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Committee cites interim control bylaw in decision n 3 · Thursday, March 11, 2010 OAKVILLE BEAVER · www.oakvillebeaver.com Continued from page 1 although it does not remove E2 (employment/industrial) land uses, it does suspend them," said Paul Chronis, committee chair. "How can we ignore the municipal council's decision and the Ontario Municipal Board's (OMB) decision?" Gerald Swinkin, attorney for Ford, argued the bylaw was not relevant because Ford was not asking the committee to permit the building of a power plant, but only severe a parcel of land. "What I am saying to you is, the transfer to TransCanada Energy may or may not come to pass," said Swinkin. "I have a client with surplus land and in my view that parcel as proposed is perfectly suitable for an industrial use and you should not turn me away." Town Assistant Solicitor Denise Baker said TransCanada and Ford have appealed the OMB's decision to uphold the bylaw. She said the committee could not rule in favour of the land severance because they would be deciding the outcome of that appeal. The bylaw is set to expire on March 30, however, Oakville Mayor Rob Burton has stated the bylaw will likely need to be extended so the Town can complete its study. The land transfer issue attracted a large, mostly anti-power plant, crowd of about 100 people to Town Hall's council chamber. Many addressed the committee, voicing their concerns about the impact of the land transfer. "For the safety, health, community and economic impacts we strongly suggest it is critically important the Town be able to complete its work before approving any applications," said Doug MacKenzie, Citizens for Clean Air (C4CA) president. "On the issue of setbacks on a broader basis, there may be many issues such as particulate matter descending on schools less than 320 metres away and homes less than 400 metres away, water vapour plumes, noise persistence etc. With the recent Middletown explosion that killed six and was felt over 25 miles away, setbacks should be an issue, hopefully one that is covered by the Town's study." Chartwell-Maple Grove Residents' Association spokesperson Dave Gittings worried about what would happen if TransCanada was allowed to reduce the required distance between its proposed facility and the CN Rail line from 15 metres to 7.5 metres as they requested that night. "Most people would feel the existing 15 metre setback does little to pro- tect residents from a potential catastrophe," he said. "Allowing this proposed facility to be only 50 per cent of the required distance away from major rail lines is not minor. It proves this site is not appropriate in terms of location or size." Burton also weighed in on the rail distance issue. "The application to build bigger and closer to the railway than allowed shows TransCanada won the RFP (request for proposal) by misrepresentation," said Burton following the meeting. "TransCanada won the RFP points certifying they did not need variances from the town. Needing to get even closer to the railroad tracks, the schools and homes makes an already dangerous location worse and even more irresponsible. I call on the OPA to show integrity by revoking immediately their contract." TransCanada has stated the rail line is only used by Ford to move equipment and is not a major railway line. They have also stated their buildings will be 15 metres away from the railway as required with only, what they call, their ancillary services (water tanks, part of the sewage system) approaching the 7.5 metre mark. That said the company is not bound to these changes. "We will build this clean energy plant without any variances if that is the will of the authorities," said Chris Breen, TransCanada spokesperson. "In the unlikely event that the authorities insist on a big parking lot that will never be used we are going to have to follow their orders, but we are showing an opportunity here to reduce the overall footprint of our project to avoid unnecessary paving of what could otherwise be nice grassy space." Breen said as far as the railway distance issue is concerned CN Rail has signed off on TransCanada's proposal. While nearly every speaker condemned the TransCanada power plant, one resident spoke in favour pointing out that power supply is an important issue. "As I have lived in Oakville for some years now, I have seen nothing, but construction, development, grand houses being built. Never to my knowledge has it been addressed where the power to run these monstrosities is going to come from," said Bob Parry. "What we're proposing now is a clean generating plant, to the best of my understanding, that is going to provide power to do this and continue to allow this community to grow. I think that, by virtue of the people here, being opposed to this without really hearing studies on the issue is contradictory to good judgement." Parry's comments drew a few hisses from the largely anti-power plant crowd. Once Ford's application to provide TransCanada with land was rejected by the committee, TransCanada's minor variance requests for a reduced distance from the railway and for a reduction in the number of required parking spaces from 214 spaces to 24 spaces was considered. TransCanada Lawyer John Inglis asked the committee for a deferral on these matters stating the Town and the Halton Region had called on TransCanada to complete studies related to these variance requirements at the last minute. As a result, he said TransCanada could not properly defend their requests. This did not satisfy the committee, which rejected the variance requests. In his deliberations, committee member David Martin said the request for the TransCanada plant to be closer to the railway was of particular concern because it would have brought the railway closer to the power plant's only ammonia storage facility. TransCanada and Ford can appeal the committee's rulings to the OMB, but have yet to confirm whether they will pursue this course. oyster perpetual yacht-master ii Monday-Saturday 10am-6pm, Sunday 12pm-4pm