Council wasn’t supposed to meet until December, and then the Provincial government announced the More Homes Built Faster Act, aka: Bill 23, and the rapid pace of change to municipal planning rules demanded an immediate response. So council met this past week to talk about what that response should be, and you will probably agree that it’s pretty definitive. Let’s recap this week’s meeting. Continue reading “This Week at Council: Bill 23? No Thanks!”
The new council will tackle Bill 23. You can click here for the amended agenda from City Hall, and you can click here for the Politico preview. For the complete blow-by-blow of today’s council meeting, you can follow along on Twitter, or follow the tweets below. You can also watch the City’s own live-stream of the meeting here. Continue reading “LIVE BLOG: City Council Meeting for November 22, 2022”
The first real city council of the term is one that not many people are looking forward to. You might have heard about Bill 23, the More Homes Built Faster Act, and City staff have heard of it too. They also have some considerable concerns about the legislation, which is why we’re having a whole meeting about it on Tuesday. Here’s the late breaking preview of the meeting per the amended agenda. Continue reading “City Council Preview – What’s on the Agenda for the November 22 Meeting?”
The year at city council ended with what actually might be some of their most intense debates. In December, there was a pretty fiery discussion about accelerating the City’s response to climate change, a new debate about whether a governance review is needed for the downtown business improvement area, and there was even some time for a public meeting on a rezoning and a brand new heritage designation. Let’s recap this last month of 2021 at council. Continue reading “This Month at Council: Race to Zero, Hotel Redo, and Downtown Drama”
It’s the last planning meeting of the year, and it should be a bit laid back. You can click here for the amended agendas from City Hall, and you can click here for the Politico preview. For the complete blow-by-blow of today’s council meeting, you can follow along on Twitter, or follow the tweets below. You can also watch the City’s own live-stream of the meeting here. Continue reading “LIVE BLOG: City Council Meeting for December 13, 2021”
The last planning meeting of the year offers a veritable potpourri of planning matter for council consideration. There are a couple of decision reports ready for ratification, a new request to designate a heritage property, and a brand new statutory meeting on a transformative project in the south end. All that, plus council will deal with a referral from an earlier meeting. Continue reading “City Council Preview – What’s on the Agenda for the December 13 Meeting?”
For a time, the second half of the month at council was more dry and wonkish with special meetings and workshops about dry subject matter like Development Charges and the multi-year budget. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on your point of view), council made up for some of the lost drama at the month’s regular council meeting, where they revisited the internal misunderstandings that stared the month. Here’s the second part of the recap. Continue reading “This Month at Council PART 2: Workshops, Development Charges, and More Drama”
Finally, a council meeting dedicated to changes to Development Charges! You can click here for the amended agendas from City Hall, and you can click here for the Politico preview. For the complete blow-by-blow of today’s council meeting, you can follow along on Twitter, or follow the tweets below. You can also watch the City’s own live-stream of the meeting here. Continue reading “LIVE BLOG: City Council Meeting for October 20, 2021”
Money matters will pre-occupy in the third week of October, and in the second of two city council meetings that week, members of the public will be asked for their point of view about updates to the Development Changes Bylaw. If you’re unaware, DCs are the money collected from developers that go on to fund a large portion of our infrastructure, and they do sometimes need an update. What are those updates? Read on! Continue reading “City Council Preview – What’s on the Agenda for the October 20 Meeting?”
In another emergency session of the Ontario Legislature today, a representative sample of Ontario’s political leaders approved an extension of the state or emergency and other measures to assist Ontario schools and municipalities weather the crisis. The government said they’re using every tool at their disposal to protect the health and safety of Ontarians. Continue reading “Ontario Government Passes New Emergency Measures”
Guelph Politico 