problems about privacy. There's problems that these people are not going to care long term about the well-being of the community. These are family homes. You're proposing to put ginormous buildings that are single uh single room apartments for supposedly students. They are only going to be in and out while they're doing their program. They're not going to care about the community. We already have problems with litter. We already have problems with people walking along the sidewalks and being disruptive. We already have people coming up to us and approaching us while we are just on our front lawns and being disruptive. And so I just don't see how adding this much extra population, 105 units, I don't see how that's going to help at all with the problem of we have tons of traffic already. It takes sometimes 5 minutes to get out of my driveway because of the amount of traffic that already exists. 105 units. That's 105 extra cars that are going to be on the road and are going to create even longer times for us to get out of our driveways, making us having to leave way earlier to get to places that we need to go. And it's unreasonable to think that all of these apartment buildings are not going to have their own cars. This place is not transit safe. It's not transit friendly. We have a bunch of buses that have to abide by constant traffic regulations as opposed to having subways that would definitely help get traffic off of the streets and underground. Faster ways of doing things. I just think that as the next generation, there are so many things that you guys could be doing differently. And this is I'm I'm just so disappointed is just what I want to say. I'm just so disappointed with the way things are going and the way that you are treating small neighborhoods like this. Um, it just goes to show that capitalism is winning and the little guy is not being listened to and it's ridiculous. That's all I have to say. Thank you. Um, I'll look uh we'll go online. Number of folks want to speak there. Uh, Chris Hines, if you can hear me. Yep. Uh, can you hear me? Uh, yeah. Please go ahead. You have five minutes. Thank you very much. Uh, just uh want to express my concern. I'm a uh resident on Sterling Street, been here over 30 years. Um the apartment uh uh proposal is um absolutely does not fit with the neighborhood. So, I just want to make that uh uh my voice known that I I oppose it as it as as the um as a request uh or submission stands. 105 units uh six stories is way too big for uh this neighborhood. Um yeah, the uh the other concern with um that many more people on the the street would be um the the the other residents. I've mentioned it already, but that the speeding down Sterling Street is um is already bad and and hoping that if uh if this does go through that um there'll be some traffic calming measures or something like that put in place as well. But uh hopefully um we can uh get our voices uh heard and uh yeah so I oppose it and um that's all we need to say. Thank you. Thank you. I'll go next to Moyes Kawaja. I'm sorry if I mispronounced your name. Yeah. Hi, my name is Moyes Kuaja. I live on Barker Street. I oppose this proposal as it currently stands. Uh the level intensification brings several impacts that need to be addressed. First, there is a longstanding speeding issue on Barker Street. Uh I've documented this through a petition request I submitted almost two years ago in the spring of 2024 with no followup. At the same time, the traffic study for this developed development assumes trae vehicles travel at 50 km an hour. that assumption does not reflect the resident experience or the speeding concerns that have been raised by other residents here. Um if the baseline speed used in this model doesn't align with real world conditions, the conclusions of the traffic study cannot be reliably pred cannot reliably predict uh future impacts. An updated evidence-based speed and traffic assessment is necessary before evaluating any sort of proposal uh of this kind. Second, the Barker Cheapside intersection is already strained. Uh many residents experience delays and challenging right and challenging right turns into Cheapside East. I'm also asking the city to clarify the current level of service. Uh what specific improvements are being planned to address this if this proposal moves forward? Third, uh, parking capacity, as mentioned by many people here already, is insufficient. With more than twice as many units as parking spaces, overflow onto Barker is inevitable. The street already deals with congestion and driveway access issues, and this will intensify without proactive mitigation. Fourth, uh, the building will significantly increase traffic activity. Uh, there's already issues with deliveries, ride share vehicles, waste pickup, and general noise. Barker is currently a quiet, low volume street and this will materially change day-to-day conditions. Um, another concern is funeral processions regular move through Barker Street. Increased congestion will create delays and operational challenges for those events which are all which are an important part of the community's rhythm. And finally, storm water and flooding risks need to be considered. I know there's been a a storm water study, but I know personally that there's four homes at the bottom of Barker Street near this development which have already experienced basement flooding during heavy rainfall. Adding more impermeable surface area will put additional pressure on storm and sewer waters that have already shown vulnerabilities. These are measurable impacts. These are concrete and measurable impacts. traffic safety, intersection performance, parking pressure, neighborhood disruption, procession movement, and storm water capacity. Each requires clear solutions before this application is ever considered. Thank you for your time. Thank you. I'll look for the next speaker. Please give us your name and you have 5 minutes. Yeah. Good afternoon everyone. My name is Jon Dorne. I live in uh 236 Sterling Street. Um in addition to everyone mentioned earlier uh lack of parking and lack of space for overflow of ne neighborhood streets that have seasonal parking restriction. Everybody are aware about that we have a restriction especially at night and landlords do not discriminate against tenants with cars number of visitors with cars or numbers of vehicles with deliveries. On top of that, as of March 2026, the requirements of one space per unit, the application is for 46 spaces for the whole building. Lack of green space to offset pollution and replenish soil moisture to combat hot spot and drought in the surrounding environment. They plan to remove all all matured trees. There haven't been any environmental assessment traffic on top of that chip site is surrounding street are two lane street there is high traffic and lines of cars at peak hours even in the four-way stop before you can go in it's a lineup on top of that it will add to the already growing number of cars on cheap side street water use on top of that this is very important to everyone we have a water a water use restriction. The city is imposed water restriction between May and September. Why is the case is there is adequate infrastructure and water supply for high density housing in creates an environmental burden and a privacy. The current zoning is R1 one is story lowdensity buildings. The area is primarily made up of single family bangalows. The proposal is for sixf flooror highdensity building. It will tower it close to approximately over one story houses on all four sides. This means the lack of privacy for a large number of neighborhoods and their private property. It sets a new president in the area. I hope that you guys understand our our concern. Thank you very much and have a good afternoon. Thank you. I'll go online to uh Karen Doncaster. Are you there? Miss Doncaster. Hello. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. You have five minutes. Please go ahead. Okay. I am a longtime resident. Um, this neighborhood 23 years, it's a beautiful neighborhood. It's quiet. Uh, it's a family neighborhood. And I feel this large building is going to ruin the neighborhood. I I feel like that the building is just far out of proportion um to our area. U I have um great concerns and I guess that's all I have to say. Okay. Thank you very much. Miss Velastro, please go ahead. You have 5 minutes. When planning applications come to this committee, they're here because they want to break the rules. And very few planning applications almost all planning applications in the city end up here because they want to break the rules. And the and that's because this committee encourages breaking the rules. Point of order. Mr. Councelor Cuddi. Thank you, Chair. I have a problem with the uh the speaker making some accusations that u people come here to break the rules and that we accept those rules to be broken. Uh yeah. So the speaker uh I I agree with the counselor so please uh don't make accusations like that. Go ahead. So I come here on a regular basis and I follow the planning applications and you can go back and you can look and actually research what planning applications are coming forward how many what sort of rules are trying to break and how many of them get approved or refused. planning staff is trying to course correct on occasion when they see that a building is too big, too fat, too big for the land it sits on. And it's hard for them even to get that through because it's cost effective for developers. They're they're investment companies. They're not like a single homeowner. They're investment companies and they're trying to maximize their return and that's why they come to wherever they can buy a parcel of land cheap and then build buildings that are too big to fit on the land. And issues like drainage are very legitimate issues. paving over land that normally would absorb water and alleviate pressure from our storm water systems and replenish aquifers are just not part of the conversation. They just don't happen at this committee. Your counselor, Susan Stevens, sits on this committee in case people don't know. So that's what the problem is. It is encouraged by this city to break the rules. the rules really have no force in effect anymore because the city gets money by the as long as they they keep producing units, they'll get federal money um because it's kind of a competition to see who can build more units faster. So your concerns are very legitimate. um they're shared by many people across the city about just the sheer size of the buildings that are going on, parcels of land and and all the environmental the lack of green space. It's deteriorating our city and this idea that the city is moving in the wrong direction is shared by people across the city because of this committee. And so the the planning department department is trying to course correct and we'll just have to wait and see whether this order approves or not. I'm going to go a point of order. Deputy mayor chair. Yep. The member of the public is absolutely entitled to share her personal opinion on a planning application. She is not entitled uh to project uh motives on staff who have prepared their professional planning opinion who are certified planners who have put their opinions in writing to us. She is not here and has the right to impugn staff's work nor does she have the right to allege the motivations of councel. This speaker has been warned multiple times about her behavior in this chamber and I would request that if you cannot as chair uh keep her on her own opinion on a planning application that you ask her to leave. Well, I see she's taken her seat. So, I I guess she's finished speaking. So, we'll leave it at that. I'll look for the next speaker. Sir, you already had your time. I see another. I don't believe I used all of my five minutes. It doesn't matter. You get one shot. Yeah. Please, ma'am, give us your name. You have 5 minutes. Hi there. My name's Nicole Shay. I live at 243 Sterling Street, directly across from this planned development. I'm just going to uh reiterate what I sent to Steven or sorry, to Susan and to um the city some time ago. Um, I'm just I was writing to formally object to the proposed zoning bylaw amendment for 929 Cheap Side Street uh which seeks to reszone the lands from R15 to and convenience commercial to I think it was R84 permit for a six-story 105 unit apartment building. While I do support the cities of London's objectives related uh to housing and supply and intensification, the London plan is clear that growth must be compatible, contextsensitive, and appropriately transitioned. In this case, the proposal does not conform with the London plan policies 193, 252, and 255, which require that intensification respect existing neighborhood character, provide appropriate scale and massing, and achieve gradual height transitions. The sorry um the subject site is embedded within a low-rise residential neighborhood characterized by one and two twostory single detached dwellings. Although the broader area has successfully accommodated three-story walk up apartments, those buildings represent context appropriate intensification that respects neighborhood scale. A six-story mid-rise building introduces a fundamentally different build from that that is disproportionate to its immediate context and inconsistent with the established pattern of development. Sorry. Policy 255 requires that tall and mid-rise buildings provide an appropriate transition to adjacent low-rise residential areas. A direct transition from one story to six stories cannot reasonably be considered gradual or appropriate. The London plan anticipates that increased height and density be directed toward major corridors, transit oriented areas and strategic nodes, not interior residential sites abuing R1 zoning. The proposed density of approximately 310 units per hectar further reinforces this incompatibility. This level of density exceeds what is typical or appropriate for low-rise neighborhoods and has not been justified in relation to site context surrounding land use or available infrastructure. The proposal also raises significant resident focused concerns related to parking and neighborhood functionality. The provision of only I had 46 I believe it was 44 vehicular parking spaces for 105 units does not reflect current transportation realities in this area. As acknowledged by Deputy Mayor Shawn Lewis on January 16th, 2025, reduced parking standards have resulted in persistent on street parking pressures and have contributed to vacancy issues and higher density developments lacking sufficient parking. This proposal effectively shifts parking demand onto surrounding residential streets, occupied lots directly impacting existing residents quality of life. Compounding those concerns and the extent of zoning relief required, the proposal seeks relief from multiple fundamental standards, including height, density, setbacks, lot coverage, and parking. When relief is required across numerous core metrics, it indicates overdevelopment rather than a design that it fits within contrary to the intent of both the zoning bylaw and the London plan. Importantly, this objection is not to intensive. Sorry, I don't know what I was saying there. A three-story apartment building consist consistent with existing walkup developments in the neighborhood would provide meaningful housing while maintaining compatibility, respecting established transition patterns, and minimizing adverse impacts on residents. Approval of this resoning would establish a concerning precedent, suggesting that highdensity R8 zoning is six-story buildings are appropriate within low-rise residential neighborhoods. regardless of the context. This would undermine planning predictability and the London plan's artwork or framework for compatible incrementable intensification. For those reasons, I respectfully request that council refuse or defer the proposed zoning bylaw amendment and require a development that better aligns with the London plan policy and the lived reality of the surrounding residents in the community. Thank you. Thank you. Look for other speakers. I'll ask the clerk if there's anyone online. No one. Nobody else is online. I don't see anyone else approaching the microphone. Okay. So, I'll uh open the vote to close the closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay, there are a few questions um that were raised by uh those who spoke that I'd like to uh have staff address. Start with the first one um regarding Brownfield. Are staff of aware aware of previous um commercial activity here um and any comments regarding environmental assessment etc. Thank you. and through the chair uh staff were aware of the previous commercial use on site and we're not aware of any uh potential pollution being on site. Additionally, the site is not u listed on map 5 natural heritage. So there are no natural heritage features present. Uh that is why there is no environmental impact assessment required. Um and this the proposal has been reviewed by ecology staff and no um issues or concerns were outlined. I will uh also say that uh the building division as part of um building permits may require um an um record of set condition. That's up to them, but that's not part of this application. Uh there's concerns about not enough space uh for snow removal. Uh would staff like to weigh in on on those concerns? Thank you. through the chair. Uh staff do share some of the concerns with um the site functionality including um the increased um lot coverage and reduced landscaped open space. Um there also some functionality concerns regarding the handicapped parking stall. Those matters will be addressed as part of a future site plan application but those are also the reasons that staff are recommending alternative special provisions. Another concern raised was uh for uh grading uh for um storm water uh on the site and uh where it would go. So could staff uh comment on that? Yeah, thank you through the chair. Um it's a requirement of the future site plan approval that the storm water is to be contained on site and directed to the internal catch basins within the parking area uh and then eventually out to Cheapside Street. Uh, one of our main goals in storm water design is to ensure that there's no impacts to the adjacent properties. Thank you. And the last one, um, there were some comments regarding um, uh, number of parking spots per unit. Um, uh, right now uh, we have a minimum parking uh, requirement of 0.5 uh, per unit. Uh, however, there has been discussion at council about changing that. Um I just want staff to confirm that that is the current um guideline in place right now and um although there has been discussions there's been no change to that as of March 1st. I heard that date um or yeah that's it's just been discussion. So I'll just go for st to staff to comment on that. Thank you and through the chair that is correct. Currently the minimum parking standards are 0.5 uh spaces parking spaces per unit. The applicant is requesting a reduction to that. So providing less parking uh than the minimum required and staff are not in support of that requested special provision. Thank you. So those are the questions I had. So um I'll put this on the floor for committee um to uh to take action on. Councelor Stevenson. Thank you. I'd like to move the staff recommendation. Do I have a seconder for that? Deputy Mayor Lewis. Um, so I'll look for comments on that. Deputy Mayor. Uh, first of all, uh, to the members of the public, uh, you're concerned about parking and I heard councelor Layman reference this to staff. Yes. Um, I'm 100% in agreement. That's why I'm trying to change the bylaw. March 1st, unfortunately, was just the introduction to start the process. It doesn't mean that the rules are in force and effect right now. Um, but I've heard this multiple times and I'm going to continue to work to do that. Um, and hopefully with my colleagues support. Um, but we do have to follow the rules that are in place right now. But I think it's important to recognize um cuz I I heard a member of the public say there's so many of these things and I'm sorry I forget which individual commented but she said how how are so many of these things already pre-approved. They're actually not. Clause B actually says refuse these things. Um and so and one of those is the parking the lower parking. So I'm supportive of reducing the lower parking. Um, I also heard a lot of concern about speeding and traffic in the neighborhood. Um, and I know we've got an all hallway at Cheapside and Barker right now. This may actually be the tipping point that triggers the counselor to ask for a traffic study to see if a traffic light is warranted or like an upgrade. But that building would have to happen first. That's not something we can tie into this on Sterling Street. I was looking at the map like I see that's your your backyards are backing onto the schoolyard. They're not on the front of the schoolyard. So there's normally we're able as a council and we've been working on this for the last 5 years where the school address is traffic calming is automatic. We don't need a neighborhood petition. Um on the back side and I have this in my ward I can tell you at Prince Charles school I have the same problem. Um, there's concern about the speeding on the other street, not on the street where students are walking in the front door. So, I hear what you're saying there. Happy to work with councelor Stevenson on some traffic calming measures on Sterling because I think for the school kids that matters. Um, and there's actually uh in addition to the traffic in addition to the parking um something that we all supported, Council Ramen has actually brought forward a motion to simplify the traffic calming process for neighborhoods too. so we don't have to go through all of these petition neighborhood vote things all the time that we get a consistent process. Um so that's something that we expect to see back um in just a couple months. Um I appreciated hearing Mr. Samuels comments about um keeping the special provision. That's what moving the the recommendation does. Keeps those limitations on things for now. Um I will say when it comes to ground flooror commercial space um when you talk about a coffee shop or a sandwich shop unfortunately you know we also heard concerns about delivery drivers and things like that and in this day and age those businesses don't survive because there's just not enough patrons in the neighborhood who walk to them and use them throughout the day to to stay viable. Um, we see a lot of them. I've got three in my ward that used to be little neighborhood variety stores or little neighborhood shops that are just closed and they've been closed for years cuz nobody wants to lease them anymore to do that. So, um, I I wouldn't push anybody to have that sort of thing in their development cuz I don't think vacant space on the ground floor is really going to be helpful. Um, so I wanted you to know that I heard about the parking and and the traffic. That's why I'm not supporting the reduction in in parking. I think that that's way too low. Um I can't force it to one today, but we are going to keep working on that. Um but you know, when I hear things like um bring in rent control, that's not a thing that the city of London or the city of Hamilton or the city of Ottawa or any other municipality in the province can do. That is provincial legislation. and whether you support the current government or not, whether you voted in the provincial election or not, they're the ones that make those calls, not cities. And that has to be the same across the province. Um, so when we talk about making housing more affordable, the most important thing a municipal council can do is get housing inventory uh built in our city. There's a reason we saw rents decrease 4% in 2025 versus 2024. Uh, and that is in part because of the new inventory that was brought online. I get that you don't like the height, but it is the height that's allowed on that neighborhood connector level street. Um, now without the parking ratios, can they have the same number of units? They're going to have to figure that out. I would suggest probably not. Um but whether that switches some to two bedrooms instead of one bedroom um changes the the footprint in some way um they'll have to work within the restrictions of the things that they're not getting when you have that clause B and when you say you can't have the reduced parking and those other things. So I wanted to share with you why what I heard that I take seriously and why I'll be supporting the staff recommendation. That's where we are today. I know you're not going to leave happy about that, but I want to share. You know, in my neighborhood at 633 Clark, and I I recognize the woman who said, u two-lane, and Clark's a fourlane, so I recognize there's a difference, but behind them, uh, in the street behind them, it's single family homes behind a six story there. On Hail Street, um, at 632 Hale, I've actually got an eightstory London housing apartment building beside single family homes. So it does happen and a number of eight six have been approved on Fanshaw Park Road in the last year. Construction starting on them. Some of those six stories I think are pretty close to being occupied at this point. Um because those neighborhood connectors and those more arterial and urban corridors are where the density is trying to be located. So sharing my reasons with you as to why I'm going to be supporting it, knowing full well you're not going to be happy with all of those reasons, but I want to acknowledge some of the things that I heard from you today. And I do take seriously and I'll be happy to work with councelor Stevenson to address some of those that we can. Councelor Stevenson. Well, I just want to be clear and this we've been trying to do a few things behind the scenes, so I'm I apologize if I've confused things here, but I'm not going to be supporting the staff recommendation. Um, I do really appreciate the developer and their willingness to invest in the city and build housing on a lot that the neighborhood I heard wants to see something there and six stories is allowed. Um, I wasn't, you know, things have changed and we just recently, uh, and I supported it, a change to one:1 parking for the very reasons that the neighborhood is saying that they're concerned about. And so, I understand that the rules haven't changed yet. Um, but the the concerns are real and we recognize them and that's why we're proposing to change things. And so what what I might have supported before I just can't support today. Um because we we as a council I just voted saying yes we need to be onetoone and and so it leaves me kind of in an awkward spot. Um but I I I just can't support the the proposal or the development today. We were working on a few other things that that didn't work out today. And so I get to be the voice of the people who are in the gallery here today and say no. Council, thank you chair and through you and um chair. I I generally support um the council of the ward uh because first of all I have a great deal of respect for my colleagues but also the counselor knows the ward far better than I do. And I'm I'm grateful to hear councelor Stevenson say that she's going to refuse that she's not going to support this because I'll I'll not support it either. And I want to take a minute chair to thank all of the residents that came and I'm very impressed by how everyone spoke today. And as much as we all want to see intensification, it just doesn't work here the way we want it to. So chair, without going into any further detail, um I want again want to thank the residents. I want to thank staff for the work they've done and also want to thank councelor Stevenson. Thank you. Thank you. I'll look for other comments or questions from committee members or visiting counselors. Councelor Stevenson. Yeah, if you don't mind, I finished off a little quickly there. Just a little startled the way things are going here. Um but I did want to thank the community sincerely. They all sent in a lot of letters. There was a petition. Uh they were willing to meet with me. Uh there was and I thank the developer for doing the virtual presentation. There were several people there and for coming out today. It's a big thing to come here to be in the gallery to speak to take time out of busy lives and it really does say something to have so many of you here. It's a new thing for me and a development in my ward. I haven't I haven't seen this kind of a response and it does mean something. So I hope you hear that. Councelor Hopkins. Yeah. Thank you again for recognizing me and maybe through you. I do have a quick question uh about the uh the staff's recommendation which in B is to refuse but it is to go forward and I would like to have a better understanding of the uh units per hectare of intensification. Will it still be 310? I'll go staff. Thank you. through the chair. Uh based on the staff recommendation, the proposed amount of units will likely not be met. I cannot uh give a specific answer to what the ultimate uh units per hector would be, but if they would have to comply with the minimum parking standards and increase their parking amounts, the layout of the site will probably have to change. Councelor, so it would have to change. And this is where um I I don't think uh and I'm just going to share my comments. I think uh the committee I appreciate uh the conversation of the committee. I think uh this will go to council March 31st uh for a full vote of all uh of the recommendation coming out of the of this committee. Uh I I think there's a lot more information we need to do. I do appreciate uh the ward counselor's comments um because I am a big supporter of gentle in intensification and I do have concerns about the extent of the intensification and really with this recommendation not really understanding what that looks like. So, I'd like to um do a little bit more work for for my understanding, but I think it's important uh I want to thank the community for being here, but to follow this process. It will go to council on March 31st as well. You can make further comments to uh all of councils. I just wanted to share that information uh with you as well, Mr. Chair. Thank you for allowing me to speak. Thank you. I'll look for other comments or questions. Uh, Deputy Mayor Lewis. Uh, thank you, Chair. So, I just wonder if staff uh through you uh can remind folks uh whether or not uh because we do have a 90-day statutory deadline where we have to make a decision on a completed application. Um so, approve or refuse. This has to be decided on on March 31st at council as councelor Hopkins mentioned. Uh given that the staff recommendation is an approval, if council was to refuse this, is staff able to defend council's position at an OOLT hearing uh or not given that the staff recommendation is an approval uh with the exception of the special holding provisions. Um I'll go to staff but just um you know for they're not our legal department so for them to give a full opinion they can I think respond whether they can defend the position but I think it's important to know because usually we have a full yes or a full no right and what we have here is a yes to two clauses and a no to a different clause. Um, usually if we refuse a staff recommendation, staff cannot defend our position and outside counsel has to be brought in. Um, but I'm wondering in this case, cuz we have three clauses and two are yes and one is a no. So, in the event of an appeal, uh, how does civic administration uh, approach that? Oh, okay. So I see we have uh council here so that then I'm more comfortable going to staff with that question. Thank you through you, Mr. Chair. We would typically call a witness that can support council's decision in full. Deputy Mayor. So, I just want to be clear that would mean you would not be calling city staff because it wouldn't be able to support council's decision in full if we are counter to two of the three staff recommendations. I'll go staff. Uh without through you, Mr. Chair, without getting into legal strategy, typically we we would need to ensure that our witness can support council's case fully. Deputy Mayor, thank you. That's that's sufficient. That helps. Okay. Thank you. Um yeah. Okay. I'll look for other um speakers. I'll ask Deputy Mayor to take the chair, please. Go ahead, Councelor Layman. I'll take the chair. Thank you. Um I think it's been acknowledged by a number of folks tonight or today. um the challenge the challenge uh before us in providing housing and and many folks that come here acknowledge that by saying yeah we understand uh the need for housing um but this particular spot uh is not appropriate for reasons given and and I just want to follow up on councelor Cu's remarks about uh the department of your behavior tonight was uh respectful um you spoke clearly and spoke to the facts at hand and and we appreciate that. It allows us to um it helps us in our deliberations because we understand is a very emotional uh very emotional thing as it would be if it was uh beside my house which is has happened. Um when we deal with infill um as councelor Hopkins said I I too support infill for those reasons. It's a way to prevent urban sprawl and to address our uh our housing situation by bringing extra stock on the market. But as we've spoken uh here and at council um coming from concerns that we've heard I think at at this committee um and then seeing the resulting uh actions when things are built um the parking situation really resonates with me. uh it did when I first read this application um and then further reinforced by the comments made by um the people who spoke today uh about it. Um for example, the church parking lot um uh I see potential there for for that to be abused and there's no way to uh uh to force those things. We've seen other areas where there's town houses beside a development and that townhouse parking gets uh gets used up. Um Cheapside is an interesting street and there's a high volume and some point probably will be widened. I don't know when that is but um you whether it's 10 years or 20 years I don't know. Um but it's not widened yet. It's not a fan shaw where we have approved age stories. So, and just looking in the area around, you're right, it's it's a all low-rise residential. Um, so for for that reason, I'm not going to support this tonight. Um, it's uh yeah, it's um it's hard for me to do cuz I've been pretty much supportive of most things that come before before planning, but but this particular one, for the reasons I've given, uh I just can't get there on this one. So, I just want to be able to uh to give my opinions when I didn't have the chair. Thank you. Thank you, Council Layman. I'll return the chair to you. We have no one else on the speakers list. Okay. I'll look around the uh horseshoe here to see if anyone else would like to weigh in. No, I don't. So, we uh have a motion moved and seconded, and I'll call the vote. Closing the vote. The motion failed. Okay. Uh, Councelor Stevenson, I'm sorry I couldn't hear you. Would you like to comment? I was just wondering if you could explain to the gallery what this vote means. Yeah. So, what this vote means is staff made a a recommendation that they would go ahead with this, but certain provisions would have to be met. And what has just happened here is that the committee has voted against that. So that recommendation will go to council and if it's you know whatever council will do they'll take a recommendation uh for you know what it's worth at that time and and then they have the final say but uh that's that's what transpired today. If you have any questions please follow up with your your local counselor. She'd be happy to to explain further. Okay. All right. Thank you. Okay. Moving on um to 3.9. This is regarding 50 Southbridge Drive. I'll open the vote for a public participation meeting. Closing the vote. Five to zero. Thank you. I'll look uh for the applicant. Please give us your name and you have five minutes. Good afternoon. Uh Mr. chair, members of uh the planning and environment committee, and members of the public uh as they filter out. Uh my name is Laura Jameson. I'm a planner with the Primo Limited here on behalf of our client uh Pulse Communities, Inc. Uh with regard for the official plan and zoning bylaw amendment applications before you for the lands at 50 Southbridge Drive. I'd like to take a moment to thank staff for um their work in reviewing and processing these applications. We have had an opportunity to review staff's report and are in agreement with the recommendation for approval. Uh we do however have concerns regarding staff's additional recommended provisions. As noted in our written correspondence to the committee, staff are recommending that parking be prohibited within 13 or 16 meters of lot lines fronting uh public streets or multi-use pathways. With this provision, both parking within the base of the building and surface parking areas would be removed, resulting in the loss of approximately 72 parking spaces for the proposed 160 unit development. The site design as currently shown uh hides parking within the ground floor of the building and aligns with council's current thinking with respect to providing uh appropriate parking at a rate of approximately one space per unit. In our opinion, our client has brought forward a creative building design that integrates and disguises parking within the building to reduce visual impacts to the public realm while balancing the need to provide parking. Should the provision restricting the location of parking be approved, significant modifications to the site plan would be required, likely resulting in a reduction of units. Modifications to the building elevations would also be considered as the proposed ground floor height of 5 meters as is currently shown is necessary to accommodate uh ground floor parking within the building. Should the restricted parking location uh provision be included, we requested the removal of the minimum ground floor height of 5 m for the proposed apartments. This would allow for the proponent proponent to provide an appropriate ground floor height for efficient building design specific to residential units. Finally, staff are recommending a provision to regulate the location of building entrances. It is our preference uh to address the location of building entrances through a direction to the site plan approval authority as there's no prescriptive policy basis to require entrances to be located towards the street. I would like to highlight that there were no public comments or concerns regarding the proposed building design and the site layout. It is our opinion that the proposed development with parking proposed on the ground floor is a creative and desirable approach to provide appropriate intensification on the subject lands while balancing an efficient site design that meets the needs of future residents. Thank you very much for uh listening to me this afternoon. I'm available to answer any questions. Thanks. Thank you. I'll look for speakers from the public that would like to address the committee. Ask the clerk if there's anyone online. There is nobody online and I don't see anyone going to the microphone. So, I'll open the vote to close the PPM. Councelor Stevenson. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay. Uh, I'll go to committee. Uh, Deputy Mayor. Thank you, Chair. So, I'm going to, uh, as I did with the earlier one, uh, for Councelor Hopkins, I'm going to put the staff recommendation on the floor. Uh, councelor Pelosa, I believe, has joined us via Zoom. Uh, she does have, uh, an amendment that she wants to make. I'm happy to move that for her as she's not a voting member of the committee, but I'd ask you to go to her uh, uh, to let her address uh, her amendment. Okay. So, let's let's get the motion on the floor. Excuse me. I'll look for a seconder. Uh councelor Cuddy seconds. Um now, um councelor Pelosa, do you want to ask questions or serve up the tray or do you want to just I can just go back to the deputy mayor to uh to put Yeah, I could certainly frame it. Um Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um and sorry for not being there in person today. Um and thank you to the applicant for having met with me beforehand. uh before the staff report and then after it. And thank you for staff for clerking the language. It has been clerked. Staff is aware of it and I know it's a little bit contrary to what they wanted. We're strictly speaking about uh is on page 417. Um and it was getting to the zoning bylaw amendment and it was to uh remove the staff recommendation of no parking in inside. Um, as you heard from the applicant, um, that is where we're going to lose 40 to 70 spots. That would diminish the 1:1 ratio that we've been pushing for. And X was going to be removed, which is really just uh, site plan and going to um, it's already how they wanted the building allocated uh, for an entrance, just uh, it belongs at site plan, not in the zoning bylaw. So, um, looking for your support, Chay, for that. I have a mover in Deputy Mayor Lewis and a seconder in councelor Hillier. Okay. Um let's go to confirm that. Deputy mayor, are you moving that amendment? And councelor Hillier, I see a second. Okay. So, the amendment is on the floor now and I'll look for uh comments or questions on the amendment. Deputy mayor. Thank you, chair. Um again, happy to support my colleague on this amendment. Uh, first of all, I am very much in support of us creating parking situations where they're not fully visible from the street, where they're hidden in that ground floor, which often is not the most desirable space to have rental units either. Um, you know, frankly, people want some separation from the ground floor lobby in in many, uh, cases. And so, uh, I'm okay with the ground floor appearing to be a ground floor while it's actually working as a bit of a virtual parking garage. Um, and I'm supporting this because, you know, we um, to the applicant's point, the ground floor height of 5 m, um, that's in the zoning bylaw regulation is specifically there as an accommodation and and in their design to accommodate parking. So, they submitted a design to accommodate that. We've put that height into the zoning bylaw in appendix B, but then we're going to say they can't have parking there. I'm I can't support that. And I I also support uh councelor PLA's uh comments with regard to part 10. Um I have never been supportive of putting urban guideline requirements or site plan specifications directly into a zoning bylaw. I think they appropriately belong at site plan. Um they don't have a policy basis to be in the bylaw. They certainly have a policy basis to be discussed at site plan. That is 100% where that should happen. Um but not to be written into the zoning bylaw. So I'm asking colleagues uh to support our W 12 colleague on this. It's her ward. Um she's looking for support on this and I think she's being very reasonable in her approach. Uh and as we heard uh from the applicant as well, there's been no public comment uh opposing this development. I'll look for other speakers from committee or visiting counselors. Excuse me. Seeing none, um I'll open the vote on the amendment. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Thank you. So, I'll look for I'll move her in and a second her as amended. Deputy Mayor Lewis moves it and um uh Councelor Hillier uh seconds it. So, um any discussion uh on the amendment or on the motion as amended? Seeing none, uh we'll open the vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay. Moving on to 3.10. This is regarding modification of flood plane and two zone concept amendments to the London London plan. And I'll open I'll call the vote to open the PPM. vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay, I'll look for speakers on this. Please, John, can I give us your name and my name is John? My name is John Sprite. I'm here on behalf of London Dairy and Paul Lombardi who can be here today. Um she provided a letter asking for a deferment of this. Essentially the land owner of London Derry would like to see the whole thing, the flood plane modeling, the study, all that. There's a bit of controversy about storm water management. Ponds aren't included in it. So we're simply asking for a deferment. Thank you. Thank you. Look for the next speaker. Please take example of the brevity on previous speaker. Not on this one. Thank you. Please. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Please give us your name and you have five minutes. Uh, thank you, Mr. Chair. It's Mike Wallace from LDI. And just a reminder of um to uh committee of I I represent about 15 of the largest land developers in town and and in this case uh Bluestone Properties, Auburn Developments, Drual Holdings, Sith Developments, Foxwood Homes, and Southdale Developments are all all our land owners in the vicinity that we are talking about. We are also here to ask for deferral and we do appreciate that uh uh we have sent in a letter asking for the whole thing to be deferred. Uh and that staff responded that the changes the potential changes to the mapping map one and map six uh is in this uh report as deferred. But there are two other items that are in here and we're asking for the whole package to be deferred. And here's why. First of all, um on the two zone or one zone uh process, we as of the last year or longer uh have been working with staff uh city staff uh on the concept of the two zone approach which even in the report talks about is an appropriate approach for infill and where housing already exists. But for some reason they think it may not uh exist or might not be appropriate for uh uh in Greenfield. In addition uh to this there is now a proposal this is part of the today's proposal of this OPA is to change to add something which is called cut and fill policies which do not exist yet uh and has did not exist in the London plan. And listen, we're not saying the staff aren't right, but we have no idea uh and we haven't really been in our view properly consulted on this. And I'll just give you sort of a little time. We didn't we didn't had no idea about this cut and fill policy change. It was it was presented to us in January, which is highlighted in the report. We didn't see the actual wording of the cut and fill policy that was got on uh get involved. I I I can show you an email from staff saying on February 10th, a month ago today, that it would be posted in a couple of days and by the 18th it was posted and I shared it with my group. There was a customer service committee where staff presented it to us which is we thank them for that. That's great. But there has been no real discussion consultation on this item. And even if you look at your at the at the report today that's in front of you on the section of um uh 4.3 on comments received. If you look on the second paragraph, it says staff will be meeting with representatives to of the development community to discuss the shift in the approach. Well, this is a shift that we actually haven't had any discussion on other than it's being presented to us, which is fair, but we don't think it needs to be in this. There needs to be an OPA on it without us having that discussion yet. And so, I don't know how you say, you know, approve this OPA and let it go to council for approval. But in the same report with that this is a shift in report and we do need time to discuss it. And if you look at the very final next steps consult with the development community on the use of one zone pl uh flood plane approach in Digman and the balance cut fill assessment guide. Well, how why would you approve? We're fine with the discussion. We want the discussion. We want to understand but we we are we don't want you to approve the OPA to implement those in the lender plan prior to that discussion. We are begging you for a deferral on this OPA so that we can we can have the um I will call the normal consultation process on this item as we've been working on it for years and years and years and this is a shift that we need to understand better with communications with the staff and where it will land and I think the whole package should come back together the mapping the changes to the OP in terms of cut and fill and whether we can use one zone or two zone approach all should be done at once and it can't be done tonight. Thank you very much. Thank you. I'll look for other speakers. Miss Velasio, please go ahead. You have five minutes. Um I tend to agree that this uh should not go forward today, but I disagree for the reasons uh that the developers brought up. Uh first of all um there was no citywide notices given out to known organizations like city like neighborhood associations and other groups that were organized. That just didn't happen. I'm on that list. I know I didn't get that notice. I also think it can't go forward without the public review of an environmental assessment uh because they are linked. I actually disagree with the developers that don't want um I don't I think that um going forward with a a cut or a gentle um you know encroachment on uh flood fringe is a d is dangerous. There also has to be a biological and uh ecological inventory. Those areas along the river are um very important um as part of the raperian zone along the river. So I agree um this should not go for today it's inappropriate there is the environmental assessment has not been completed uh it lacks uh people can't make decisions without that environmental assessment and I think the public which I think would fight the developers because they don't want any more restrictions to build in dangerous zones cuz flood zones are dangerous and they're illegal uh in the uh pro proincially Unless you get rid of the flood zones, I think that there people would have uh would be able to contribute to the conversation because they come from a different perspective. Um and that was all my opinion and that was all my perspective. Thank you. Uh I'll go to you ma'am. Please give us your name. You have 5 minutes. Thank you. Good afternoon Mr. Chairman, committee members, city staff, public attendees. My name is Danielu and I'm a planner with Zelinkaprio Limited. We are the planning consultants for try recycling regarding their lands located at 3544 Dingman Drive which is located approximately 350 m uh west of Highway 401 and immediately west of the city sanitary pumpy station and the storm water management facilities. Um we would like to provide comments on this proposed amendment. Um first of all, dry recycling is a highly regarded and essential construction and demolition recycling facility on the subject lands which plays a vital role in the city of the of London waste diversion strategy. The city's primary landfill has a strict rules and does not accept most of construction and demolition materials and dry recycling fills this gap by receiving and processing these materials. Currently the southerntherly portion of the subject lands south of the hydro corridor is fully developed while the reminder of the subject lands to the north is designated zoned and site plan approved for the planning expansion of the facility to the north which also includes a connection to a road uh as an outdoor storage uh facility uh being a fundamental part of the tri recycling introducing official plan policies that prohibit outdor storage within flood fringe lands would negate the approval plans uh in place which underwent significant public participation. This would prevent the future use of the lands for their intended purpose of expanding the recycling facility. Dry recycling supports the initiative to implement a two zone and cut few policies within the London plan. However, we respectfully request that prior to the adoption of any proposed policies, both TI and the committee be formally advised on how how the approved site plan for Tri Recycling proposed expansion can be implemented in light of the proposed policies and anticipated mapping or whether this could be accomplished through a modifying planning u policy worthy. That's all. Thank you for your time. Thank you. I'll look for any other speakers. Uh please, sir. Uh go ahead, Brennan. You have five minutes. Thank you. Uh Brennan Samuels. Uh just wanted to flag something reading this report and maybe pose a question. Um, as we all know, um, when we have heavy storms, a lot of, uh, precipitation, um, debris, pollutants, things in floodplane areas often get swept up and washed downstream. And as a result, that has major implications for the good work the city's doing to uh, restore the health of the Times River. Wondering uh, in the course of this process when indigenous communities have been consulted about any concerns they might have. I looked through the comments that were received and I wasn't sure if any of the First Nations down river have been asked for comment. Um, so I'll leave that with you. Thank you. Thank you. I'll look for any other speakers. Uh, so clerk if there's anyone online. Seeing none, I'll open the closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay, before we get into discussion on this, I'll go to staff if we can just get a kind of a brief overview of uh what we're discussing today for our education and for the public listening in. I think we're all familiar with flood plane and flood plate mapping if uh you've been paying attention to this committee. Um however, there's some new, you know, cut and fill, one zone, two zone, etc. Some new terminology. Um so if you can kind of just give us a little uh synopsis of uh what we're discussing today. Thank you. Uh through the chair. Uh so the proposed amendments would introduce changes to the London plan to allow for flood plane modifications subject to criteria and the application of cut and fill and to update the existing twozone flood plane management framework. With regards to the addition of modifications and cut and fill policies, this approach would enable certain properties to modify the flood plane on lands to allow for development. It would essentially be cutting and filling essentially by moving earth on a property. These proposed new policies do not change existing flood plane boundaries, but rather establish a framework to allow for future proposals to be considered through the planning and conservation authority review process. Supported by technical studies that demonstrate no adverse impacts on public safety and the environment. These policies, if adopted, would apply citywide, but they were initiated in response to the Dignon Creek environmental assessment process. The publicly circulated amendment did include the policy changes as well as proposed mapping changes related to a revised flood plane for Dingman Creek. The map the mapping changes however are not being considered at this time and will be addressed at a later date. Uh I I wanted to note as well that we also have if anyone has any technical questions we do have representatives from environment and infrastructure and the project leads here as well. Thank you. Great. Thank thank you. Okay. So I'll put this on the floor now for committee. Um, members, uh, Deputy Mayor Lewis. Yeah, thank you, Chair. Um, I've circulated some language to the clerk. I am supportive of a referral. I think this needs to go back um, for all the reasons we heard. Um, this is a fairly big OPA change with relatively little opportunity uh, for us to absorb uh, what it means. And even with the uh realities that we are dealing with, frankly, with our provincial partners, um today the Minister of Natural Resources have is having a briefing on an update to the conservation authorities. Um that started at 1 p.m. I haven't had time to look at that and neither have members of the committee. Um I understand it's not 36 to 7 now, it's 36-9. So already there's mapping changes there. So when we talk about subject to you know um future reviews by conservation authorities and stuff I think that directly impacts uh this item. So my uh referral is that item 3.10 10 modification to flood plane and two zone concept amendments be referred back to civic administration for further engagement with the development sector with regard to the change in directional direction proposed for additional review with regard to changes being implemented by the province of Ontario with regard to the structure and mandate of conservation authorities and to complete work on the mapping changes referenced in the report and bring those forward with recommendations to a future meeting of the planning and environment committee in the next term of council. Thank you. And councelor Steven has indicated she'll second it. Uh so I believe it's uh in um uh up in Eastcribe now. So uh I'll look for comments committee members and visiting Steph. Yeah. So, this is a pretty significant change um to look at a cut and fill. Um you know, we heard earlier today in neighborhood planning applications uh concerns about how grading changes impact backyards and and basements and things as well. Um and now we're being asked to consider whether there's some benefit to to allowing some grading changes with cut and fill in a flood plane. Um and there may be. I'm I'm not saying that there aren't um but this is a very significant change and I'm not comfortable moving forward to an OPA yet without more time uh spent on this. Um uh I think Mr. Samuel's comment about uh some engagement with the First Nations community um is something I wouldn't mind hearing from staff um if they have any response to that today in terms of any engagement that they've had with our neighboring First Nations communities on this proposal as well through you. Yep. So, I'll go to staff on that uh through the chair. Um all, as you know, all applications are circulated um to the indigenous uh groups that are surrounding London. Uh in particular, we meet with representatives from the Chipoa of the First Nations on um about four to five about four times a year as well as um we meet with representatives from um some of the other local um um communities as well. Uh we're actually going to be meeting with them tomorrow likely to discuss this um further. So um just as an FYI, however, they did not provide comments through the formal circulation. Deputy Mayor. Okay. Uh thank you. I appreciate that. Uh and I do know that we often circulate and and we certainly saw a couple of communications uh with reference to applications earlier in today's meeting uh where we did get comment back that they didn't have concerns about applications. So um I just wanted to make sure that that was happening in this case as well. Um so I I think I'm going to leave it there. I mean we are kind of walking on uh quick sand here because the with and and not with respect to staff suggesting some changes but uh like I said there's uh Ministry of Natural Resources uh briefing today on conservation authorities. We don't know exactly where that is. Um I appreciate that there's some mapping in the package. For me, I for an OPA, I would like to see all the mapping come forward with it. Um, I need that visual. I also uh recognize we made changes to the urban growth boundary, which in some cases we're going to see development where storm water management uh will be required in new subdivisions. And what does that mean for downwater stream in some of these flood planes where perhaps we may not see uh the same downflow as we had before because it's managed further upstream in in plans of subdivision mitigation measures. So I'm really hesitant to to go forward and I think we need with some more information back uh some more time to absorb this and and frankly we need to see what the province is doing around their changes too. So, I appreciate the staff works that has gone into this already. I'm just not comfortable moving forward at this time and I need some more information. Councelor Frank, thank you. Um, I did have a couple questions and then I just have a question about the motion. Right now, it reads just the development community, but I've heard um a desire for there to be more engagement with the community and with indigenous partners. So, I'm just wondering, will staff interpret this as only development community or would this require an amendment to include other partners? I'll go staff uh through the chair. This is all sort of part and parcel to the Dingman uh Creek EA as well, the ongoing environmental assessment process. Um we we have a get involved page for instance already established, but we will continue to also um um meet with um any groups that are interested in meeting as well, whether they be um neighborhood associations or ecological um groups. Uh depending on their level of interest, they we will also meet with them. Council Frank, thank you. I do see the deputy mayor trying to get you. Deputy Mayor. Yeah. If if it um if it assists and if the consity if the committee is willing to consent uh because the motion's in the committee's hands now that it's been seconded and and on the floor. Uh but I'm willing to change that to relevant stakeholders if and I see some nods from councelor Frank rather than uh the development sector. We could just say engagement with the uh relevant stakeholders. So, the clerk is willing to entertain this as a friendly amendment. If I can look around with the committee and seeing nods in the second um then we're okay. So, it as that will the the motion will be changed to reflect that. Councelor Frank, thank you and I appreciate that. Just want to make sure that uh other folks maybe can get their two cents in as well. Um I did have one question through the chair to staff in regards to um I know we were talking about mapping and this is coming before the mapping's happening. Um, but I am wondering just given this approach, it's the first time I've heard of a cutfill approach and so I was wondering if staff could just comment on um like impacts of climate projections and I know again we look at this mapping and we you know are putting projections on it. I assume that they are looking at uh significant flooding events but I'm just wondering what role in the modeling in a cut fill approach does climate change have. I'll go staff. Thank you and through the chair. Um, basically through the extensive modeling work done for the Digman Creek environmental assessment process, we have modeled many different scenarios, including a climate change scenario. uh there's no requirement to include it, but we have done it as a sensitivity analysis and are quite satisfied with the line work we're showing you today is conservative and reflective of what a regulatory line uh should be in consultation with the upper temps conservation authority that we've come together with one line and this has taken very long to get to one line and we're here before you with that. Um the cut fill specifically actually promotes development to occur now before the line work is even finalized in a sense and uh that may add some complication here but uh that was a spirit of bringing it forward was that these policies would facilitate if you are identified in a flood plane that you can do studies you can work to amend your property uh to allow for cut fill which we previously didn't have in the OP. Um so that was really the spirit of staff bringing it forward just to kind of clarify that point. Um it isn't the policies themselves are not a departure from what we've spoken with the development community for the last few years although I do appreciate more conversation on this. Um we have worked on this for a long time and um open to those discussions. Um but yes I think overall this is a very progressive policy just I'll say overall but thank you counselor. Thank you. I uh appreciate that background. And then the only other question I had and again I don't know um I think this is perhaps towards legal but I'm just wondering um in this cut fill scenario um is there any liability on the city where we start approving things that um potentially could still again I heard that it's a great line and it's it's been approved by a lot of folks but I'm just wondering what kind of city liability we have where if in the year you know 2027 we approve a development application and then 5 years down the road it floods um is the city at all liable for approving ing that um given you know the sensitivity of these kinds of development areas near rivers. I'll go to staff. Uh so the municipal act does have a uh limitation that uh municipalities are not uh normally liable uh in negligence for policy decisions. Uh the uh official plan is is a city policy. So it would normally fall under that category. uh anything further we'd have to uh you know address on a case- by case basis. Councelor, thank you. I appreciate that. Councelor Hopkins. Yeah, thank you. I do have a question on the deferral uh through you to staff. I would like to um have a better understanding on how staff reads this deferral. It does state that the province of Ontario is making changes to conservation authorities. I know at the conservation authority we continue our work, but would staff be looking at not working with the community until a decision has been made with CAS. I just would like to have a better understanding how you view this deferral. Go staff. I can take it. Okay. Through the chair. Uh just to be very clear, we're not going to be waiting for any kind of changes. We're going to continue to engage as we have been engaging and uh we'll just try to ensure that uh um we spend some more time sure that we are all on board or at least understand what's being brought forward so that council consider that as per the uh resolution that's before you councelor thank you for that and one other question it is uh in the deferral it is suggesting that it goes to the next council I wonder if I can get some clarification why That is go staff or the mover if you feel comfortable in answering that. Um, sure. I I will say for me there this isn't a rush. We know that at some time this year the province is going to implement its changes to CAS that may include some mandate changes. I know we've had some information come out of them today. Um, but we I mean this is an OPA. It's a fairly significant change. Uh, we will be going also into an election season and I think that at this point um this is something we should give staff the time to work on and bring it back to the next term of council uh rather than rush through and make a decision in uh the the time we have left. Counselor. Uh thank you for that, Deputy Mayor. I'm just trying to have a better understanding of um what difference would it make to the changes that may come out of the policy changes andor the mapping. I I I'm just um a little unclear what we're waiting for um and why a timeline is is put put on. And just a little bit more clarification like the both the referrals on the floor with the reasons given uh counselor. So uh unless the deputy mayor you want to weigh in further uh on that but you I don't want to get too much cross debate here. Yeah I don't think I really have that much more before we you know wrap up here. I mean to me we've heard that, you know, our own local development community only heard about this 6 to 8 weeks ago. Fairly significant OPA change. Um we have a shifting reality proincially. Um we have lots of other projects that are on our staff's plate. Um so quite honestly I don't see what the rush is. Um we can take our time with this one. this this one's not subject to any statutory deadlines. Um doesn't need to be uh brought back to us in a cycle or two. We have time. So, let's take the time um to do more stakeholder consultations. Counselor and I would assume that the deferral will come back with the changes with the mapping is the assumption with the deferral. I just would like to have a Mrs. committee I want to be able to ask some questions while I'm here. Is that the assumption of the deferral as well? Thank you, Deputy Mayor. Yeah, and that's why the mapping changes pieces in the the referral to see the maps. Counselor, any other comments or questions from committee are missing counselors? Okay, I'll open the vote. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. And we have no items for direction. Um, we have a deferred matters list. I'll uh look for a motion on that. Uh, councelor Cuddy, I almost called you deputy mayor. Jeez, I almost got promotion. And um you're going to uh move to accept that and I'll look for a seconder. Uh councelor Stevenson. Seeing no discussion, we'll call that vote. Yeah. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Okay. Uh we have a confidential matter. So, um, uh, I'll look for a motion to move in camera. Uh, councelor Stevenson, seconded by councelor Cuddy. I'll call that vote. So, last clerk to prepare the room. Closing the vote. The motion carries 5 to zero. Yeah. Okay, we're back in in session. I'll ask the deputy mayor to report out. Thank you, chair. I'm happy to report out the progress was made on the item for which we went into close session. Thank you. So, that uh completes all the matters at hand. I'll look for a motion to adjourn. Councelor Cuddy, seconded by Deputy Mayor Lewis. All in favor? Motion carries. Thank

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