Doug Ford - Build in greenbelt | Page 3 | GTAMotorcycle.com

Doug Ford - Build in greenbelt

He changed his mind! He listened to the people. What politicians are supposed to do. Trudeau can learn something there.
 
He changed his mind! He listened to the people. What politicians are supposed to do. Trudeau can learn something there.

Agreed.

Theres money to give a convicted terrorist, but not enough for the veterans.
 
Boy, that was stupid. Almost as bad as John Tory and the school funding. The greenbelt was created from headwaters land that supplies the lakes with fresh water. It wasn't just a bunch of greenies throwing a dart at a map. The Moraine, the Escarpment, all the areas that collect water to supply the lowlands had to be protected. You can't "swap" the land for some flat piece of farm land that has no ecological importance. I have no problem with developers building homes, but a shortage of land is really not the problem. Doug was trying to please developers. Perhaps more housing is the answer, but there's plenty of room to build right now. Leave the Greenbelt alone or suffer severely in the polls.
You're part right. The existing greenbelt includes a lot of "flat pieces of farm land that has no ecological importance". These lands were part of the 'cake' McGinty delivered as a reward to the six 'nut punch' McGinty delivered to the PC heavy 905.

Farm fields might conjure up images of wholesomeness and exceptional land stewardship -- not really the case for corn and bean farms that dump a bazillion kilos of fertilizer, herbicides and pesticides into our watershed. If you want to see how development goes in harmony with the environment, ask anyone who lived around the Cooks Bay basin to compare 25 years ago to now. Smart development on the fringes of the bay and the Holland River watershed dramatically pollution from farm runoff into the Lake Simcoe watershed.
 
People talk about this development as if there aren't millions of acres of undeveloped land outside the GTA... it's cheap too.

It looks like DF is backing off on his plans to develop the green belt after being told it was stupid.
There are millions of acres outside the GTA however it's unserviced so you need massive tracts to support a small population. Urban infrastructure runs up to and through the greenbelt making it possible to create nigher density developments. For an example, look at thee core of Aurora, on the low density side it supports large homes on 3500'sq foot lots (double, triple, that for for condos and towns) compared to a minimum of 30,000sq' for a rural Aurora lot with no city sewage.
 
He changed his mind! He listened to the people. What politicians are supposed to do. Trudeau can learn something there.

Actually the fed liberals have done a lot of that, float legislation and then modify based on the feedback/response. Contrast, they do it on purpose. If you were paying attention you would have noticed... Instead, as seen in many threads here, people lose their ..... drama but don't pay attention to what becomes law.

Agreed.

Theres money to give a convicted terrorist, but not enough for the veterans.

Hate to break it to you, the liberals have increased funding for veterans and started to reverse the bad decisions from the last guy (Harper) who cut it. Still failing them, just failing them less than the Conservatives.

As for the terrorist, sucks, but in the end we would have lost in court (based on the Charter) which would have cost way more $$$$s--sometimes saving the taxpayers money is a thing--and Harper set the rate $$$$s based on the money he paid out in other similar cases. Basically the last two or three PMs (lib and con) should have done their jobs and just got him back here (and locked him up) instead of violating the charter...letting him rot in gitmo.
 
My wallet hasn't been raped at all... on the contrary, many policies that the Liberals have promoted have been very lucrative for me career wise. A lot of the blunders didn't affect me too too much.

It's not that I'm buying the snake oil, I'm not under the illusion that Wynne is some sort of great leader, but I've just spent enough time in certain government agencies to know that Doug's populist BS isn't all that realistic or necessarily smart and that he'll be just as beholden to certain interests as Wynne is, it will just be different ones. Wynne's just the devil I know and the one that's been relatively good to me. That said, I don't hate Ford, I think things will probably be alright. I just feel bad for the suckers that think the world is gonna change and government is gonna be fixed with with Ford at the helm. They'll still have a dick in their ***, it'll just be Doug's instead of Kathleen's.

Horwath and the NDP is just a non-starter for me; they're too far to the left IMO and their unconditional support of labour unions and expansion of public services seems like a choke on private business. It's just bad for me on a personal level.
There are always winners and losers, if you work for the government, depend on government assistance, have a passion for gender politics, contract or partner with the govt' of Ontario... the last 15 years have been good to you.

If you work in manufacturing or heavy industries, earn an above average income, or live outside the the Red Zone, are a millennial looking for affordable home, own a small business, are a person of faith, or things might not be so good for you.

If you have high school level economics, you are probably asking why your leaders aren't running surpluses and paying down debt when the economy is red hot. You might be worried about the gianormity of deficits we could face if the economy cools.

If you're in Ontario, you might also be pondering why the party you last elected took such a hard left turn.
 
There are always winners and losers, if you work for the government, depend on government assistance, have a passion for gender politics, contract or partner with the govt' of Ontario... the last 15 years have been good to you.

If you work in manufacturing or heavy industries, earn an above average income, or live outside the the Red Zone, are a millennial looking for affordable home, own a small business, are a person of faith, or things might not be so good for you.

If you have high school level economics, you are probably asking why your leaders aren't running surpluses and paying down debt when the economy is red hot. You might be worried about the gianormity of deficits we could face if the economy cools.

If you're in Ontario, you might also be pondering why the party you last elected took such a hard left turn.

Why is the US and Conservative Trump running 3X+ the per capita deficit of Crazy Liberal Trudeau and Canada (all USD)? Using your high school economics.... Ford is also going to run a deficit BTW in redhot Ontario....
 
Why is the US and Conservative Trump running 3X+ the per capita deficit of Crazy Liberal Trudeau and Canada (all USD)? Using your high school economics.... Ford is also going to run a deficit BTW in redhot Ontario....
Nah, he only said he'd cut our hydro bill and cut our taxes. He didn't say anything about the deficit. Deficits take care of themselves, don't they?
 
Agreed.

Theres money to give a convicted terrorist, but not enough for the veterans.

That $hite makes me so angry! And no sense!
I wish those people who were push pies into politicians faces would come back and pie Trudeau..one with $hite in it.
 
Nah, he only said he'd cut our hydro bill and cut our taxes. He didn't say anything about the deficit. Deficits take care of themselves, don't they?

Actually he (Ford) has already said (admitted may be a better term?) he will run a deficit. And in the real world, there is no way he can deliver all his "spending" promises, do his tax cuts, and balance the budget even IF he found all the efficiencies he plans to. That does not even require high-school economics to figure out, grade school math is all that is required!

But yeah, it is all about deficits....it is super cute (and super sad) when people think blue pigs are better than red or red are better than blue, they all just want a spot at the taxpayer trough.


The word of the day (and everyday) on GTAM is Hypocrisy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypocrisy
 
Last edited:
There is a difference though; one party underestimates the contribution government can make in growing the province, and the other party overestimates it.

The way I look at it, of those two errors, the one Ontario can most tolerate right now is the latter after decades of underfunding on infrastructure. There are a few projects at risk of being cut before they materialize just like in the Harris years (except for the multi-billion wasteful one Rob Ford started which needs to go). Once these projects get started I'm all for belt tightening again and making industry the province's economic driver again, rather than government as it seems to be now.

Also, Doug is an ignorant ***.
 
Actually he (Ford) has already said (admitted may be a better term?) he will run a deficit. And in the real world, there is no way he can deliver all his "spending" promises, do his tax cuts, and balance the budget even IF he found all the efficiencies he plans to. That does not even require high-school economics to figure out, grade school math is all that is required!

But yeah, it is all about deficits....it is super cute (and super sad) when people think blue pigs are better than red or red are better than blue, they all just want a spot at the taxpayer trough.
The hard part about taking power from a Liberal regime is managing their spending legacy. Social entitlement spending is a Genie in a Bottle, once it out, you can't put it back in. Liberals know this and when facing pending doom they throw fiscal stink bombs -- sometimes to sew up an election (Gas Plant) sometimes to stifle a new regime for long enough to re-challenge them (min wage, civil service job and wage, Hydro, daycare ...etc, etc, etc).

So expect deficits, there's no way to safely roll things back.

The important thing is not this year's deficit, it the trajectory we are on. If Ford can run a $10B deficit next year, he'll have beat the 15 year average for the Liberals. My guess is he'll do better than that.
 
There are always winners and losers, if you work for the government, depend on government assistance, have a passion for gender politics, contract or partner with the govt' of Ontario... the last 15 years have been good to you.

Doesn't describe me or anyone I know.

If you work in manufacturing or heavy industries, earn an above average income, or live outside the the Red Zone, are a millennial looking for affordable home, own a small business, are a person of faith, or things might not be so good for you.

Lots of heavy industry firms are doing just fine. Manufacturing is fine for high tech stuff. Low skilled labour intensive jobs took a dive because they can't compete on a global scale given the cost of labour here. This is the story everywhere in OECD countries. Very little to do with government.

Sure, home prices are expensive in every hot job market. I don't think there's a thing Wynne, or Ford, or God himself could do to quell demand in Toronto/GTA.

Not a person of faith personally, but I'm not sure what has changed that's keeping the faithful from being faithful.

Some small businesses may have gotten the short end of the stick, sure. Lots of workers also got some extra cash... there's something to be said about whether your business is in fact that profitable or if it's just being subsidized by underpaid workers if you can't weather a minimum wage increase.

If you have high school level economics, you are probably asking why your leaders aren't running surpluses and paying down debt when the economy is red hot. You might be worried about the gianormity of deficits we could face if the economy cools.

If I only had highschool economics I might think that, yeah. But I have a master's degree in economics and spent my life in finance so I'm smart enough to know that when other people's money is cheap, you borrow and spend it because you can stimulate the economy and make long term investments at a low rate. Government debt is made up of many tranches of debt issued at different times, and it's not smart to prepay it even if the cash was burning a hole in your pocket because of things like time value of money.

FWIW, I don't think this can continue indefinitely, but I don't think we're in the "danger zone".

If you're in Ontario, you might also be pondering why the party you last elected took such a hard left turn.

I think the liberal party is quite centrist economically. Sure, compared to the US they're practically maoists, but that says more about the US than about us.
 
Last edited:
He changed his mind! He listened to the people. What politicians are supposed to do. Trudeau can learn something there.

Lol weren't you saying that people that flip-flop on their opinions don't know what they're talking about? I seem to recall a Climate Change discussion where that was your argument...
 
@Type17 Probably works in insurance. lol.
 
Lol weren't you saying that people that flip-flop on their opinions don't know what they're talking about? I seem to recall a Climate Change discussion where that was your argument...
I'm using liberal tactics. They taught me well!
 
@Type17 Probably works in insurance. lol.
Based on postings I'm guessing well educated, still green with respect to experience. Maybe couple of years out of school, maybe an arts degree, works on infrastructure stuff for Ont Govt or a Contractor doing biz with the govt.
 
They say as you get older you get more conservative... That's when you start paying your own bills.

<Ba Dum Psss>
 

Back
Top Bottom