{"id":38316,"date":"2026-06-11T15:58:34","date_gmt":"2026-06-11T19:58:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=38316"},"modified":"2026-06-11T15:58:43","modified_gmt":"2026-06-11T19:58:43","slug":"heathwood-heights-appeal-to-be-fought-at-ontario-land-tribunal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/heathwood-heights-appeal-to-be-fought-at-ontario-land-tribunal\/","title":{"rendered":"Heathwood Heights appeal to be fought at Ontario Land Tribunal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A proposal to build five homes on a single lot at 161 Heathwood Heights will be fought by the Town of Aurora at the Ontario Land Tribunal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Proponents of the development plan have appealed their application to build five homes on the lot to the Ontario Land Tribunal (OLT) and the Town confirmed its intentions to oppose the appeal following a special Closed Session Council meeting last week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The motion, which was approved on a vote of 5 \u2013 1 with Ward 2 Councillor Rachel Gilliland opposed and Ward 4 Michael Thompson absent, instructs the Town solicitor to \u201coppose the appeals relating to the Official Plan and Zoning Bylaw amendment applications and [that] an external lawyer and any necessary experts be retained to appear before the OLT to support Council\u2019s position.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Heathwood Heights proposal was recently the topic of an informal public meeting called by Ward 5 Councillor John Gallo and held at the Aurora Public Library on May 28 to get residents\u2019 input.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Nearly 20 residents attended the session, along with Ward 1 Councillor Ron Weese and Ward 3 Councillor Wendy Gaertner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Those who spoke up were unanimous in their view the Town should fight the appeal at OLT and cautioned they believed it could set a precedent not only in the Heathwood Heights community, but across Aurora as a whole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe\u2019re looking for people to stand up for principle,\u201d said one resident. \u201cIt\u2019s carving up a lot and it\u2019s the impact on Aurora and the Aurora trails system, which is why we moved from Newmarket 20 years ago to Aurora\u2026. It\u2019s just one lot, but the implications and the far-reaching implications of it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It was a point of principle for another resident who said, the applicant is looking for \u201call or nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThere\u2019s that concern on NIMBY-ism (Not In My Back Yard) and I\u2019m sure that\u2019s got to be a part of it, but\u2026 it\u2019s the precedent that\u2019s going to be set,\u201d they said. \u201cThere\u2019s going to be creepage. It\u2019s not just that one property, and there\u2019s absolutely no gains to anybody except the developer. There\u2019s no low-cost housing. It\u2019s not solving any problems for anybody.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cIf you\u2019re opening a can of worms, there\u2019s a number of homes in our neighbourhood that just sit empty, owned by whoever, we don\u2019t know. If they even got one to do that, they\u2019d go, \u2018Why can\u2019t I do that? I\u2019ll make more money than someone else in this house. Let\u2019s put four on my property.\u2019 Then, down the street, somebody else puts four. What kind of neighbourhood are you going to have in 10 years?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>By Brock Weir<br \/>Editor<br \/>Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n<a class=\"synved-social-button synved-social-button-share synved-social-size-24 synved-social-resolution-single synved-social-provider-facebook nolightbox\" data-provider=\"facebook\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" title=\"Share on Facebook\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newspapers-online.com%2Fauroran%2Fwp-json%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fposts%2F38316&amp;t=Heathwood%20Heights%20appeal%20to%20be%20fought%20at%20Ontario%20Land%20Tribunal&amp;s=100&amp;p[url]=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newspapers-online.com%2Fauroran%2Fwp-json%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fposts%2F38316&amp;p[images][0]=&amp;p[title]=Heathwood%20Heights%20appeal%20to%20be%20fought%20at%20Ontario%20Land%20Tribunal\" style=\"font-size: 0px;width:24px;height:24px;margin:0;margin-bottom:5px;margin-right:5px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Facebook\" title=\"Share on Facebook\" class=\"synved-share-image synved-social-image synved-social-image-share\" width=\"24\" height=\"24\" style=\"display: inline;width:24px;height:24px;margin: 0;padding: 0;border: none;box-shadow: none\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/plugins\/social-media-feather\/synved-social\/image\/social\/regular\/48x48\/facebook.png\" \/><\/a><a class=\"synved-social-button synved-social-button-share synved-social-size-24 synved-social-resolution-single synved-social-provider-twitter nolightbox\" data-provider=\"twitter\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" title=\"Share on Twitter\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newspapers-online.com%2Fauroran%2Fwp-json%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fposts%2F38316&amp;text=Like%3F\" style=\"font-size: 0px;width:24px;height:24px;margin:0;margin-bottom:5px;margin-right:5px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"twitter\" title=\"Share on Twitter\" class=\"synved-share-image synved-social-image synved-social-image-share\" width=\"24\" height=\"24\" style=\"display: inline;width:24px;height:24px;margin: 0;padding: 0;border: none;box-shadow: none\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/plugins\/social-media-feather\/synved-social\/image\/social\/regular\/48x48\/twitter.png\" \/><\/a><a class=\"synved-social-button synved-social-button-share synved-social-size-24 synved-social-resolution-single synved-social-provider-mail nolightbox\" data-provider=\"mail\" rel=\"nofollow\" title=\"Share by email\" href=\"mailto:?subject=Heathwood%20Heights%20appeal%20to%20be%20fought%20at%20Ontario%20Land%20Tribunal&amp;body=Like%3F:%20https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newspapers-online.com%2Fauroran%2Fwp-json%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fposts%2F38316\" style=\"font-size: 0px;width:24px;height:24px;margin:0;margin-bottom:5px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"mail\" title=\"Share by email\" class=\"synved-share-image synved-social-image synved-social-image-share\" width=\"24\" height=\"24\" style=\"display: inline;width:24px;height:24px;margin: 0;padding: 0;border: none;box-shadow: none\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/plugins\/social-media-feather\/synved-social\/image\/social\/regular\/48x48\/mail.png\" \/><\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A proposal to build five homes on a single lot at 161 Heathwood Heights will be fought by the Town of Aurora at the Ontario Land Tribunal. Proponents of the development plan have appealed their application to build five homes on the lot to the Ontario Land Tribunal (OLT) and the Town confirmed its intentions [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38316","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-9Y0","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-21 15:19:56","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38316","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38316"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38316\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38317,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38316\/revisions\/38317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}