Tag: zoning bylaw

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Township of Muskoka Lakes introduces mandatory pre-consultation on certain planning applications

Photo by Shutterstock/Georgian Bay Boudoir

The Township of Muskoka Lakes has made some changes to its planning process.

As of January 17, those looking to build in the area may have to undergo a pre-consultation with town staff before submitting their application. The change is intended to streamline the planning application process.

“A lot of applications were landing on my desk without any pre-consultations,” says Bryce Sharpe, the township’s manager of planning. “When that occurs, there may be missing information. And then you have to backtrack and start from square one, trying to get a hold of people and explain, ‘Well, we’ve reviewed your application and X, Y, and Z are required.’”

Pre-consultations are mandatory for zoning by-law amendments, official plan amendments, site plans, and condominium or plan of subdivision applications. There’s no fee for the pre-consultation, and it can be booked through the planning department’s email.

Previously, Sharpe says the township didn’t see a need for pre-consultations. Applicants would drop into the office if they had questions. But when COVID hit, the planning office closed to the public, cutting off that resource. “We were still doing pre-consultations via Zoom,” he says. “But it seemed like there were a lot of incomplete applications being submitted.”

During the pre-consultation, staff will go over an applicant’s proposal with them, pointing out any requirements, such as a necessary study or elevation drawings. For the pre-consultation, staff ask that the applicant provide them with the property’s tax assessment roll number, a brief description of the proposal, a site plan, and any preliminary drawings.

Due to restrictions under Ontario’s Planning Act, a pre-consultation isn’t mandatory for minor variance or consent applications, but Sharpe strongly recommends booking one anyways. He also adds that staff can waive the need for a pre-consultation under certain circumstances.

“Say there’s been a recent application made on a property and it’s been determined that a further exemption to the bylaw is required after the fact. We may say, at that point, we’re very familiar with the property. Given what’s proposed, I don’t think we need to pre-consult, just go ahead and submit your application,” Sharpe says.

“The intent is really just to make the whole process more streamlined and to identify requirements up front versus after the fact.”

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Carling Council settles with Tokyo Smoke CEO over cottage built without permit

Photo Courtesy of the Township of Carling

A dispute over a controversial cottage built on a Georgian Bay island has finally been resolved.

On Nov. 7, the Township of Carling, a three-hour drive north of Toronto, entered into a settlement agreement with Alan Gertner, the owner of an in-progress cottage on Morlock Island. Gertner, the CEO of Tokyo Smoke, a lifestyle brand with ties to cannabis, started construction on the cottage in the fall of 2020 without a building permit.

As part of the settlement, Gertner will be allowed to keep his cottage where it is but has lost building permissions for other structures on the island and will have to pay for all staff time that went into negotiating the outcome of his cottage.

Gertner bought the three-acre island in 2018. At the time, a small, 1960s cottage sat on the property. In 2019, Gertner applied for and received two building permits from the Township of Carling. One permit was for a 49-square-metre sleeping cabin, and the second permit allowed for a 17-square-metre enclosed porch to be added to the existing cottage.

In the fall of 2020, Gertner determined that the enclosed porch couldn’t be added to the existing cottage due to its structural condition. Instead, he broke ground on a new cottage on the opposite side of the island without applying for a building permit. Contractors started work on the new structure, building it within 4.6 metres of the waterfront, violating Carling’s shoreline protection bylaw, which stipulates that all new builds must be 20 metres back from the waterfront.

In December 2020, Gertner applied for a building permit for the new cottage without telling the township that construction had already started. When the township discovered how close to the water Gertner planned to build, Carling’s planning department said that a survey of the property needed to be conducted to see what kind of impact the build would have on the surrounding ecosystem before a building permit could be issued.

Soon after, the township started receiving complaints from neighbouring properties about a cottage going up on Morlock Island next to the water’s edge. The township’s chief building official, Naythan Nunes, visited the site in May of 2021 and found contractors working on a structure that had already been framed and roofed. He issued a verbal stop-work order to the contractors, who complied.

 

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All work on the property froze and the township fined Gertner for building without a permit. The township didn’t release the fine amount, but under Ontario’s Building Code Act, an individual who builds without a permit can be fined up to $50,000 for a first offence.

In the meantime, the township debated whether to grant Gertner a building permit with an amendment to the township’s official planning act, allowing him to keep his cottage in its current location. If the township decided not to grant the amendment, Gertner would have to pay to relocate his cottage 20 metres back from the water.

This process extended into the winter of 2021/2022. During this time, Gertner negotiated with the township to allow his contractors to put up the cottage’s siding to protect the interior from the elements. The township agreed, but let Gertner know that there was still the possibility the cottage would have to be torn down, making the siding a gratuitous expense.

In late January 2022, the township held a council meeting to allow Gertner to plead his case while also hearing from neighbouring property owners about their thoughts on the cottage.

The neighbours were unforgiving. Most speakers said the township should not grant Gertner the amendment, voicing concerns that the decision could set a dangerous precedent, convincing others that they could also build without a permit.

During his opportunity to speak, Gertner apologized to the community for betraying their trust by building without a permit. He did, however, point out that from an environmental perspective, his cottage was in the best location on the island. Gertner’s lawyer, Michael Cook, expanded on the argument, noting that the cottage damaged minimal vegetation and didn’t impact fish habitats or any endangered species in the area.

Council deferred its decision on the permit until an outside professional planner could draft a report on the impacts of the build. Gertner said he would also have an outside planner conduct an assessment.

In July, council reconvened to decide the fate of the Morlock Island cottage. John Jackson, a planner based in Parry Sound, recommended that council deny Gertner’s application for a building permit, stating that the cottage is unlawful.

“The appropriate requirement is to have the owner remove the offending structure,” Jackson wrote in his report.

After listening to Jackson, council was quick to deny Gertner’s application.

Unwilling to tear down his cottage, Gertner filed an appeal with the Ontario Land Tribunal (OLT), which adjudicates on matters of land use and planning in the province.

But before an OLT hearing could be scheduled, Gertner’s lawyer sent the township’s solicitor a settlement agreement on October 21. After careful consideration, the township agreed to the settlement, allowing Gertner to keep his cottage.

In a statement, the township said that it agreed to the settlement because all other structures on the island were legal, the planning report showed that construction of the new cottage caused no negative environmental impacts, and there was concern that Gertner’s OLT appeal would succeed. The township’s solicitor also pointed out that Carling had granted permits to builds in the past that were less than 20 metres from the water without a site-specific official plan amendment.

“Carling Township Council, after much deliberation, careful review, and extensive discussions with the Township Solicitor as well as the Solicitor’s internal planning staff, has come to the decision that it was in the Township’s best interest to enter into a settlement agreement with the owner of Morlock Island,” the township said.

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Minden town council rejects short-term rental’s application to rezone as a resort

Photo Courtesy of The Post House/Facebook

On August 25, after months of debates and deferrals, the Minden Hills town council denied a short-term rental’s application to rezone itself as a lakeside resort.

The rental, known as the Post House, sits on the southern shore of Lake Kashagawigamog in Haliburton County. Husband and wife Joel Baker and Helen Milstein purchased the property, which sits on a two-acre lot, in 2018, and submitted their zoning application in June 2021.

Council, however, wasn’t happy with how the rental has conducted itself. Despite the owners labelling the property as a short-term rental, neighbours argue the Post House has operated as a resort since it first opened.

During the August 25 meeting, Debbie Fitzsimmons, whose 90-year-old parents live next door to the Post House, said that the previous weekend the property hosted a wedding with 15 to 16 cars parked along the driveway. She also pointed out that the property houses an industrial-sized kitchen operated by private chefs who cook gourmet meals for guests. A feature common among resorts.

“From what I’ve learned in this process, any development requires appropriate zoning, a site plan, and sufficient infrastructure, such as septic capacity, to all be in place prior to permits being approved. This whole process with the Post House has been in reverse,” she said. “Neighbours trusted what was initially presented to them about the business plan for the Post House, and now we realize what a misrepresentation that was.”

On its website, the Post House says that it acts as a corporate retreat, providing a private getaway for colleagues, clients, friends, and family. The property includes four dwellings, one sleeping cabin, a garage/gym, a boathouse, as well as an industrial-sized kitchen.

The Post House is zoned as a residential lot, meaning it can serve as a home, cottage, or short-term rental. Through its application, the property aimed to be rezoned as recreational-commercial, allowing the Post House to operate as a tourist establishment, resort, or restaurant.

As a short-term rental, the entire Post House property must be rented out to a single group. Whereas if it was rezoned as a resort, the property could rent out each cabin to separate groups.

Minden’s town council held a public meeting in December 2021 to review the Post House’s application. During that meeting town councillors deferred their decision until the Post House completed a lake impact assessment and septic system review to ensure that the rezoning wouldn’t threaten the health of Lake Kashagawigmog.

The Post House employed a number of firms to complete these tasks, submitting the findings to the council. The Post House also assured council that it did not plan to remove any trees or vegetation from the property or add any new buildings.

After reviewing the results of these assessments and confirming that rezoning the property as a resort wouldn’t affect the lake, town staff recommended during a June 9, 2022 meeting that council approve the zoning application. Yet, the council deferred the decision again, wanting staff to further research what kind of restrictions and limitations could be put on the property if it was rezoned as a resort, especially if the property was sold.

After hearing from all stakeholders during the August 25 meeting, council denied the application.

“This is setting a precedent. What we see as a short-term rental…a short-term rental to commercial zoning, that means that every short-term rental we have on the lake could do the same thing,” said councillor Pam Sayne during the meeting. “The way they’ve gone about this to totally undermine the process by just doing it and then asking for permission and rezoning is not the way any of us do [things].”

Minden mayor Brent Devolin agreed with Sayne, adding: “I can tell you this, not only to the applicant but to future applicants, it’s about trust. If your actions betray the trust between us, our staff, and the public, it comes with consequences, and in this circumstance, I think it’s unanimous that we want to deny this.”

In response to the denied application, Post House co-owner, Joel Baker, said over email that they were disappointed in the ruling, especially after he and his wife addressed and satisfied all of the council’s requirements.

“As permitted under the Planning Act, we will be appealing this decision to the Ontario Land Tribunal,” he said. “Facts were mischaracterized during the meeting and had we been given the opportunity to respond, we would have been able to correct those misrepresentations. In the meantime, we continue to operate lawfully and respectfully under the township’s zoning bylaw and short-term rental framework.”