{"id":5809,"date":"2014-03-12T14:43:46","date_gmt":"2014-03-12T18:43:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=5809"},"modified":"2014-03-19T15:47:58","modified_gmt":"2014-03-19T19:47:58","slug":"districts-future-lies-in-public-planning-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/districts-future-lies-in-public-planning-meeting\/","title":{"rendered":"District’s future lies in public planning meeting"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Whether for it or against it, Aurora residents will have a further opportunity to speak out on the proposed Southeast Aurora Heritage District next month at a public planning meeting.<\/p>\n

Councillors were due to advance to the second phase of the Heritage Conservation District (HCD) study at the Committee level last week, but these plans were nixed after residents took to the podium unanimous in their arguments against the plan. <\/p>\n

A second phase will codify the fine details of the HCD, including finalized boundary lines, which are currently in flux, along with details of just what will and will not be permitted to be done with properties within the district, should it gain final approval. <\/p>\n

Councillors delayed making a final decision to move onto Phase 2, pending further public input after delegations raised more questions than there were answers. <\/p>\n

Looking within the report before Councillors last week, Councillor Michael Thompson underscored the view contained in it that a successful HCD is one where all property owners \u201cunderstand and agree\u201d with the plan\u2019s goals and intents. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see a majority of the property owners agreeing with what is before us,\u201d said Councillor Thompson. \u201cWhat this needs, before anything else, is more community consultation if we\u2019re going to move forward with the second phase. Some consideration needs to be given to expanding how we get the information out to residents and the manner in which we have done it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Previous efforts, as it related to the existing HCD in the northeast quadrant of Yonge and Wellington were \u201cexhaustive\u201d, he said and response has been significantly more cohesive. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere might be some misinformation out there and this is an opportunity correct some of it, but those issues need to be addressed. The only way to do it is through a much more elaborate community consultation process as was done in the past because obviously it seemed to work well. The majority of residents within that district were supportive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Further public consultation and engagement was also supported by such councillors as John Gallo and Wendy Gaertner, who questioned how they could \u201creconcile\u201d moving ahead to the next steps of spending money on further background study when residents appeared to be vehemently opposed to the plan.
\nFor Councillor Evelyn Buck, however, the community was anything but disengaged from the process. They were there in the audience, they were vocal, and they knew where they stood. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe community is fully engaged in this question,\u201d she argued. \u201cThey are completely engaged in the question of whether the HCD is acceptable. They have come here with solid arguments on why it isn\u2019t and they have been greeted by comments that [with] more communication you will understand better, so we\u2019ll take care of your concerns. These people have done their research. They have looked into every aspect of the impact on their properties and they want no part of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

At this point, audience members applauded Councillor Buck, who added the idea for a HCD was the brainchild of a particular property owner concerned \u201cmonster homes\u201d could start dotting the southeast landscape if a plan was not put in place. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere are properties that maybe aren\u2019t too wide, but certainly have the depth that would lend itself to redevelopment in the modern age. Certainly the marketplace for those properties would reflect the potential for that redevelopment. Certainly when people bought these properties, they paid a price for that potential and they have been paying for it ever since. [Property owners] have every right to have their houses designated. I don\u2019t believe they have the right to impose their desires on everybody else in the neighbourhood.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Chair of Aurora\u2019s Heritage Advisory Committee, Councillor John Abel has been a vocal proponent of the HCD, but said given last week\u2019s delegations he was reluctant to move forward until all these concerns could be addressed. He stressed, however, that HCD plans are only at the beginning and future talks will determine where final boundaries lie, who wants to be a part of it and what will or will not work.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not saying we\u2019re going to impose this on you,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re basically saying we\u2019re going to invite you into this proposal. What I saw four years ago indicated the whole area was for it, but a lot has happened since then. [Maybe after further talks] we can get a feeling of where this goes and how we can get it resolved.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Southeast property owners will have further chance to speak out next month on conservation district.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_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}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5809","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1vH","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-06 15:29:32","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5809","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=5809"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5809\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}