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The Town's Planning Department is reviewing the way it deals with development applications to encourage greater participation and engagement by the public.

This initiative comes not a moment too soon.

For too long, developers have had the whip hand. They have deep pockets and instant access to fancy-dancing lawyers, planners and other sundry experts ready to do their bidding for a fat fee.

And they have time on their side. They know that public discontent can flare up over a development proposal and after a few months - or even years - fade away as people get on with their lives and come to terms with the new reality.

Difficult to navigate

For the public, the planning system is notoriously difficult to navigate.

There is the jargon and the suffocating planning mumbo jumbo. And everywhere there are the "experts" attempting to elevate planning into a science - which it is not. There is, of course, a body of knowledge which planners and planning lawyers have to master but this should not be used as an excuse to exclude the rest of us from participating meaningfully in decisions which profoundly affect our streets, neighbourhoods and towns.

The entire planning process needs to be demystified to make it understandable and accessible.

So I welcome the initiative taken by the Town's Planning Department to give the public earlier notice of pending development proposals.

Legalese and planning babble

Last year, the Town moved away from public notices as slabs of text written in planning babble and legalese. We now have  images. That is a huge step forward. But the Town needs to go beyond plans and elevations. We need an artist's impression (to use a quaint old term) of a proposed development which places it in its immediate surroundings.

To fully understand how a new development might fit in, we need perspective which can come from our old friend the artist or, these days, more likely from 3D models or computer generated graphics.

When Ron Eibel unveiled his memorable polystyrene model of Bob Forrest's monstrous Clock Tower development it told us more in an instant than a thousand pages of text ever could.

Speeding up the process

The Town also wants to speed up development application processing and this, too, is good.

The Planning Information Report, published last week, tells us:

"Official Plan and Zoning By-law amendments address matters of land use (what type of activity), density (how much floor area), built form (height, layout, setbacks), and compatibility (buffering, protection of sensitive lands, etc). Site plan applications address how a property is laid out to ensure functionality and compatibility including landscaping, traffic and pedestrian movement, grading and servicing."

The Town now wants to deal with Official Plan and Zoning By-law amendments and Site Plan issues concurrently.

This new procedure is to be piloted at 514 Davis Drive - the site of a proposed five storey office building.

Meetings with developers

Quite separately - and on another issue entirely - we need to be told when developers have one-to-one meetings with the Mayor and Councillors and a record should kept of what was said. This seems to have disappeared from the radar.

Elected officials are, of course, free to meet developers. But when they do the rest of us should be told about it.

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As a dual national, I have now signed two petitions about Donald Trump.  

The first calls on the UK Government to withdraw the invitation to President Trump to make a State Visit on the grounds that it would embarrass the Queen.

But who really knows if the Queen would feel comfortable travelling with the great man in the very confined space of the State Coach?  

If she were nervous she wouldn't let on.

Anyway, I am one of 1,843,622 who signed this petition and I am left with a warm glow. The petition will be debated in the UK House of Commons on 20 February 2017.

Donald Trump should be allowed to enter the UK in his capacity as head of the US Government, but he should not be invited to make an official State Visit because it would cause embarrassment to Her Majesty the Queen.

Donald Trump's well documented misogyny and vulgarity disqualifies him from being received by Her Majesty the Queen or the Prince of Wales. Therefore during the term of his presidency Donald Trump should not be invited to the United Kingdom for an official State Visit.

Astonishingly, people who sign the petition get a transcript of the debate emailed to them together with a video link.

Emboldened, I have now called on the Government of Canada to go one step further and to ban Trump from coming here until he re-thinks his recent controversial Executive Order which identifies everyone from seven named countries as being a potential security risk. Curiously, Saudi Arabia, where most of the 9/11 terrorists hailed from, doesn't make Trump's list.

We, the undersigned, citizens of Canada, call upon the Government of Canada to prohibit President Donald Trump from entering Canada until he withdraws his Executive Order that prohibits travel from Sudan, Syria, Libya, Iran, Iraq, Somalia and Yemen because it violates human or international rights.

This petition has only been up and running for a few days and has attracted 3,021 signatures. It can only grow.

Conrad Black: Trump's Apologist

Postscript: I see that Conrad Black, a great fan of Donald Trump, is mocking Barbra Streisand, Jon Stewart, Cher and other famous names

"who promised to emigrate if Trump were elected, and most promised to come to Canada... but they seem not to be moving."

Which begs the question: why is Conrad Black still in Canada? He voluntarily renounced his Canadian citizenship in 2001 to  become a member of the House of Lords in the UK. And after serving a prison sentence in the United States he was, exceptionally, allowed leave to remain in Canada on a one year temporary residence permit until May 2013.

And yet he is still here.

He was stripped of his Order of Canada in January 2014 and expelled from the Privy Council the same day.

When I raised the matter with my MP, Kyle Peterson, in March 2016 I was told there were privacy considerations and his hands were effectively tied.

So, I don't know what Black's immigration status is but I know he spends a lot of time pontificating about the immigration status of others.

If I may paraphrase the famous fraudster who spent 37 months in a US prison:

He's here, I suppose, and he seems not to be moving.

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Details

On Monday (6 February 2017) the public will have a chance to comment on plans by 400 Park Avenue Inc (aka the Rose Corporation) to redevelop the King George School site, a stone's throw from Newmarket's historic Main Street.*

The developer - who is close to completing the big rental apartment building going up at 212 Davis Drive - proposes to retain the old school and convert it into 11 condo apartments.

I am very much in favour of this.

However, the developer is also proposing a two-storey Townhouse development on the school lands. There are no Townhouses in this heritage neighbourhood at the moment so, if the development goes ahead, we've got to make sure we get it right.

The developer, whose approach is imaginative, is trying to squeeze as much as possible on to the site.

Height

A block of six Townhouses will front on to Botsford and a block of eight will front on to Church Street.

The two blocks are of different heights.

The completed planning application form, signed by Dan Berholz of 400 Park Ave Inc, says the floor area of the proposed development is

"subject to change during the design process".

The Botsford block will be 6.4 metres high and the Church Street block 8.4 metres high.

A Room with a View - or not

The Church Street block - so much higher than its sister block - will crowd the very important heritage building at 182 Church Street. At its closest point, the block of eight Townhouses on Church Street will be only 3 metres from the heritage building whose occupants will be presented with the view of a solid brick flank wall.(see below right)

To me, this is unacceptable. 

The Townhouses will obscure the view of the fine heritage building at 182 Church Street from Park Avenue and, perhaps, other vantage points.

It is very difficult to visualise what is being proposed. Plans and elevations help but they only go so far. What is needed is a 3D model or computer graphics which allow us to get a better feel for what the developer is trying to do with this important site.

Unique

The developer wants the Council to rezone the land to R4-R - Townhouses. But, so far as I am aware, there is no other Townhouse development in Newmarket with R4-R zoning that comes close to what is being proposed here. Nowhere else is there a Townhouse that abuts a heritage property or, indeed, another built form. If there is, we should be told so we can go and have a look.

I hope our councillors take a serious look at the Townhouse component of the development.

If I ruled the world the eight unit block would be reduced to six to give 182 Church Street more breathing space and to preserve views of this fine old building which is in the first rank, historically and architecturally.

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*The meeting is being held in the Council Chamber at 395 Mulock Drive at 7pm.

 

Details

I promised myself not to feel sorry for them but, increasingly, I do. 

I noted three years ago they were made for each other.

 They see swirling conspiracies everywhere. People are out to frame them and defame them.

Now he is commenting at length on my recent blog about Snapd and its intervention in the municipal election in 2014. He is, once again, unhappy with the world.

I suspect I may soon see him panting and wobbling up my drive to hand deliver some document from the Newmarket Small Claims Court, accusing me of some calumny or other and claiming $25,000 in damages.

This is what he does when he is not selling insurance.

In the meantime, the days will pass and it will soon be 10am on 10 February 2017 - the date of their next rendezvous at the Small Claims Court in Eagle Street.

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The highest paid Mayor in Ontario - and possibly Canada - Frank Scarpitti is considering whether to contest the riding of Markham-Thornhill which is now vacant following the appointment of John McCallum as Canada's new ambassador to China.

I see Newmarket's Darryl Wolk, a Conservative, believes Scarpitti

"would be a star candidate for Trudeau and would hold the seat".

John McCallum won the seat in 2015 with over 55% of the vote with Conservative Jobson Easow trailing with just over 32%. On paper it looks like a very safe Liberal riding. And one that should be very difficult to lose.

But Wolk - who likes to hedge his bets - says he wants Scarpitti to run for Chair of York Region in 2018 - the first ever direct election for the position.

Scarpitti comes across - at least to me - as the archetypal municipal fixer and boss.

Only a few months ago he spoke against letting the cameras into York Regional Council telling his colleagues

"audio is more than adequate".

Is this the openness Trudeau is looking for?

Sunny ways?

Seriously?

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