Vote could spur boom in Caledon
Peel hands planning control to Mississauga and Brampton
A historic decision by Peel Region council could lead to the creation of the GTA’s next boom city, as Caledon — long resistant to growth — will now be forced to develop according to provincially mandated guidelines.
The move came last week, after a recent feud over the way Caledon was planning its growth led to the town filing a lawsuit against its own upper-tier regional government. On Thursday, Peel council voted to accept provincial mediation of the dispute, which means the lawsuit will not go forward.
It also means the region, guided by provincial growth policies, will dictate Caledon’s planning around its major growth centre of Bolton.
The trouble began at regional council in June, when Caledon councillors and Mayor Allan Thompson staged a midmeeting walkout in protest against Mississauga and Brampton council mem- bers, who sought to take over control of much of Caledon’s planning.
At the time, Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie said, “Caledon is resisting the growth plan set out by the province.”
Crombie and most of her regional council colleagues, against the wishes of their Caledon peers, brought in a provincial development facilitator to review the town’s planning and make recommendations.
With Thursday’s decision, Caledon — the GTA’s largest geographic municipality, even bigger than Toronto — will effec- tively lose control over most of the residential growth around Bolton.
“Council agreed to provincial facilitation in order to find a settlement that was equitable for all parties,” Crombie told the Star on Wednesday. “Facilitation recommended an open and transparent process for allocating future growth in Caledon.”
The decision could cause Caledon’s population, currently at just more than 60,000, to increase dramatically.
The town’s neighbours to the south, Mississauga and Brampton, are now Canada’s sixth- and ninth-largest cities, with populations of 713,000 and 524,000 respectively.
Caledon councillors have warned for years that their town’s population could grow even larger than that if pressures from developers and the province go unchecked.
Crombie and other councillors from Brampton and Mississauga argue that Caledon had long failed to follow proper growth strategies, instead developing where it made little sense, costing the two larger cities millions of dollars in growth-related costs to build infrastructure to disconnected places. For example, one development plan north of Bolton came with estimated costs of $100 million just to service the lands. Smart-growth advocates have been arguing that denser growth should be planned to spread out from Bolton, Caledon’s only real urban area.
“This decision has significant resource implications for the Region of Peel, as these lands will have to be serviced by the region, with Mississauga picking up two-thirds of the cost,” Crombie said of last week’s move. “The result of this open planning process will be that future residential and employment lands are located in the right place and that they are properly serviced.”
Thompson voted against the motion and says Caledon has followed proper planning procedures.
“The minutes of settlement support Caledon’s position,” he stated in an email. “I supported the recommendations of regional staff because I’m so confident in the planning process that Caledon undertook.”
Thompson and Caledon Councillor Gord McClure are both facing Municipal Conflict of Interest Act complaints in Ontario Superior Court for allegedly trying to push development to the mostly rural southwest corner of Caledon where they or their family own or owned land.
As of Wednesday neither had filed a response in court to the allegations.