Gordon Prentice at Large - Politics in Newmarket
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- Written by: Gordon Prentice
There are many casualties in the Clock Tower saga.
The flourishing Main Street businesses whose owners were evicted by Bob Forrest who cited "demolition" as a reason.
The public whose iconic Main Street was blighted for years by shops boarded up and shuttered by Forrest.
The so-called heritage professionals whose "expertise" is hired out to the highest bidder with their views tailored to fit the brief.
The peer reviewers whose shoddy work is tolerated and not exposed by Staff.
The Staff whose actions and inactions conspired against the public interest. Critically important information was withheld from councillors and the public. Where was the man in charge, the Director of Planning, Rick Nethery? 
The developer, Bob Forrest, who gamed the system. He believes he can make things happen
"by leveraging our strong reputation and existing relationships with municipal staff and politicians."
Well, not this time.
(The photo right shows Forrest's right hand man, Chris Bobyk, explaining the concept to the public in April 2013 - six months before the Heritage Conservation District By-law was enacted by the slothful Mayor, Tony Van Bynen.)
Mayor Tony Van Bynen who stubbornly clung to supporting the Staff recommendation even when it had been pointed out to him the calculation on the project's density was completely bogus. When he said the Clock Tower was a great example of the intensification the old downtown needed, he really meant it.
On the positive side, we have seen councillors assert themselves. And think for themselves. The seven councillors who rejected the Clock Tower application deserve our hearty congratulations.
At last night's Council meeting, Regional Councillor John Taylor engaged with some of the major issues and made a number of insightful observations on the planning system and how it can be made better. His focus on the peer-reviews was welcome.
We can also thank the BIA and the merchants of Main Street who have done so much to build the terrific downtown over recent years.
The Heritage Advisory Committee and its Chair Athol Hart deserve a special vote of thanks for their trenchant opposition to Bob Forrest's Clock Tower project which would have resulted in the destruction of a unique and irreplaceable Townscape.
You can read the exchanges between John Taylor and Staff here together with details of the vote.
And you can read here Van Bynen's Statement to the Committee of the Whole meeting on the Clock Tower, 28 November 2016, explaining why he was supporting the staff recommendation to allow a seven storey apartment building in the heart of the Heritage Conservation District where a three storey height cap applies.
And you can read here Bob Forrest's angry letter to the Mayor and Councillors dated 28 November 2016 and my letter to the same recipients dated 4 December 2016. (Scroll to item 22 in the agenda.)
Update on 5 February 2020: Note: the links above are broken.
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- Written by: Gordon Prentice
Newmarket Council tonight confirmed that it is denying Bob Forrest's Clock Tower planning application to dump a huge condo into the heart of the Town's Heritage Conservation District.
And councillors also rejected the so-called compromise from the Town's own planners.
more to follow tomorrow.
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- Written by: Gordon Prentice
Aurora residents living next to the former Highland Gate golf club will soon be getting the Glenway treatment.
The golf club closed for good on 9 November 2014 and the old putting greens and fairways are to disappear, giving way to 159 single detached houses and a seven storey condo. Residents have been offered a trail system and some sweeteners. Trees and bushes will be planted in great quantities to soften the impact on the eye. The developer's counsel, Mark Flowers, ludicrously describes this as a win-win. 
Flowers was addressing the OMB Hearing in the Council Chamber at Aurora Town Hall on Thursday (1 December) explaining the details of the settlement that had been agreed with the Town Of Aurora. As he speaks, he dips into the settlement brief, an intimidating three inches thick.
Glenway
The planning opinion prepared for Highland Gate Developments Inc cited the Glenway precedent.
The excellent Aurora councillor, Tom Mrakas, battled mightily on behalf of the residents but ended up on the losing side when the Council voted 6-3 to settle with the developer, Highland Gate Developments Inc. I see him perched opposite looking down on the teams of lawyers and planners.
Flowers reminds us of the many public meetings where the developer and public clashed. He freely admits that upwards of 500-600 people vocally expressed their opposition to a development that would rob them of cherished open space. 
Mrakas said the residents were "beaten into submission".
I agree.
It's Kagan again!
Now I see in front of me at the lectern the silver-tongued lawyer, Ira Kagan, who also speaks for the developer. It was the ubiquitous Kagan who masterminded Marianneville's victory at Glenway where the old fairways are now being chewed up. They are crawling with bulldozers and heavy machinery.
The procedures at the OMB Hearing are now familiar. We all stand up when the adjudicator, Ian Roe, enters the Council Chamber. He is a lawyer with a degree in philosophy. Therefore he must think before he speaks.
Professional Planning Opinions
The planners swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth when giving their professional planning opinion. What a pantomime!
It is as if their utterances are ex cathedra, unchallengeable by lesser mortals.
As it happens, Newmarket's Mayor, Tony Van Bynen, has recently been pronouncing on the OMB. 
In his piece in the ERA newspaper on 24 November 2016 he talks about the Glenway "lessons learned" meeting on 23 June 2015.
Unfortunately, he never took the opportunity to tell us what lessons he had learned from the disaster. He simply thanked us for our attendance and said it was a very valuable exercise.
However, in April this year the secretive retired bank manager dropped his guard and told the ERA newspaper:
"We've learned through Glenway that polarity doesn't help anybody."
Translated, this means his preference is always to do a deal with the developer. All that stuff we used to hear about "defending the official plan" is for the birds. That's yesterday's story.
OMB Summit
Van Trappist went along to the OMB Summit organised by Tom Mrakas but I don't know what he said or what advice he gave to his colleagues.
Before the last municipal election in 2014, Van Bynen promised to make OMB reform the priority of his administration. There is no evidence that he did anything at all, leaving all the heavy lifting to the then newly elected Ward 7 councillor, Christina Bisanz.
I discovered early on that Van Bynen is, for the most part, a spectator at events. Waiting for others to take the lead. Over two years ago I wrote:
"Mayor Tony Van Bynen has many fine qualities but leading from the front is not one of them. He is a process and procedure man above all."
That is still my view.
Indeed, last June, at a meeting of the Committee of the Whole, veteran councillor, Dave Kerwin scolded Van Bynen in front of a packed public gallery:
"You never show leadership. And that's what's wrong!"
Who am I to contradict the considered view of the venerable David Kerwin, the longest serving councillor in the whole of Canada?