Hamilton moves forward with review over urban boundary, adding a public comment period

Hamilton city council voted unanimously to have city staff review whether or not to expand the city's urban boundaries and pave over rural green space, but staff will also hold a brief comment period after critics raised concerns about how the city is reviewing its options for urban growth. 

City staff presented a review plan at a general issues committee meeting Wednesday.

It evaluates if there should be an expansion, how the expansion should take place if it is approved and the timing for the expansion.

The city previously said it expects Hamilton to gain 110,300 new households by 2051. The provincial government is requiring municipalities to expand to allow for construction on urban outskirts, saying it will enforce such a measure if municipalities don't do it themselves by July 2022. 

Hamilton is considering developing more than 1,300 hectares of "Whitebelt lands" — land outside its current urban boundary that isn't protected as part of the Greenbelt.

But on Wednesday, a wave of critics spoke at the meeting with concerns about how the review will be conducted and how the issue is framed. 

Don McLean, a long-time city watchdog who runs Citizens at City Hall (CATCH) and spokesperson for climate advocacy group Hamilton 350, said the section of the review framework that focuses on if there should be an expansion at all — instead of the initial how and when — was just recently added.

"The public has had no opportunity to comment on this [new section]. The opportunity is literally limited to the five minutes today. That's an unfair process, it should not be allowed by council," he said, prompting councillors to decide to allow a public comment period.

Lynda Lukasik, executive director of Environment Hamilton, said there should be more consideration about how to move forward without expanding the urban boundaries.

"What does a no boundary [expansion] model look like if we were committed to creating 15-minute neighbourhoods across all existing neighbourhoods within the urban boundary?," she said.

She and McLean also said the review framework didn't make climate change enough of a priority in the decision-making process.

Other delegates rebuked councillors for not doing enough to try and stop the potential boundary expansion.

Residents will have 5 to 10 days for comments

Mayor Fred Eisenberger defended the province and city staff from critics' comments.

So did Steve Robichaud, the city's chief planner, saying the review incorporates climate change in multiple ways, in addition to transportation systems, finances and other themes.

Councillors Brenda Johnson (Glanbrook, Ward 11), Maureen Wilson (Chedoke-Cootes, Ward 1) and Brad Clark (upper Stoney Creek, Ward 9) had questions about how the plans would impact prime agricultural lands, like those in Elfrida. Later in the meeting, councillors voted unanimously to tweak some of the language in the review framework.

Ward 3 Coun. Nrinder Nann (Hamilton Centre) pushed for the five to 10 day period for public feedback on the review framework.

The city will return to council with feedback.

Roughly 18,000 responses to city survey

The potential urban boundary expansion has already been a divisive issue in the city. Last week, roughly 100 people demonstrated in front of City Hall in opposition of the potential plan.

City council was going to vote on the urban boundary expansion earlier this year but voted to wait and get more input from the public via a survey.

Some residents complained they never got the survey but Robichaud said there have still been some 19,000 responses from residents about whether or not to expand the urban boundary.

"We were hoping maybe two to five per cent response rate … we were probably closer to almost 10 per cent response rate," Robichaud said.

"It's far exceeded our expectations."

Robichaud said city staff would notify city council and publish the results as soon as they can.

Coun. Brad Clark ( upper Stoney Creek, Ward 9) tweeted that of the responses his office received and reviewed through copied emails, four people supported boundary expansion and 8, 258 did not.