Sorry, I was referring to Matlow(?) I forgot his first name. Though I'm pretty sure Minnan also voted to fight the OMB, did he not?

Edit: Josh

Krystin Wong-Tam and Josh Matlow spearheaded this motion to abolish the OMB. The motion passed 34 to 5 ! I don't know if Minnan-Wong supported it (be surprised if he did since he seems to be one of the few sensible ones) but for sure most of the right wing of council went along!

UT did a cover story on this a way back and there was a very excellent comment made by a city planner Andrae Griffith which I will quote below:

http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/10/development-review-ontario-municipal-board

Andrae Griffith • 4 months ago −
I am an urban planner, so I guess you can say that my thoughts on the OMB constitute my professional opinion (assuming that matters to anyone, but whatevs :p)

In the opinion of this planner, municipalities have three legal duties when they make a land use planning decision:

1) Their decisions must be principled and cannot be arbitrary.
2) Their decisions must be consistent with the provincial policy framework.
3) Their decisions must be in the spirit of "good planning".

When a municipality fails in any of these three duties, we should not be surprised when the decision is overturned at the Ontario Municipal Board as the decision they made was "illegal" (so to speak). If we disband the OMB, then the oversight responsibility will just go to the courts. Assuming they've still failed at their duties, we shouldn't be surprised when the decision is overturned by the courts (an option which I feel is more dangerous, as judges are generally not well versed in what the spirit of good planning is).

I feel that municipalities have all the tools available to them to make a decision and have it stick - they just often don't use those tools or they do not use them correctly. As for individuals who are unhappy with the land use decisions in their community, we need to make it clear that getting involved when an application is submitted is like showing up in the 8th inning. If one truly wants to shape their community in a positive way, the time to get involved is when policies like the Official Plan and the Provincial Policy Statement are up for review.

So as we can see from the above expert opinion it is fruitless - even dangerous - to do away with the OMB because disputes will just wind up in courts. Someone should explain that to these two dummies!

urbantoronto-6583-21438.jpg
 
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Thanks for that informative post, Peepers. Incidentally, I saw that comment as well and actually thanked Andrae on Twitter for his wonderful contribution. I retweeted it as well, but I doubt anyone I know is interested ahaha

By the way, 34-5? That shows just how shortsighted, power hungry, and dangerous our council is. All they want to do is cave in to NIMBY demands. I really hope they don't accomplish their ridiculous plan.
 
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Those buildings might be members, but the SNLA only represents the views of those along the Esplanade.
I am not sure what you base this on, buildings send delegates to the SLNA (based on 'population" ) and I do not think I have ever seen a vote that split along "location" lines. It is true that most of the current SLNA Board do live along or close to The Esplanade but there's an election in 3 weeks and maybe there will be candidates from other parts of the SLNA 'territory".
 
Because the SLNA only acts in the interests of those who live along the Esplanade, and ignores the rest of the neighbourhood. As you say, it's a organization by, for and of the Esplanade.
 
Because the SLNA only acts in the interests of those who live along the Esplanade, and ignores the rest of the neighbourhood. As you say, it's a organization by, for and of the Esplanade.
You keep repeating this like a Conservative Party talking point, but that doesn't make it true. Do you have any evidence of this? I've attended many of their meetings (in the past as a delegate) and there was always good representation from buildings not along The Esplanade. This will only increase as more residential developments are built elsewhere in the neighbourhood, such as this one.
 
Well, yes. They routinely ignore any concerns not along the Esplanade. For example, they were vocal supporters of the destruction of St. James Park in the autumn of 2011.
 
Well, yes. They routinely ignore any concerns not along the Esplanade. For example, they were vocal supporters of the destruction of St. James Park in the autumn of 2011.
St. James Park looks far better now than it did before the events of autumn 2011. Those that "destroyed" it, did a far better job restoring it after their usage of the park ended, than the city does with normal maintenance.

Seems a bit odd to complain about someone using a park, when they left it in better shape than when they arrived.
 
St. James Park looks far better now than it did before the events of autumn 2011. Those that "destroyed" it, did a far better job restoring it after their usage of the park ended, than the city does with normal maintenance.

Seems a bit odd to complain about someone using a park, when they left it in better shape than when they arrived.

They didn't restore it. Private business did that.
 
St. James Park looks far better now than it did before the events of autumn 2011. Those that "destroyed" it, did a far better job restoring it after their usage of the park ended, than the city does with normal maintenance.

Seems a bit odd to complain about someone using a park, when they left it in better shape than when they arrived.

Are you really that naive to think that those people "restored" it? Did you happen to see what the park looked like directly following their illegal usage of it? Ironically enough, the whiners (ie "protesters" - what were they protesting again?) prevented "99%" of the park's regular users from using it.

As Andrea said, it was private businesses that restored the park.
 
Well, yes. They routinely ignore any concerns not along the Esplanade. For example, they were vocal supporters of the destruction of St. James Park in the autumn of 2011.

What on earth are you going on about? The SLNA were not in favour of forcibly evicting Occupy Toronto but worked hard to get them 'moved on' peacefully and getting the park back to "normal'. Which is what happened. They and the local BIA were very supportive of the restoration (as you say it was by private groups) and many SLNA people worked on the 'community clean-up of the park last fall - as they oftem do.
The SLNA also has representatives on the BIA's Parks Committee - which produced the excellent 8-80 Cities report of last fall.
 
They didn't restore it. Private business did that.
Your splitting hairs here. The private businesses weren't generally opposing the park use last fall. How much did that over-priced seafood restaurant nearby, which I dare say only 1% of the population could afford to eat there contribute to the restoration?

Ironically enough, the whiners (ie "protesters" - what were they protesting again?) prevented "99%" of the park's regular users from using it.
What are you talking about? I went past there frequently during that period. I didn't see anyone being stopped from using the park. It was quite open. Busy, but open. Quite frankly, when I wondered into a corner of Central Park in NYC a couple of months ago, it was just as crowded ....

The only day that anyone gave me any difficulty about doing anything, were Toronto's police, that decided to block traffic and inconvenience pedestrians outside the park.

I'm not sure about the bizarre attempts to change history and twist what happened. I can only assume there's some agenda here. Particurily with AndreaPalladio repeatingly making the same deliberately erroneous statement about how SNLA works, despite being corrected several times.
 
What on earth are you going on about? The SLNA were not in favour of forcibly evicting Occupy Toronto but worked hard to get them 'moved on' peacefully and getting the park back to "normal'. Which is what happened. They and the local BIA were very supportive of the restoration (as you say it was by private groups) and many SLNA people worked on the 'community clean-up of the park last fall - as they oftem do.
The SLNA also has representatives on the BIA's Parks Committee - which produced the excellent 8-80 Cities report of last fall.

If you knew what you were talking about, you would know that the head of the SLNA spoke publicly in support of the squatters and everything they were doing.
 
What are you talking about? I went past there frequently during that period. I didn't see anyone being stopped from using the park. It was quite open. Busy, but open. Quite frankly, when I wondered into a corner of Central Park in NYC a couple of months ago, it was just as crowded ....

Then you need to go back and read the judge's decision evicting the squatters and review the uncontested evidence of people being harrassed, threatened with assuault and actually assaulted if they dared entered St. James Park while the squatters had appropriated it to the private use.
 
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Then you need to go back and read the judge's decision evicting the squatters and review the uncontested evidence of people being harrassed, threatened with assuault and actually assaulted if they dared entered St. James Park while the squatters had appropriated it to the private use.
I think you confuse "dare entering" with "trying to confront the protesters". And I'd hardly call shoving during a heated exchange "assault". Most people had no problem walking through the park without picking fights with the other people using the park.

If you want some kind of pristine, never-touched by human feet, park experience, so you can walk your dog in solitude, I'd suggest staying away from the downtown core of the largest city in the nation.
 
If you knew what you were talking about, you would know that the head of the SLNA spoke publicly in support of the squatters and everything they were doing.

This is simply not true. The SLNA were in support of a peaceful end to the occupation and of course some individual Delegates supported their aims while others did not. The President and the SLNA itself did not take a position on their issues, only that a peaceful end was the much desired outcome. . The SLNA minutes on www note "Occupy T.O. – Councillor Pam McConnell’s work praised in reaching peaceful outcome"

Since you clearly see the world through 'Right Wing spectacles' and seem to have a tendency to state your opinion as being the only 'truth" I am putting you on my (very short) ignore list. Not to prolong this discsusion of old issues I would note that your inaccurate assertion that the SLNA is only interested in "Esplanade issues" is rather demolished by your more recent assertion that they had opinions on St James' Park.
 

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