By Doug Draper
If Niagara’s regional government is really all that interested in saving what is left of lands along our Great Lakes for public access, it better get to it, because there isn’t much left to save.
Even less this March following a ruling by the Ontario Municipal Board – a quasi-judicial board handpicked by the provincial government – to say yes to a proposal for a condominium that would include some 35 units, along the shores of Lake Erie in Wainfleet.
The land in question is one of the last open pieces of property along the entire Great Lake shores in Niagara and, like so many others, will now be lost to private development and the late Gord Harry, a former mayor of Wainfleet and employee for the Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority may be up there crying a few tears now.
Harry tried asking the regional government more than four years ago to possibly partner with others to purchase the Easter Seals Camp property for the public. But nothing ever materialized and a conglomerate of private developers, now calling themselves Lakeshore Beach Properties Ltd., purchased the land and the condo development it proposed has now been approved the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB), a non-elected body that has extraordinary veto power over the views of local citizens and municipalities on planning matters in their communities.
In this case, the OMB noted in its March 11 decision that it relied mostly “upon the evidence of witnesses who are professionals in their fields” – in fact it wrote in its decision that it “must rely upon the evidence of witnesses who are professionals in their fields” – and of course those kinds of witnesses can often be bought and paid for most often by the developers pushing the project, rather than the ordinary citizen.
Betty Konc, one of the ordinary citizens in Wainfleet who opposed this project, told Niagara At Large that “as far as we, the residents go, it is the professional witnesses that are the experts hat are paid more attention to. …
“All in all,” she added, “the face of the lakeshore in Wainfleet is going to be forever changed by this subdivision that does not fit in with the neighbourhood, no matter how hard the planners try to make it so.”
Beware; those of you in Fort Erie who are planning to appeal your cases against the Crystal Beach condo tower and NASCAR race track development next. You better get your professional experts in order.
(Click on www.niagaraatlarge.com for Niagara At Large and more matters of interest and concern to our greater binational Niagara region.)
Niagara At Large 
Twas always so! Except perhaps when the Ontario Municipal Board began under the tutelage of its first Chair who insisted on evening meetings, when the public could attend more easily, and the Board mandate was understood to be as “protectors of the public purse” and not facilitators of a system that for many years now has been dominated by high paid lawyers and “expert” planners. While I can’t recall the name of the 1st chair of the OMB (possibly Seaborne) I can clearly remember in the mid-1980s presenting for PALS to an all-party Standing Committee of the Provincial Legislature regarding the changes needed to the OMB. Paramount in our minds was the experience of the late Bob Hoover-our unpaid expert of some note- who had been the subject of what he called ‘ ad hominum’ (against the man) verbal attacks by highly paid lawyers at the 1978-1981 OMB hearings on the urban boundaries of Niagara. Our recommendation to the Legislative Committee was to take the OMB back to its roots where the public could participate on an equal footing to the development forces , and somehow prevent the Legal representatives of the development industry from dominating OMB hearings with such regularity. While PALS was successful in winning over 3,500 acres of fruit land in the urban boundary hearings due to Bob Hoovers stellar work, despite the high paid lawyers, many since then , such as those in Fort Erie, have been far less so. It’s time for a review of the role of the OMB . Lets take it back to its “public” roots !
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P.S. I should have referred to Wainfleet rather than Fort Erie. and I remember now, the first Chair of the OMB was Kennedy.
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The OMB and its rulings clearly have made our municipal elections a meaningless exercise.
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