Across Ontario, Premier Ford's More Homes Built Faster Act (Bill 23) drastically reduces the infrastructure charges developers are required to pay urban, and rural, municipalities — fees that fund water and sewer upgrades, transit expansion, roads, libraries, community centres, parks, and fire and emergency services. For the City of Toronto alone, this $2.3 BILLION LOSS, over ten years, creates an infrastructure funding gap the City is forced to fill by raising property taxes, cutting services, and delaying infrastructure upgrades. For the GTA, this amounts to tens of billions of dollars paid by taxpayers — instead of developers. 

Across Ontario, Bill 23 drastically reduces the power of Conservation Authorities to protect floodplains, rivers, lakes, forests, farmland, wetlands, and shorelines. March 10, 2026, the Ford government confirmed it will reduce the number of Conservation Authorities from thirty-six to nine by early 2027 — easing developers' access to previously protected land. * It was the newly passed Bill 23 that overrode protection of 7,400 acres of land in the Greenbelt in 2023. 

Bill 23 drastically reduces the authority of municipalities over planning decisions. Planners in cities, districts and towns have significantly LESS POWER to enforce height, density, land use, and community benefits — retail space, daycares. 

In municipalities large and small, across Ontario, developers are bypassing community concerns, and Municipal Council, by appealing directly to the Ontario Land Tribunal. OLT finds in favour of developers more than 90% of the time. Bill 23 grants OLT power to order losing parties to pay the winner’s legal costs. It has never been easier for developers to overturn municipal decisions. And it has never been harder, or more expensive, for municipalities and residents to challenge them.

On January 29, 2026, the Ford government froze Inclusionary Zoning. Developers of massive projects near transit hubs in Toronto, Mississauga, and Kitchener, are no longer required to supply 5% of their units for affordable housing. This exemption is grandfathered, as long as development applications are filed before July 1, 2027. (Happy Canada Day.) 

A warning sign for the GTA is the Bloor Street West Corridor, in Etobicoke. A proposed 39‑storey high-rise at 69 Old Mill Terrace is set to replace a stable, 3-storey rental building — already an affordable home to young families, seniors, and long‑term tenants. Developers have not shown how a luxury condo tower — one‑quarter the height of the CN Tower — can fit on a corner lot of a small residential street, with aging sewers and subway, single‑lane traffic, on a bus route serving two schools already at‑capacity. Nor is it clear how a high-rise that is 60% studio/one bedroom units will provide the livable spaces families need. On the same block, there are eleven, mid-rise rental apartments that hundreds of tenants call home — it isn't hard to imagine the precedent this tower will set. We must say NO to this 39-storey high-rise.

Communities across Ontario are paying the price for Bill 23: 

• Protected watershed areas proposed for development.
• Existing affordable housing demolished — rent-controlled apartments (69 Old Mill Terrace, Etobicoke), mobile home parks (Twin Pines, Mississauga) — tenants displaced, without sufficient compensation, to make room to build "affordable housing".
• 30-, 60-, 90-storey high-rises approved by Ontario Land Tribunal, without a commitment to livable spaces for families to grow. 
• Massive projects built faster than the infrastructure needed to support them: schools, hospitals, water, sewer, transit, roads, libraries, community centres, parks, fire and emergency services.
• Overdevelopment without a vision for livability, or quality of life.

Growth should strengthen communities, not erode them.   

We support housing. We are asking for homes — with real space — for families to grow, and infrastructure to make our cities, districts, and towns livable. We want to be an example of what RESPONSIBLE growth looks like when it's done right. 

We call on the Province to:

• Repeal More Homes Built Faster Act (Bill 23) to restore:
  • Infrastructure paid for by developers. NOT by raising our property taxes.
  • Conservation Authorities oversight over watershed management
  • Municipal authority over planning decisions
  • Meaningful community consultation — Stop silencing residents 
• Unfreeze Inclusionary Zoning so developers are once again required to supply affordable housing
• Major density policy MUST be tied to proven infrastructure capacity and funding
• Repeal designations for Protected Major Transit Station Areas (PMTSA) and Major Transit Station Areas (MTSA) if infrastructure capacity and funding are not proven
• Fast‑track provincial funding for schools, transit, roads, healthcare, utilities, emergency and community services, and parks to keep pace with rapid development

We call on the Ontario Land Tribunal to:

• Approve responsible high-rise proposals, ONLY WITH a commitment from developers to drastically increase the number of livable, 2-3 bedroom units for families to address the housing crisis they face.
• Approve responsible development proposals based on their cumulative impact on infrastructure — Stop planning in silos
• Reject irresponsible development proposals if rapid growth outpaces infrastructure, and STAFFING: teachers, nurses, firefighters, paramedics.

We call on Municipalities across Ontario to:

• STAND WITH their constituents AGAINST irresponsible Provincial planning policies 
• Put community needs before developers' greed

Sign and share. ONTARIO'S COMMUNITIES — and our future — depend on it.

#FamiliesFirst #SmartGrowth #MoreHomesBuiltBETTER #GreaterCommunityOfOntario

Find us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/groups/ontarioforfamiliesandinfrastructurefirst/