CATCH Articles:
Environmentally significant area threatened by development
Mar 19, 2007
A natural area in Stoney Creek quietly had its environmentally significant designation removed two years ago and is now threatened by two development proposals. The environmental importance of the area has been recognized by both the provincial Ministry of Natural Resources and by a city study completed five years ago.
The area is known as Community Beach Ponds and lies north of the QEW and just east of Confederation Park, and includes two shoreline ponds and about eight acres of wooded lands that shelter a smaller third pond. It has been recognized as an important bird migration stop-over and a likely breeding site for the provincially and locally rare Black-crowned Night Heron.
In September 2002, city staff chose it as one of sixteen sites to be added to the list of Environmentally Significant Areas (ESA) in the official plan. Decisions on such designations are made on the basis of scientific study and specific criteria listed in the official plan.
The city report noted that “the site has been identified by the Ministry of Natural Resources as a Life Science Area of Natural and Scientific Interest (ANSI) of local significance. These shoreline ponds are the best remaining examples of this habitat type within the City of Hamilton”.
The report went on to explain that the Community Beach Ponds were chosen for ESA status because they contain a distinctive landform that is significant in Hamilton, as well as rare biotic communities that perform a significant ecological function.
The latter criteria include providing habitat for one or more rare bird species, and some uncommon plants and amphibians. The designation also says “the area is locally significant as an isolated remnant natural area in an intensively developed urban landscape.”
After several months of public consultation, an official plan amendment in April of 2003 formally designated the area, along with almost all of the other candidate sites, as an ESA. But the designation was challenged 18 months later at a planning committee meeting in November 2004.
The minutes of that meeting record that “Mr. Sergio Manchia addressed committee on behalf of his clients, Mr. Murray vander Milne, the Hamilton-Wentworth School Board and the Hamilton Separate School Board. He explained his concerns that during the processing of Official Plan Amendment No. 97, his clients had not been properly consulted. Mr. Manchia proposed that the decision on OPA 97 should therefore be rescinded.”
The minutes go on to note that city staff explained the public consultation process and “confirmed that this was the standard process for considering ESAs”.
The two school boards each own about half of the land. Mr Murray Vandermarel – apparently the same individual that Manchia represented at the meeting – has made an offer to purchase the Catholic section and develop it under the name Church Street Developments.
Manchia is a senior planner and partner in Planning and Engineering Initiatives and appears frequently before council on behalf of various local developers. He is also an elected trustee of the Catholic School Board, and a council-appointed member of the Hamilton Conservation Authority board.
Apparently as a result of his complaint, a staff report in April 2005 proposed re-designating all of the new ESAs except Community Beach Ponds. The brief report noted: “Recently, a process error was detected in the public notice provisions, therefore, the amendments are being re-adopted. There are no substantive changes in the amendments, with the exception of the removal of the westerly Community Beach Ponds proposed ESA.”
The report didn’t explain why this area was being excluded, but merely noted that “it will be considered in a separate amendment at a later date”. Manchia spoke at the April meeting on behalf of Vandermarel.
Neighbouring residents have been informed that a purchase offer has been placed on the four-acre Catholic School Board property that makes up the northern half of the site, and a sign on the property indicates that much of the land will be cleared to accommodate a townhouse development.
The lands were originally set aside as a school site, but the Catholic Board declared them to be surplus to its needs. It formally notified city council of this decision in April 2004. The city has first rights to purchase surplus school lands, but a staff report in July 2004 recommended against acquisition, giving their ESA designation as the reason for not purchasing them for parkland.
“Although there is a shortage of parkland space in the Lakeshore community, these lands are environmentally significant and are not suitable for active recreational use,” noted the report. “Therefore the city is not interested in the purchase of the subject property. The Conservation Authority may be interested in acquiring these lands.”
Later in the same staff report it says that the “Conservation Authority has responded to the school board that they have no interest in the acquisition of this property.”
It is unclear if the decisions to pass up the opportunity to purchase available lands would have been different if it had been known that the ESA designation would subsequently be removed.
In the same April 2005 planning meeting that approved the re-designations (including the dropping of the Community Beach Ponds ESA), councillors also adopted a staff recommendation not to purchase the four-acre public board property on the south side of the Community Beach Ponds area.
The staff report recommending that decision made no mention of either the ESA status of the lands, or of the shortage of parkland in the neighbourhood. The report was approved without discussion by the committee.