I asked the County this week about when we would get to the public consultation part of the MZO for Picton Terminals. I had been looking forward to the only public consult so far on both Council’s deal with the Terminals and the plans for the MZO. I netted this response:

“Staff are currently working to confirm the requirements for a complete submission to the Minister. That is why we cannot commit to a date on which the formal request will be made, or what other steps, including public consultation, the municipality may have to take before making the request. The municipality will provide updates to the community when they become available.”

The response suggests public consultation may not occur.  It made me wonder, how does one apply for an MZO? I had thought public consultation was a requirement. I went to Ontario’s MZO website.  

An MZO requires an application to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing. It must come from the municipality, but will, in this case, be made on behalf of Picton Terminals. 

There’s a checklist of things that must be explained. Or should be explained. Or, perhaps, could be explained. I see the problem staff might be having: the directions suggest not a checklist so much as an open-book exam. 

Despite its promising title, the open-book exam is the absolute worst kind (except, perhaps, for the “take-home.”) Your answers are better the fuller and longer they are. If you skip a question, or a consultation, beware. 

 The MZO exam asks for a description of the whole project, including “a rationale on why the project requires ministerial zoning relief rather than following municipal planning processes.” 

The request must also explain how it answers government priorities for MZOs, which are for affordable housing and/or long-term care homes. 

A map, accompanied with a complete description of the lands to be included in the new zoning order — important, as Picton Terminals was given to December 26 to acquire as many neighbouring properties as possible — must also be included. 

A “description of consultation with the public” must be given. If there was no consultation, that must be indicated. If there was consultation but it evoked hostility and outrage, alas, that would have to be described. 

I suppose no consultation might be the best consultation if you can avoid having to describe the protests, petitions, shock, and horror residents have expressed over this MZO.

Moving right along. The test also asks for a description of “engagement with Indigenous communities.” The Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte live near the waters of Picton Bay and are directly affected by both the rock quarrying and the shipping already underway at the Terminals. 

Public consultation, engagement, whatever, let’s keep going. We can answer that one later. Maybe. 

The next question asks about “evidence of municipal support for the proposed project.” 

Staff must be having a hard time. There has been no public consultation, no engagement with Indigenous communities, and the municipal support part is … thin. Council’s votes, on the move to settle and on the deal itself, carried by razor-thin margins. The final one, to ratify the done deal, almost failed. Even the Mayor was opposed. 

But keep moving. We are running out of time. The anxiety-inducing MZO Open Book Exam also asks that what was heretofore secret information be made public. “A description of any licences, permits, approvals, permissions or other matters that would be required for the project after a Zoning Order is made.” And: “justification for the exemption … from provincial and local land use policies.” 

My forehead is feeling clammy. “Anticipated timelines related to applying for downstream approvals (for example, site plan, plan of subdivision, building permit)” and “anticipated timing for project completion” must also be supplied. 

The MZO project — what was it again? a rock quarry? container shipping? cruise ships? — wait, it’s not in the book!

I go back to the still unanswered questions at the beginning. The “complete description of the project.” Do we even know what that is? 

Confusing and difficult as these demands for descriptions and rationales, for consultations and justifications, are, at its heart, the MZO Exam requires a simple and straightforward declaration. The County must identify exactly what activities Picton Terminals proposes to undertake with its new zoning, as well as when, and where, for how long, with what, and how. 

Let me back up and consider. Despite the fact that as I write this, Picton Terminals is blasting the limestone cliffs over Picton Harbour to smithereens, and despite having quarried hundreds of thousands of tonnes of limestone to the tune of at least $65 million dollars for the past ten years, Picton Terminals has never declared itself to be a rock quarry. It is therefore not regulated under the Aggregate Resources Act. 

As long as the Terminals says it is quarrying stone for some other purpose — building a pier, or a shipping road, or the still unfinished safe storage container for hazardous materials, or, as now, for the silos for would-be grain shippers Parrish and Heimbecker — the Ministry of Natural Resources can continue to agree that it is not operating a full-time rock quarry on Picton Harbour. 

That means no regulation. And aside from a few environmental checks every now and then, there is no oversight over PT. I’ve written before about the buck passing. From the County to MECP. From MECP to QCA. From QCA to MNRF. From MNRF to the QCA. From QCA to MECP. Round and round it goes. 

All the way to the the MZO that the CAO, Marcia Wallace, says will offer the County some protections and oversight it otherwise would not have had. 

It sounds odd, I know, but the County has defended its much-criticized settlement deal with PT as offering some of the regulation that has so far been missing. That that regulation has been missing because the County has failed repeatedly to enforce its own bylaws is apparently, beside the point.

But once Picton Terminals describes the real project it wishes to expand with its MZO, its rock quarrying operations, it will bring the full force of the Aggregate Resources Act down upon itself. Something it has so far managed to evade. 

Clear answers, public consultations, transparency. That is what is required to apply for an MZO.

It’s hard to make up the answers when it’s an open book exam.