Growth Hearing in Simcoe County

Legal team prepares County Council for hearing about future

by Catherine Thompson Bayshore Broadcasting

Simcoe County Councillors are getting ready for a hearing in just a couple weeks.

The county’s senior legal counsel gave councillors some tips on how to conduct themselves at a hearing on May 24th to hear from developers in Midhurst who are trying to get a portion of a bonus growth allocation for the county.

The province imposed caps on growth figures but then later allocated a bonus of 20,000 more people to Simcoe County to 2031.

This means developers want their projects to be considered as the county prepares for more people. And there is a deadline of mid-January 2017 to allocate the growth numbers for development.

The county wants the process to be fair so a hearing has been set up for May 24th at the county administration centre and members of council will not be acting in their political capacity, but rather as decision makers.

Senior legal counsel for the County of Simcoe, Marshall Green, says Collingwood has already been granted 400 people for a subdivision and Adjala-Tosorontio has an allocation.

Marshall says there is about 17,000 in population allocation left and there are currently four parties from Midhurst wanting to state their case at the hearing.

Green told councillors at Tuesday’s Committee of the Whole meeting that they should not interrupt or debate with presenters at the hearing. He also advises members of council to be open-minded through the process.

It is expected that decisions will be made at this hearing, which is open to the public.

Also on Tuesday, the province announced amendments which will expand the Greenbelt and Greater Golden Horseshoe area.

The county will be reviewing the information over the next few days and weeks to see how the county will be impacted if at all.

The county planning department says it appears these changes won’t affect the hearing.