Call on Premier Ford to Resign

The stench of corruption surrounds the process by which Premier Ford broke his promise not to open up the Green Belt.

The report of Provincial auditor general Bonnie Lysyk, August 9, makes it clear that developers were the drivers of what areas of the Green Belt were to be opened. Lysyk describes how developers at an industry dinner slipped “packages” with their proposals for land that should be removed from the protection of the Greenbelt to the housing minister’s chief of staff, Ryan Amato. Amato was directing the process for choosing which land would be opened up. Of the 15 parcels that were, 14 were proposed by Amato, not non-partisan provincial staff tasked with the work. Of those, 12 were brought to Amato by the developers themselves. “Altogether, those who had access to the chief of staff at the September BILD event ended up with land removals that accounted for 6,784 acres, or 92 per cent of the 7,412.64 acres ultimately removed from the Greenbelt in December 2022,” Lysyk wrote.

The main beneficiaries of this rich giveaway include prominent Tory connected developers Silvio De Gasperis and Michael Rice. Lysyk wrote in her report that she “found that how the land sites were selected was not transparent, fair, objective or fully informed.” Lysyk’s report comes at the same time as an ongoing investigation into the Greenbelt deals by Integrity Commissioner J. David Wake, the province’s ethics watchdog.

Whether or not the RCMP Rackets squad is called in, the buck stops with our Premier, his broken trust and handover of vitally important protected land to vested private interests.