Frustrated residents seeking legal options to block daycare build
A group of residents of EldorDaigneault Street in Pierrefonds refuse to give up the fight even though they know the borough has approved the construction of a daycare on their street and are aware that because the land is zoned commercial it means a daycare can legally be built on the land.
They are determined to both demonstrate their ire and make every effort to block the process because they believe the increase in traffic will destroy the tranquillity of the area and create safety concerns for both pedestrians and drivers.
Residents Frank Bomba, Faz Sham and Ken Matziorinis spoke with the Montreal Gazette last week, saying they are consulting a lawyer and considering taking legal action.
They are angered by what they described as the “arrogance and disregard” Pierrefonds-Roxboro borough Mayor Jim Beis and other elected officials have shown towards them from the first moment they voiced their concerns.
“The mayor has the audacity to say that he has responded to everybody,” Sham said. “That’s a lie. This has been imposed upon us against our will.”
Beis told the Montreal Gazette that all the residents’ concerns were heard and responded to during a public consultation in June and during the borough council meeting two weeks ago.
“There is a complete unwillingness to participate in any dialogue,” Bomba said. “The residents’ concerns should be the mayor’s concerns. This street is completely unsuitable for a daycare. Houses should be built on that land like is happening (on another parcel of land nearby). That is in keeping with the nature of the neighbourhood.”
Beis said the only way to prevent a business from being built on the commercial land would be for someone to buy it and then never build on it or request a zoning change from commercial to residential so that homes could be built.
Frustrated by the fact they cannot block the daycare through the referendum process, the disgruntled residents are turning their attention to land adjacent to the daycare, which houses a landscaping business.
The landscaping business, which backs onto Eldor-Daigneault Street, is run by Yvan Hortie. Hortie owned the adjacent empty lot before selling it to the daycare.
Hortie has requested a zoning amendment that would allow him to store landscaping and snow-removal machines on his property as well as sell wholesale landscaping materials such as sand and rock.
In the case of requested zoning changes, citizens in the affected area are within their rights to request the launch of a multi-step process that could potentially lead to a referendum and the rejection of the request.
Bomba said that is exactly what they plan to do.
In an email to the mayor, Bomba wrote, “Had you properly and preemptively consulted the affected citizens, the Horties would not be facing this negative outcome.”
“If they are against the zoning amendment it is within their rights to request a register (the first step in the process),” Beis told a reporter. “But they shouldn’t be against (the zoning change) because they are against something else. That’s awful.”
Sham said they have filed access-to-information requests to see all the documentation involved in the daycare project to make sure that the procedure was legal and above board.
Beis said the borough consulted its legal team before approving the daycare project.
Sham said a gesture of goodwill on the part of the borough would be to create an alternate access to the daycare to ease any traffic crunch on both Wilfrid Street and Eldor-Daigneault, but Beis said that won’t happen because it would cause more traffic chaos on nearby Gouin Boulevard and any new access point would have to cut through private property.
“We do understand their concerns about traffic,” Beis said. “We are looking at ways to mitigate any problems. One option we are looking at is having a priority green light at the intersection to give drivers entering and exiting the street (which leads to the daycare) a head start.”
There is a complete unwillingness to participate in any dialogue. The residents’ concerns should be the mayor’s concerns.