• Bill 109 Implementation Phase 2

    Share Bill 109 Implementation Phase 2 on Facebook Share Bill 109 Implementation Phase 2 on Twitter Share Bill 109 Implementation Phase 2 on Linkedin Email Bill 109 Implementation Phase 2 link

    New legislative timelines for the processing of Site Plan Control and Zoning By-law Amendment applications were approved as part of Bill 109 approval, effective April 14, 2022. Site Plan Control now has a required approval within 60 days whereas the City takes an average of 196 days. Zoning By-law Amendment applications have their timelines set at 90 days to receive a decision, whereas the City takes an average of 178 days. Should the new timelines not be met, refunds of the planning application fees are required by the province.

    The City of Ottawa Bill 109 Implementation Phase 2 report includes recommendations to best position the City by adjusting internal process to meet the new provincial timeline requirements and, as much as possible, prevent the refunds imposed by the Province.

    FAQ

    Please find below a set of Frequently asked questions on the Bill 109 Implementation Phase 2 and the Provincial Legislation Resource Impact Report.


  • City of Ottawa’s Submission to Municipal Reporting on Planning Matters – Proposed Minister’s Regulation under the Planning Act

    Share City of Ottawa’s Submission to Municipal Reporting on Planning Matters – Proposed Minister’s Regulation under the Planning Act on Facebook Share City of Ottawa’s Submission to Municipal Reporting on Planning Matters – Proposed Minister’s Regulation under the Planning Act on Twitter Share City of Ottawa’s Submission to Municipal Reporting on Planning Matters – Proposed Minister’s Regulation under the Planning Act on Linkedin Email City of Ottawa’s Submission to Municipal Reporting on Planning Matters – Proposed Minister’s Regulation under the Planning Act link

    In 2022, the Province set a goal to build 1.5 million homes by 2031, of which 151,000 will be in Ottawa. The Province’s regulatory proposal will require Ottawa, and other municipalities, to report specific planning-approval information quarterly, annually, and provide five-year historical data from 2018 to 2022, inclusive for all datapoints identified. The Planning, Real Estate, and Economic Development Department has reviewed this proposal and made the following submission to the Province.

    Response Regarding Municipal Reporting on Planning Matters

  • March 7th Public Information Session

    Share March 7th Public Information Session on Facebook Share March 7th Public Information Session on Twitter Share March 7th Public Information Session on Linkedin Email March 7th Public Information Session link

    In an effort to keep the community informed of the impacts of the new legislation and how the City intends to implement the necessary changes a virtual information session will be held on March 7th at 6:30 p.m.


    This session is open to the public and will provide a high-level update on the City’s review of the impacts of Provincial Legislation and an overview of how the City is adapting as a result of these changes. Topics will include Bill 109, Bill 23, the Official Plan, and the impact on planning related matters. Registration can be done here.


    After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.


    Please let us know your question in advance by clicking here.


    March 7th Presentation


    Please find below a Questions and Answers document from the March 7th Public Information Session:


    March 7th public Information Session Q&A

  • Memos to Council

    Share Memos to Council on Facebook Share Memos to Council on Twitter Share Memos to Council on Linkedin Email Memos to Council link

    Below are a series of memos provided to Ottawa City Council on the provincial legislation and related projects.

    November 7th, 2022 Memo to Council - City Response to Bill 23

    November 25th, 2022 Memo to Council - Financial Impacts of Bill 23

    December 2nd, 2022 Memo to Council - Bill 23 Amendments




  • Bill 23 Next Steps

    Share Bill 23 Next Steps on Facebook Share Bill 23 Next Steps on Twitter Share Bill 23 Next Steps on Linkedin Email Bill 23 Next Steps link

    On November 30th, the Minister of Housing provided a commitment to work with municipalities to explore means to close funding gaps related to Bill 23 measures. This would commence with a third-party audit of select municipalities of their municipal finances, including reserve funds and development charge administration. It is not yet known if Ottawa will be included in this audit. As of this date, staff are not aware of any financial commitments or agreements from either the provincial or federal government to provide offsetting revenue and will monitor this.

    Staff will continue to review the impact of this legislation and will update this website with changes required to programs resources and operations, including the calculations of parkland and development charges, and future impacts on infrastructure and service delivery.

    Further, staff have submitted comments on regulations and bulletins posted to the Environmental Registry including the following postings, where permitted.

    • ERO No. 019-6162 Consultations on More Homes Built Faster: Ontario’s Housing Supply Action Plan 2022-2023
    • ERO No. 019-6172 Proposed Planning Act and Development Charges Act, 1997 Changes: Providing Greater Cost Certainty for Municipal Development-related Charges
    • ERO No. 019-6163 Proposed Planning Act and City of Toronto Act Changes (Schedules 9 and 1 of Bill 23)
    • ERO No. 019-6196 Proposed Changes to the Ontario Heritage Act and its regulations: Bill 23 (Schedule 6)
    • ERO No. 019-2927 Proposed updates to the regulation of development for the protection of people and property from natural hazards in Ontario
    • ERO No. 019-6161 Conserving Ontario’s Natural Heritage
    • ERO No. 019-6160 Proposed Changes to the Ontario Wetlands Evaluation System
    • ERO No. 019-6141 Legislative and regulatory proposal affecting conservation authorities to support the Housing Supply Action Plan 3.0
    • ERO No. 019-6197 Proposed Changes to 299/19 Additional Residential Units
    • ERO No. 019-6171 2031 Municipal Housing Targets

  • Bill 109 Next Steps

    Share Bill 109 Next Steps on Facebook Share Bill 109 Next Steps on Twitter Share Bill 109 Next Steps on Linkedin Email Bill 109 Next Steps link

    Bill 109 refund timeline expected to shift to July 2023

    The province has committed to introducing legislation that, if passed, would delay the implementation of development application refund requirements set out in Bill 109 by 6 months, from January 1, 2023, to July 1, 2023. The delay of these measures will give municipalities more time to implement measures.

    This commitment was included in a letter to the President of AMO from Minister Clark who also committed to “ensure that municipalities are kept whole for any impact to their ability to fund housing enabling infrastructure because of Bill 23”. The letter was sent in the response to concerns and calls for infrastructure funding after Bill 23 – More Homes Built Faster Act, 2022 received royal assent on November 28, 2022.

    With these new timelines, the City of Ottawa will no longer be implementing an Interim Process for pre-consultation. In addition, the report that was to go to Council in December 2022 will now be shifted to the end of Q1 or early Q2 2023. The department will be using this time to finalize and socialize the Bill 109 changes and organize staff training sessions on the new pre-consultation process and the Development Application Study Policy By-law (studies) in Q1 2023.

  • Bill 109 Summary and Implications

    Share Bill 109 Summary and Implications on Facebook Share Bill 109 Summary and Implications on Twitter Share Bill 109 Summary and Implications on Linkedin Email Bill 109 Summary and Implications link

    Bill 109 was introduced by the provincial government and passed first reading, on March 30, 2022 with the second and third reading swiftly occurring on April 4, 2022 and April 14, 2022 respectively. On April 14, 2022 Bill 109 passed royal assent providing legislative 8 direction to the provinces slew of changes implementing the More Homes for Everyone Act, 2022.

    Bill 109 amended four separate Acts in order to implement the More Homes for Everyone Act, 2022, including:

    • New Home Construction Licensing Act, 2017 – No impacts to the City;
    • Ontario New Home Warranties Plan Act – No impacts to the City;
    • Development Charges Act – Limited impacts to the City;
    • Planning Act – High-impact to the City.

    A comprehensive list of impacts of Bill 109 can be consulted in Document 1, but below is a list of high level legislative changes:

    • Site Plan Control (SPC) approvals appointed to Staff
    • Removing Council as approval authority for SPC • Removes the ability of Cities to refuse SPC
    • Modifying SPC timelines to 60 days
    • Reducing Zoning By-law Amendment applications (ZBLA) timelines to 90 days
    • Requiring refunds of fees for SPC and ZBLA that don’t meet the timelines
    • Introduces appeal rights to clients related to complete applications
    • Allows the Minister to suspend timelines for approval, and send approval for a New Official Plan to the Ontario Land Tribunal (OLT)

    Site Plan Control Report

    On July 6th, 2022, Ottawa City Council also approved report ACS2022-PIE-GEN-0011 as part of the response to the Provincially mandated changes resulting from Bill 109.

    The report recommended:

    A phased approach to implement the Provincially mandated changes resulting from Bill 109:

    Phase Description Deadline
    1 Site Plan Control Delegation: Implement the Site Plan Control delegation of authority to staff and create internal capacity. July 1, 2022
    2 Internal Changes: Refunds of SPC / ZBLA: Addresses any internal processes and procedure updates to create additional capacity and ensure Staff can deliver approvals within the updated timelines prescribed by Bill 109, and implement Refunds of SPC and ZBLA, should the new timelines not be met. January 1, 2023
    3 By-law Amendments: Refunds of SPC/ ZBLA: Addresses any By-law Amendments requiring Council approval, to ensure that Staff can deliver approvals within the updated timelines prescribed by Bill 109 and update the development application Fee By-law with respect to refunds January 1, 2023
    4 Implementing Outstanding Bill 109 Requirements: Entails monitoring progress, complete outstanding items from previous phases, developing a Ministerial Zoning Order procedure, address Surety Bonds, and implement any other items which did not have a specific implementation deadline. 2023


    Amendments to the Delegated Authority By-law 2022-29

    The updated Planning Act provisions required amendments to the City’s Delegated Authority By-law 2022-29 with respect to Site Plan Control approval and include:

    • Appointment of the Director of Planning Services or his/her delegate for all SPC applications approvals;
    • Amends several locations of the By-law to effectively remove Councillor involvement, as prescribed by Bill 109, from:
      • Requiring Councillor concurrence;
      • Councillor ability to withdraw SPC delegation ability;
      • Councillor imposing of terms and conditions on SPC applications;
      • Threshold of when delegation of SPC applications can be applied for (it is now all types of SPC applications.

    Approve the repeal and replacement of the Development Application Study Policy By-law 2001-451

    Bill 109 Subsection 7(1) and 7(2) and Planning Act Subsection 41(3.1) and 41(2) were amended to require applicants to consult with a municipality before submitting plans and drawings and require the information prescribed to be submitted to the municipality. To implement this, Staff are proposing to repeal and replace the Development Application Study Policy By-law 2001-451, which has not been updated since 2001 and will serve to both meet the updated study requirements of Bill 109 and implement the policy intent from the new OP.

    Receive the amendments to the Public Notification and Consultation Policy

    The Public Notification and Consultation Policy must be updated to align with the changes to the Delegation of Authority By-law (as per Recommendation 2) with regards to delegating SPC to staff, as prescribed by Bill 109. Below is a table of the current Site Plan Control engagement opportunities, what staff propose as part of this report, and the extent of changes that Bill 109 could have justified.

    Item Current Staff Proposal Change available under Bill 109
    Councillor concurrence on SPC
    		 Yes No No
    Council as final authority for SPC
    		 Yes No No
    Community/ Councillor heads up of SPC
    		 Yes Yes No
    Community/Councillor comments SPC
    		 Yes Yes No
    Notice of decision to Community/Councillor
    		 Yes Yes No


    Approve the amendments to the Site Plan Control By-law

    The report recommends altering the Site Plan Control By-law to align the inner urban Site Plan Control exemption threshold with the exemption threshold for applications located outside the greenbelt. The By-law would permit buildings with 4-5-6 units to be exempt from Site Plan Control. This change reprioritizes the departmental effort to create capacity internally, reducing workload to enable adaptation to shorter and more intense timelines. Further, this change directly supports the efforts of solving for the Affordable Housing and Homelessness Crisis and Emergency, declared by Council on January 29, 2020 with Motion NO 26/14, and the New Official Plan intensification targets. The documents below provide further details on the implementation of exempting buildings with 4-5-6 units from Site Plan Control:

    Site Plan Control Highlights
    Site Plan Thresholds

    City Staff in the Planning, Real Estate and Economic Development Department continue to work to implement these approaches with a follow up report to Committee and Council anticipated in 2023.


  • Bill 23 Summary and Implications

    Share Bill 23 Summary and Implications on Facebook Share Bill 23 Summary and Implications on Twitter Share Bill 23 Summary and Implications on Linkedin Email Bill 23 Summary and Implications link

    Bill 23, More Homes Built Faster Act, 2022, was introduced at the Provincial Legislature for First Reading on October 25th, 2022. The Bill was passed on November 28th, 2022 and received Royal Assent the same day. It is now in effect.

    Bill 23 implements recommendations from the Ontario Housing Affordability Task Force Report.

    The Bill proposes extensive changes to a number of Acts and regulations including the Development Charges Act, Planning Act, Municipal Act, and others.

    These changes have been broken into categories such as, housing, financial implications, parkland, heritage and sustainability.

    You’re welcome to provide feedback on the provincial legislation in our Comments section. The City of Ottawa will draw upon resident feedback in our dialogue with the Province on this legislation.

    Housing

    Bill 23 has changed several important areas of land use planning. Rules around the number units per lot, their minimum size and the role of Site Plan in design have been significantly impacted.

    Units:

    • The Provincial legislation now allows up to 3 units “gentle intensification” on any lot in all urban-serviced parts of the city.
    • The City of Ottawa will no longer be able to regulate a minimum size of such units.
    • There can’t be a requirement for more than one parking space per unit.

    Site Plan Control:

    • If a building has 10 units or less, it is exempt for Site Plan Control.
    • Site Plan no longer has oversight on the design of exterior of buildings. For example, what materials are used on the outside of a building.
    • Landscaping features in the right-of-way are not included in Site Plan unless they touch on heath, safety and accessibility.

    Other Zoning Changes:

    • The City will need to get all zoning by-laws completed within one year when creating a Protected Major Transit Station (PMTS).
    • Inclusionary Zoning is allowed in PMTS areas, but now there is a cap of a maximum of 5% of IZ units in the PMTS. The maximum term for IZ units will be 25 years.

    Financial Implications

    • Exempting the 3 unit “gentle intensification” from Development Charges (DC), Parkland and Community Benefit contributions.
    • Exempting affordable, attainable and inclusionary zoning units from DCs, and discounts to Community Benefits and Parkland Dedication. Attainable housing is still to be defined.
    • Requiring a discount on development charges for purpose-built rentals, and a greater discount for larger units.
    • Requiring a phase-in period for introduction of new or revised development charges.
    • Removing cost of studies from development charges.

    Parks

    • Setting a maximum parkland dedication cap of 10% for sites less than 5 ha in area, and 15% for larger sites.
    • Halving the maximum parkland dedication rates for land and cash-in-lieu.
    • Allowing the possibility of encumbered lands and privately-owned parks to be counted for parkland credit.
    • Requiring 60% of DC and Parkland funds to be spent or allocated to be spent on an annual basis.

    Heritage

    • Increases the threshold for individual designation to require a property meet two instead of one criteria for designation under O.Reg 9/06
    • Introduction of criteria for designation of new Heritage Conservation Districts
    • Requires that a non-designated property listed on the Heritage Register be removed after two years if Council has not initiated the designation process. The City of Ottawa has approximately 4600 listed properties to review.
    • Introduces a limitation where a property that has been removed from the Register cannot be re-listed for five years.
    • Limits Council’s ability to designate a property that is subject to certain Planning Act applications if that property is not already listed on the Heritage Register

    Sustainability

    • Changes to Conservation Authorities to amend levels of responsibility and oversight.
    • Changes to the Ontario Wetland Evaluation System to remove wetland complexing.


  • Frequently Asked Questions

    Share Frequently Asked Questions on Facebook Share Frequently Asked Questions on Twitter Share Frequently Asked Questions on Linkedin Email Frequently Asked Questions link

    Below are a series of FAQ documents related to the new Provincial Legislation. Please continue to check back here for up to date FAQ on future phases of implementation.

    BILL 109 - Phase 1 FAQ