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‘We aren’t going to sleep’: Stratford resident fight glass factory MZO

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In Environment
Feb 11th, 2021
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Stratford resident stands vigil on steps of city hall

By Noor Javed Toronto Star

For more than a month, Peggy Coffey and Lesley Walker-Fitzpatrick have faced snowstorms, freezing rain and the deep winter cold to stand vigil at Stratford city hall.

For the two hours they stand every day except Sunday — each taking a turn for one hour — they have only one purpose in mind: to remind the city’s elected officials that opposition to build a $400-million glass manufacturing plant in the city was “not going away”— even when the residents were in COVID-19 lockdown.

The vigil is a way to “let everyone involved in this know that we aren’t going to sleep…and the presence of the citizens is front and centre,” said Walker-Fitzpatrick, an artist and activist.

Coffey, who works in the theatre industry, said she feels like she is “standing guard” for her community.

“Cars and buses honk in support, people ask questions, and we have been able to inform and educate so many people who walk by and ask us why we are there,” she said, adding that their vigil is an extension of weekly rallies that took place before public gatherings were banned, organized by two community groups that formed to fight the glass plant.

In October, the town released details about a deal between town officials and Xinyi Canada Glass Ltd., to build its first float glass manufacturing facility in North America, despite the fact that the project had faced massive opposition from the public in Guelph-Eramosa Township in 2018.

Residents in Guelph-Eramosa had concerns around emissions, pollution and the extensive amount of water required for the plant — and the council rejected the project.

But in Stratford, Xinyi bypassed the public process altogether, after the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, Steve Clark, issued a minister’s zoning order (MZO) — a tool that gives the minister the authority to designate land use without the possibility of appeals — for the facility in July 2020.

Despite the pandemic, the community has held weekly online meetings and rallies, set up a website and scoured the minutes of meetings, piecing together how the project got so far with such little disclosure. They have bombarded politicians with questions around greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental concerns, and sent out mailers urging people to get involved and informed.

The relentless pressure on the politicians paid off: the city announced in January that any future discussions on the project were being put on hold. And there is doubt whether, given the extensive public opposition, the project will proceed at all.

“When the MZO was first announced, people were very defeated, but after the shock wore off…they turned their attention to the mayor and council, and started asking very tough questions,” said environmental lawyer David Donnelly, who was hired by Get Concerned Stratford last fall. “Within a couple of days there was a full-scale movement going on to shed some light on this terrible idea and the secrecy of this whole thing.”

Donnelly added, “Anyone who is fighting an MZO in their community, can take a page of Get Concerned Stratford’s playbook on how to fight back.”

In January, Xinyi said it was “disappointed” the project was being put on hold.

“While we are disappointed that Stratford city council decided not to move forward at this time, we remain confident in the merits of this proposal and the economic benefits for Stratford and the broader region,” the statement on its website reads. “We will undertake to keep an open dialogue with local and provincial officials regarding the future of the project, and with the community at large.”

Xinyi did not respond to questions about the project, but has maintained that the plant would be a $400-million investment in the community and create 350 local jobs.

Mayor Dan Mathieson said council decided to hold off on discussions with Xinyi over cost-sharing for infrastructure upgrades — the final piece in the deal — to focus on the pandemic.

“This project was taking on a life of its own, needing to answer questions for the public, and trying to make sure we had all the information, and we were heading back into the lockdown,” said Mathieson. “We only have so much bandwidth, and council and staff decided we have to focus on one thing at a time.”

Mathieson said while he doesn’t “regret” the MZO, he now wishes he had followed the regular zoning process. “I look back and acknowledge things could have been done differently,” he said. “We should have encouraged a more public process.”

Across the province, some municipalities have expressed concern at the havoc MZOs — which allow the provincial minister to fast-track development applications — are having on communities, often leaving local officials instead of the province to deal with community backlash.

Recently, the province asked municipalities for feedback on an “enhanced MZO,” which would allow the province to take over the site plans of developments approved by such an order. Municipalities and planning staff are normally responsible for managing the fine details of a project such as lighting, waste facilities, landscaping, drainage and exterior design.

Vaughan, Mississauga and Markham are among the municipalities who rejected the idea of an enhanced MZO in their submission to the province last month, saying that councils were “best positioned to understand the local context, vision and aspirations for the community.”

In its staff report, Mississauga even urged the province to scale back its use of MZOs altogether, and in cases where they are issued, to “take the lead in communicating the contents of this MZO to the local community.”

Singer-songwriter and environmental activist Loreena McKennitt spoke against the glass plant in Stratford at a rally in the fall.

Acclaimed singer-songwriter Loreena McKennitt, who started a group called Wise Communities Stratford, said the province should begin with clarifying the rules on how municipalities request an MZO in the first place.

McKennitt who has tracked every council meeting and discussion around the Xinyi deal in a colour-coded spreadsheet going back to 2017, said she recently wrote a letter to Clark, asking the minister how exactly he approved an MZO when according to her findings, the discussion never took place in a public forum.

McKennitt said in a TVO interview last year that Clark had said there were two conditions for an MZO to be approved: public consultation and that council must vote in favour of it and present a resolution to the ministry.

“We are not aware of any step regarding public consultation for an MZO by the city of Stratford,” said McKennitt. “In the 2 ½ years since this initiative was launched, citizens have not been able to locate the minutes of any meeting which mention the words ‘Xinyi glass factory.’”

In an email to the Star, the province said it issued the MZO at the request of the city.

“This MZO was requested repeatedly by the mayor of Stratford, with support from the county of Perth and township of Perth South, since 2018,” said Stephanie Bellotto, spokesperson for Clark.

Last year, the province released three letters from Mathieson requesting the MZO for Xinyi, citing a need for urgency given “Xinyi expects to break ground in Spring 2020.”

Mathieson conceded that discussions around the MZO took place during in-camera meetings going back to 2018, and it wasn’t until the province issued the MZO in July 2020 that the city made that information public on its website.

Correspondence between Mathieson and the deputy minister for municipal affairs and housing, obtained by the Star, shows that the province initially intended to approve the city’s request for an MZO in November 2018. But the province changed its mind in the spring of 2020, only to finally approve it in July.

In December, the NDP raised questions with Ontario’s integrity commissioner as to why Xinyi wasn’t formally registered to lobby the province, despite comments from consultants on the project who said they had discussions with the province around an MZO for the past two years.

They also noted Premier Doug Ford’s vocal support for the company in 2018, shortly after the plan was rejected in Guelph-Eramosa.

In a statement posted on the city of Stratford’s website, Xinyi said its quest for an MZO was not a secret, and that it needed one given the complexity of the project.

“In Xinyi’s search for an appropriate location for a float glass manufacturing facility in Ontario, the notion of a Minister’s Zoning Order (MZO) was discussed in every candidate municipality,” the statement said. “There is no municipality in Ontario … that has the expertise and staff resources to work through the approvals necessary to allow a large, advanced manufacturing facility with unique requirements, such as the proposed float glass manufacturing plant by Xinyi.

“That expertise is available at the province of Ontario,” said the statement, adding that the plant will be held to the “highest standards for emissions, noise, dust, odour, stormwater management and road safety to ensure the residents of Stratford are safe.”

Mathieson said he was never pressured by the province to ask for an MZO for Xinyi.

Donnelly said that his clients aren’t claiming victory yet. He said they are hoping for two possible outcomes in the coming weeks: a full public consultation process on the project or the cancellation of the project altogether and for the MZO to be rescinded.

Coffey said she is ready to continue her daily vigil for “as long as it takes” — even if things don’t work out the way she hopes.

“The other day, my son said to me: ‘Mom, what are you going to do if the factory gets built?’” said Coffey.

“I said to him, ‘Well, I can live with myself because I did the right thing,’” she said. “And if we don’t stand up for what we believe is right, then we have really lost.”

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