Ontario Premier Doug Ford is threatening to reverse a portion of his government’s Greenbelt land removal after the owners listed the property for sale claiming that they don’t have the “development experience” to meet the province’s housing objectives.
In a statement early Tuesday, the Premier’s Office said it recently learned that the owner of 765 and 775 Kingston Rd. E., in Ajax, Ont., listed the property for sale, despite agreeing to build new homes to address the province’s housing shortage.
“At no point was the intention to sell disclosed to the government’s facilitator during active and ongoing discussions,” Ford said in a statement.
The private listing, obtained by Global News, describes the property as 104 acres of “future development land,” with the potential for either mixed residential or employment use.
Prospective buyers are being asked to sign a non-disclosure agreement in order to receive additional information on the land including an environmental report, land surveys, servicing feasibility reports, and a drone marketing video.
One source said the commercial real estate listing was being “shopped around to other developers” with Sept. 14 set as the deadline for competitive offers.
The potential sale, the government said, runs contrary to the stated goal for the removed Greenbelt lands: building a total of 50,000 homes.
Ford said the government is now exploring every option available “including immediately starting the process to put these sites back into the Greenbelt.”
Property purchased 11 days after Ford becomes Premier
According to property records the land, near Kingston Road and the 401, was first purchased by a numbered company in 2018 for $15.8 million.
At the time Ford, who was leader of the Progressive Conservative party and not yet premier, was facing backlash over a promise to open up a “big chunk” of the Greenbelt for development.
In May 2018, Ford was forced to backtrack and promised that a PC government “won’t touch the Greenbelt.”
The two parcels of land in question were purchased just eleven days after Ford won the election.
A representative for the numbered company listed on property records said his clients are “foreign owners and are not developers.”
“They purchased the property 6 years ago to hold as an investment,” John Dong said in an email.
“My clients have no development experience and required a partner with the requisite experience to meet the governments policy objective to have shovels in the ground in 2025.”
As part of that process, the owners enlisted the help of Buena Vista Development Corp., consultants, planners and lawyers to help them navigate the process.
Property listing shows potential development options
As the government threatens to revert the lands back into the Greenbelt, questions are swirling about the owner’s intent with the multi-million dollar property.
The real estate listing plainly states that “the property is offered for sale on an unpriced as-is where-is basis” and that the “purchaser” would be responsible for ensuring the developability of the land.
Dong, however, claimed that “at no time was the property going to be sold outright” but that the owners were looking for a “joint venture partner” with development experience.
Robert Scott, the executive vice president of Lennard Commercial Realty which listed the property, offered a different theory: that the owners might be looking for a land valuation to assess their share of the development’s value.
“We had no asking price. Asking price is zero,” Scott said, adding that a land valuation would give the owners a proper understanding of how much to contribute to a joint venture with a developer to construct housing.
“It doesn’t mean you sell it, but you’re looking for a sale price because you’re trying to understand value,” Scott said.
The listing also includes three conceptual plans for the land, which raises additional questions about what the owners plan to construct on the prime real estate.
The listing states that there are 97.1 net developable acres of land and offered three options: residential; mixed residential and employment or solely employment.
It’s unclear whether using the property for employment lands would jeopardize the agreement with the Ford government.
Premier puts property owners on notice
The two properties were part of a larger 7,400-acre land removal that has left the Ford government mired in controversy and facing a potential police investigation over the process.
The auditor found that select developers were given “preferential treatment” by the Ford government and that “packages” were given to a key government staffer identifying which lands should be targeted.
While Ford said the government will not reverse the decision to open the Greenbelt, the premier indicated he’s willing to return the lands if developers don’t start construction by 2025.
“To the other property owners, you’re on notice: if you don’t meet our government’s conditions, including showing real progress by year-end with a plan to get shovels in the ground by 2025, your land will go back into the Greenbelt.”
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