Review of Parkland Dedication Policy Implimentation
Nikolas Koschany, 500 524 631 Professor Robert Dowler April 1st, 2016
STAFF REPORT ACTION REQUIRED Review of Parkland Dedication Policies for the City of Toronto Date:
April 1st, 2016
To:
Professor Robert Dowler
From:
Nikolas Koschany, 500 524 631
Wards:
All
Reference PLG 810 Assignment 2 Number:
SUMMARY Purpose The purpose of this report is to summarize and analyze the implementation, to date, of parkland dedication provisions within the City of Toronto, inclusive of the so-called “cash in lieu” alternative to parkland dedication, and to provide recommendations to improve upon existing policy. The report also analyzes the implementation of Privately Owned Public Spaces (POPS) as a supplement or alternative to traditional parkland dedication policies, and makes recommendations on how to improve POP implementation.
Background Parks are an integral part of a city, providing for benefits such as clean air, psychological wellbeing, and spaces to gather and perform recreational activities. According to Toronto’s Official Plan, parks provide places to create landmarks, frame view corridors, build neighbourhood character, and ultimately provide spaces for civic life. Unfortunately, the City of Toronto currently has a dearth of park space for its residents. Between 2001 and 2015, despite a growth of over 310,000 residents within city boundaries (Statistics Canada, 2001; City of Toronto, 2015), only 242 hectares of parkland have been created within the city in that timeframe; this translates roughly to one hectare of parkland per 1280 new people (Lorinc, 2015). Moreover, while Toronto’s downtown has been growing four times as fast as the
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Figure 1 - Parkland Density Map, 2014 (Created from Toronto Open Data).
rest of the city since 2006, only 15% of new parks created within this period were within this area. As figure 1 shows, most parts of the downtown have less than 0.43 hectares of parkland per 1000 people. As the downtown population grows, there is an increasing need for parkland. Due to the small land parcels where many new developments are taking place in the city (many of them infill developments), policies that require the dedication of parkland are increasingly being forsaken for “cash in-lieu.� The monies raised through this policy are either largely being spent in wards where the associated development is not taking place, or not being spent at all. Between 2010 and 2013 1, Toronto spent $25,932,199 on parkland acquisition, yet raised $217,013,695 for its Parkland Dedication Reserve Fund (an amount over eight times what was spent). Further, while a majority of this money was raised from the planning district of Toronto and East York, where there was the most population growth, only one parkland acquisition took place there within this three-year period, at 50 St. Joseph Street (Lorinc, 2015).
The figures here are based on the first 9 months of 2013, so the actual numbers from this year are likely a few $million higher than reported.
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The existing policy, as shown in figures 1 and 2 has in essence created a system whereby downtown development subsidizes park acquisition and development in other parts of the city, despite the fact that it is in greatest need of park space to begin with. In the absence of considerable downtown public parkland provision or acquisition, the Toronto planning department has also been negotiating with Figure 3 - Funds Collected from Cash in Lieu by Ward, 2010-2013 (Lorinc, 2015). developers to contribute to Privately Owned Publically-Accessible Spaces (POPS), as a means to supplement existing spaces. However, such spaces have faced recent criticism due to exclusivity and non-accessibility issues, poor design, and temporary hours. In the absence of parkland acquisition and provision downtown, however, POPS have Figure 2 - Funds Spent on Parkland Acquisition by Ward, 2010-2013 (Lorinc, 2015). temporarily become de-facto park spaces for many downtown residents, meaning their presence warrants discussion in any policies about parklands. Moving forward, this report will attempt to address different parkland provision policies and how to modify them to make a fairer and greener parks system for Toronto’s future.
Discussion of Existing Policies The following section is a summary of Toronto’s existing parkland provision policies and POPS guidelines. The section also details the impacts of Bill 73, the Smart Growth for Our Communities Act, which was recently passed by the Ontario government; this act has
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implications for how parkland dedication provisions can be structured, and also provides new conditions and requirements for a municipality before such provision frameworks are put in place. Each policy, will be analyzed individually below, along with its risks and mitigations to these risks (with the exception of Bill 73, which the City of Toronto has no say over now that the bill has received royal assent). Proposed mitigations will be used to inform recommendations contained towards the end of this report.
Existing Parkland Provision Policy Summary Section 42 of the Ontario Planning Act (1990) enables municipalities to pass by-laws that require new developments to set aside a portion of their land for park or recreation purposes, provided provisions for this are included within a municipality’s Official Plan. If a development site is deemed by city staff or council to not be suitable for parkland, a cash-in-lieu payment (addressed in a below section) may be made by the developer instead. In Toronto, for all developments on commercial lands not in a priority area, 2% of the site is to be set aside for parkland. Development on industrial land uses are exempt from these parkland provision policies. For all other land uses, including residential, this percentage is 5% (City of Toronto, 2016). If the proposed development is located in a Parkland Acquisition Priority Area, however, (defined by the city simply as any area under-serviced by parkland, as decided by council) the development is subject to the Alternative Parkland Dedication Rate. This rate necessitates that 0.4 hectares of parkland be provided for every proposed 300 dwelling units. This rate is capped at a certain percentage of each development’s parcel of land depending on the scale of the development: • • •
Parkland dedication is capped at 10% of the site for developments under 1 hectare. Parkland dedication is capped at 15% of the site for developments between 1-5 hectares Parkland dedication is capped at 20% of the site for developments over 5 hectares.
Risks and Mitigations Due to the absence of large sites to build upon downtown, as well as the opportunity cost developers face in giving up a percentage of developable land, the parkland dedication policy is often forsaken for “cash-in-lieu” on downtown developments by choice of councilors, developers, or planning staff. However, this risks the dearth of small public spaces within the downtown core, and creates an impression that parks planning can only be done with larger land parcels. To mitigate this, councilors and planners should push more for parkland dedication over cash-in-lieu as an internal policy. Further, unless a pre-determined location is provided for the
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expenditure of cash-in-lieu within the vicinity of the development, acceptance of the cash-in lieu option should be restricted. For those parks that are provided by developers however, the policy is still lacking because the park is not required to be complete before the rest of the development is built; this means residents could be moving into a development without adequate park space around them. To mitigate this, the planning act should be amended to necessitate that all parks provided under Section 42 provisions must be completed before occupants may move into their dwelling units.
Cash in Lieu Policy Summary Cash in Lieu funding is an alternative to parkland provision in the city that is used to leverage cash “in-lieu” or parkland from a developer when council or staff deem a location to be unsuitable for parks, due to size, shape, location, or other issues. Increasingly, the cash-in-lieu policy is being used on new developments within the downtown core; whereas the existing parkland provision policy creates adequate park space during large subdivision development due to large land parcel sizes, development downtown occurs on smaller land parcels, where developers often argue the parkland provided would be miniscule (Lorinc, 2015). The amount of cash calculated and required from each site is negotiated on a site by site basis depending on its market value, and allocated into different categories, dependent on whether the land falls into a Parkland Acquisition Priority Area or not. Table 1 (below) shows the administrative distribution of these funds.
Table 1 – Cash in Lieu Funding Allocation Scheme, (City of Toronto, 2013).
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Simply put, for traditional cash-in-lieu allocation, the money collected is split evenly into four main categories based on proposed use of the funds, and geographical location of where the money will be spent. One category is for parkland acquisition, another for parkland development. 50% of this funding is spent city wide, and the other 50% is spent within the district 2. If the proposed development is located within a Parkland Acquisition Priority Area, 5% of the money collected goes into the four categories explained above. The remaining 95% of the money goes to the acquisition of parkland that is accessible or within the vicinity of the development. Similar to the traditional parkland dedication policy, the money acquired is limited to the value of land per 300 dwelling units proposed. A single reserve fund account is used to store this money, but the deposits to the fund are tracked by ward.
Risks and Mitigations The cash-in-lieu policy has many problems and risks, the primary one being its lack of actual implementation of the funds as addressed in the background section of this report. Despite the immense amount of money being deposited into in the City of Toronto parks reserve fund, the city is not spending it on parkland acquisition. To mitigate this issue, the city should amend the policy so funding deposited to the parks reserve fund should be required to be earmarked to a specific project, and spent within a certain timeframe of its deposit, potentially within 5-8 years. Secondly, the even distribution between city-wide and district spending creates a disparity between the parks that can be created across the city due to land prices. For example, parcels of land in Toronto’s downtown core are frequently sold for between $30m and $60m, whereas land outside of the core is cheaper (City of Toronto, 2014); because of this disparity, more parkland can be acquired in certain sections of the city, thereby creating an inequality between city districts. To mitigate this, the parkland distribution formula should be overhauled to favour more locally based projects. This problem is furthered because although the existing policy says all collected cash-in-lieu should be spent on a park that is “accessible” or “in the vicinity” of the development, these terms are not defined; to mitigate this, the policy should be amended to read “accessible by walking” or “within 2km of the vicinity of the development site.” Another risk to implementation of the existing policy is that it too firmly restricts what the money from the parkland reserve can be spent on. For example, the John Street cultural corridor, while providing open space for recreation, leisure, and civic life, should be allowed to receive funding from the cash-in-lieu reserves, yet under the existing policy, it does not. The definition
The four districts within Toronto are based on geographic boundaries before amalgamation. The south district is inclusive of the old city of Toronto and East York, the east district Scarborough, the west district Etobicoke and York, and the north district North York (City of Toronto, 2013).
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of “park” therefore needs to been broadened to include other public areas, in order to mitigate this risk. Lastly, while the city can spend the cash-in-lieu money to acquire land for parks, the amount of money that can be spent on these parks is limited by the City of Toronto Act to the appraisal value of the land in question. While the appraisal is based on the highest and best use of land, market forces and the propensity for bidding wars between developers will ultimately drive most prices above this appraisal value, therefore making them impossible for the city to purchase (City of Toronto, 2014). To mitigate this, a mechanism should be put in place that allows the city to pay above the appraisal value of land in certain instances for tactical acquisitions.
Privately Owned Public Spaces Privately Owned PublicallyAccessible Spaces (POPS) are spaces that are built and owned by private developers, but accessible by the public during certain times of the day. These spaces are generally small, and not always traditional parks. An existing POPS in downtown Toronto is shown to the right in figure 4. The idea for POPS originated in New York City (Whyte, 1980), and the spaces are meant as a supplement to existing public spaces during the daytime, not as a replacement to them.
Figure 4 – Example of a well-designed POPS at 832 Bay Street
In 2013, council passed a resolution to create a database of all existing POPS, create guidelines for new POPS, and create signage to designate these spaces for public use (City of Toronto, 2013). In June 2014, this set of Urban Design Guidelines for new POPS was created. These guidelines aim to improve the layout, programming and design of these spaces and also classify POPS into various categories (including courtyards, plazas, gardens, walkways/midblock connections, forecourts, landscaped setbacks, and interior pedestrian connections). The guidelines set out leading principles for POPs such as methods for arranging public art and seating, suggestions for paving and soft landscaping, and suggestions for other amenity inclusion (such as dog water bowls).
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Generally, POPS are leveraged through Section 37 of the Planning Act as density bonuses, not through Section 42 of the Planning Act. This means that new developments can both contribute cash-in-lieu of parkland dedication, while still providing a POPS, that would otherwise be unused space.
Risks and Mitigations The biggest risk to proper POPS implementation is that their Urban Design Guidelines are not mandatory for developers to follow like official plan policy, and can therefore be ignored. Many POPS are either not noticeable (figure 6), or do not provide for a proper recreational area (figure 7). To mitigate this, the city should have the power to accept or reject POPS proposals, separate from development proposals. This will ensure a greater standard of space within these developments.
Figure 5 - 100 Yorkville Street POPS
Figure 7 – The POP Guidelines Report Cover
Figure 6 - Rose Garden POPS
Given that POPS are created using section 37 funds, their inclusion in development proposals often takes away from other section 37 opportunities such as affordable housing, community centre construction, or public art. To mitigate this, POPS should be included in the Official Plan definition of “parks”, (given certain requirements such as staying open and accessible 24 hours a day), and therefore included as part of section 42 requirements in the Planning Act.
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Given their semi-private nature, POPS are also not fully accessible by everyone, such as the homeless, who have been asked to leave these spaces as various points (Berg, 2009). To mitigate this, POPS should be subject to non-discrimination bylaws by the city.
Bill 73 Bill 73, also known as the Smart Growth for Our Communities Act is a piece of legislation that was recently passed by the Ontario Government and given Royal Accent on December 3rd, 2015. Among the things it legislates, are revisions to Section 42 of the Planning Act, which governs parkland dedication policies. Specifically, the bill amends the act to require a municipality to prepare a parks plan and make it publically available to the municipality before the municipality may impose parkland dedication policies. Further, the bill changes the alternate rate for cash in lieu requirements to allow municipalities to charge for the land value of 500 dwelling units per hectare, up from 300 units per hectare (Government of Ontario, 2015). Lastly, the bill requires an annual financial statement to be made regarding the money in the parkland reserve accounts, to provide more transparency to the funding, and hopefully encourage its more expedient expenditure. A date has not yet been given for when the changes to legislation contained within the bill come into force.
Recommendations Based on the above discussion, ten recommendations have been put forth to either amend Toronto’s current park provision policies, or ask the province to amend certain sections of the Planning Act or the City of Toronto Act.
1. Restrict application of the cash-in-lieu policy by establishing an internal city policy that
2. 3.
4. 5.
pushes for parkland dedication over cash-in-lieu proposals, unless a pre-determined location is provided for the expenditure of cash-in-lieu within the vicinity of the development. Request the province amend the Ontario Planning Act to necessitate that all parks provided in new development be completed before occupants may move into their dwelling units. Amend the cash-in-lieu policy so funding deposited to the parks reserve fund is required to be earmarked to a specific project upon acceptance, and spent within 8 years of its collection. Overhaul the parkland distribution formula to favour more locally based projects. Amend section 3.2.5d of the existing cash-in-lieu policy within the Official Plan to read “accessible by walking” and “within 2km of the vicinity of the development site.”
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6. Expand the definition of “park” within Toronto’s official plan to strategically include public areas like the John Street Cultural Corridor, and other pedestrian spaces. 7. Request the province amend the City of Toronto Act, to include a mechanism that allows the city to pay above the appraisal value of land in certain instances for tactical acquisitions of parkland. 8. Create a process to separate developments with POPS, into two parts – one for the POPS being created, and one for the development itself, which can only be passed once a POPS application has been approved. 9. Amend the Official Plan, and request the province amend the Planning Act to include POPS provision under Section 42, if the POPS in question are accessible 24 hours’ round and are accessible to the general public. 10. Create a POPS non-discrimination by-law that prevents forceful removal from POPS due to loitering, panhandling, or any other form of discrimination
Delivery Options Option 1: Adopt recommendations as contained within this report • The advantage of this option is the recommendations have already been fleshed out in this report, and there are solid performance measure plans in place to make sure the recommendations would be implemented. • The disadvantage of this option is that some recommendations may not get the provincial approval required in order to be implemented. Option 2: Reject recommendations as contained in this report. • The advantage of this option is that no action is required beyond refusal. This also makes this the least expensive option in monetary terms. • The disadvantage of this option is that it continues the status quo of parks development, and all the risks addressed in this reports’ discussion remain valid concerns in existing policies. A lack of clear parks policy may also delay the implementation of parks in the city, hence leading to larger costs if parks are implemented in the long term due to rising land values. Option 3: Send recommendations back to staff for revision. • The advantage of this option is that staff get to review the recommendations and make proposed changes based on the representation of councilors, their constituents, and their political expertise. This could also allow the recommendations to unofficially be brought by councilors to provincial authorities, hence improving their chances of being implemented due to political connections. • The disadvantage of this option is that it continues the status quo of parks development for another two months as the recommendations are re-written, and there is no certainty that the recommendations will be improved once they have been rewritten, or that they will have a greater chance of being passed by provincial authorities. Option 1 is recommended.
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Performance Measures and Monitoring Plan Performance measures for implementation should be based on standardized quantitative data, and measured by forming a series of ‘benchmarks’ for each category. The more benchmarks are passed, the greater the outcome would be. For measuring the implementation of park dedication policies, an Open Space Report should be created each year by the City of Toronto in time for the City Budget, measuring variables including: • • • •
• • • •
Number of parkland provisions from new development. Amount of developments that provide cash-in lieu of parkland provision. Amount of money collected under cash in lieu policy. Amount of money spent from the cash in lieu policy (including whether it was spent on acquisition or development, and which ward it was spent in, compared to which ward it was collected from). Parkland reserve fund balances. Number of POPS created (and the number of these that are open to the public 24 hours a day). Number of “traditional” parks funded vs. more strategic public spaces like the John Street Cultural Corridor. Park usage.
Benchmarks would be established based on Toronto’s Parkland Acquisition and strategic development initiatives, and would be mainly inclusive of parkland acquired vs. population growth, to measure the prevalence of park space within the city.
Communications and Messaging Tactics The recommendations put forward in this report would be first brought before council, and pending approval, would then be communicated to interested parties and stakeholders via a news release (including developers, park advocacy groups, journalists, and citizens subscribed to the Toronto newsletter), and through social media channels including Facebook and Twitter. The release would say which recommendations from this report are being adopted, and provide details on a series of upcoming public consultations. This series of public consultations and town-hall meetings would be held across the city from April to August 2016 to both inform the public (and other interested parties) about these changes, garner feedback, and clarify any outstanding points. All information from public meetings will be made available on government websites within one week from the meeting date, including a recording of the public meeting in order to promote transparency and accountability of government. After a period of 5 years when the policies have comfortably in place, another series of consultations would be held across the city, from April to August 2021. This feedback would
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then be used to inform a review of the same policies being reviewed today, so they can be updated and improved in the future.
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References Berg, N. (2009). Improving on the Ambiguity of Privately Owned Public Space. Retrieved Online: http://www.planetizen.com/node/37361 City of Toronto. (2013) City of Toronto Parkland Dedication Reserve Funds. Retrieved online from: http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2013/bu/bgrd/backgroundfile-62799.pdf City of Toronto. (2013). Protecting and Increasing Access to Privately Owned Publically Accessible Spaces – Status Update. Retrieved online from: http://app.toronto.ca/tmmis/viewAgendaItemHistory.do?item=2013.PG25.8 City of Toronto. (2014). POPS: Creative Urban Placemaking to Enhance Urban Life. Retreived Online from: http://www1.toronto.ca/City%20Of%20Toronto/City%20Planning/Urban%20Design/Files/p df/P/POPS_guidelines_Final_140529.pdf City of Toronto. (2014). Downtown Toronto: Trends, Issues, Intensification. Retrieved Online from: http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2014/te/bgrd/backgroundfile-69192.pdf City of Toronto. (2015). TOcore: Planning Toronto’s Downtown. Retrieved Online from: http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2015/te/bgrd/backgroundfile-85168.pdf City of Toronto. (2015). Toronto Facts. Retrieved online from: http://www1.toronto.ca/wps/portal/contentonly?vgnextoid=dbe867b42d853410VgnVCM100 00071d60f89RCRD City of Toronto. (2016). Building Toronto Together. Retrieved online from: http://www1.toronto.ca/wps/portal/contentonly?vgnextoid=44220621f3161410VgnVCM100 00071d60f89RCRD&vgnextchannel=9bf452cc66061410VgnVCM10000071d60f89RCRD Government of Ontario. (1990). Ontario Planning Act. Retrieved online from: https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/90p13 Government of Ontario. (2006). City of Toronto Act. Retrieved online from: https://www.ontario.ca/laws/statute/06c11 Government of Ontario. (2015). Bill 73: Smart Growth for Our Communities Act. Retrieved online from: http://www.ontla.on.ca/web/bills/bills_detail.do?BillID=3176 Lorinc, J. (2015). Parks in Crisis. Retreived online from: http://spacing.ca/toronto/2015/04/13/parks-in-crisis-part-1-all-built-up-and-no-place-to-go/ Statistics Canada. (2001). Canadian Census. Retrieved online from: http://www1.toronto.ca/wps/portal/contentonly?vgnextoid=dbe867b42d853410VgnVCM100 00071d60f89RCRD
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Whyte, W. (1980). The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces. New York: New York. Random House.
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