Ontario Announces Bill 73: Amendments To Planning Act And Development Charges Act

On March 5, 2015, the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing introduced Bill 73, Smart Growth for Our Communities Act, 2015, to reform the Planning Act and the Development Charges Act with the aim to give citizens a greater say in how their communities will grow and give municipalities more tools to fund community services.

The proposed amendments to the Planning Act would:

• Allow municipalities to create a "community planning permit system" to encourage public participation and which, once established, would not be subject to any appeals of private applications for five years;
• Require municipalities to set out in its official plans how and when the public will be consulted on land use planning matters and to explain how public input affected its planning decisions;