P.E.I. land-use plan still years away, committee hears

A committee of MLAs heard Wednesday morning that an official land-useplan for Prince Edward Island is likely still two to three years away.

The comments were made by staff from the Department of Agriculture and Land as they were presenting on inclusionary zoning and affordable housing.

Land use and Lands Protection Act specialist Eleanor Mohammed told the committee: "We're outlining the [land use planning] process right now and we'll have a better idea once we move through that to what the timelines will be this is an average planning process that you see play out, yeah, about twoto three years from start to finish."

2021 reportconveyedurgency around issue

Last year, a provincial advisory committee completed its final report and released 13 recommendations on ways to modernize P.E.I.'s land-related legislation and policy, with at least five of the recommendations hinging on or related to the adoption of a land-use planning framework.

In its report, Now Is The Time, the committee noted that they were not the first body tasked to look at gaps in theselaws and policies, that the gaps were causing problems for development, housing and agriculture and there was"urgent need" for action.

"Many of the key recommendations contained in these reports such as the need for a province-wide land use plan are well understood, and have been repeatedly recommended since 1973," the committee wrote in its July 2021 report.

We can't wait two or three or four years for guidelines on how to provide affordable housing. Hannah Bell, Green MLA

But on Wednesday, MLAs heard from provincial planners that the process will still take years.

Currently only 9.5 per cent of land on P.E.I. falls under the official plan of a municipality. The rest is unincorporated areas of the province or municipalities without a plan.

If a provincial land-use plan was adopted, the entire province including municipalities would be subject to its authority.

"A planning process is not a simple process, so really what we're doing right now, we're just at the start in terms of mapping out what this process will look like. We're figuring out what data we have and what data we need," Mohammed said.

"Economic development, affordable housing, basic agricultural protection, all these different things need to be addressed. And with all those different items is all the data we need to support it."

Mohammed said changes,particularly around creating affordable housing policies, are still possible in the meantime.

The 2021 committee's report also recommended that interim measures were still possible and were encouraged in the absence of a land-use plan.

The report also noted a lack of planning capacity within government.

"We are developing a team of planners," director of land Glenda MacKinnon-Peters saidWednesday.

She also noted that there has been progress made on at least one recommendationin the 2021 report:merging teamswithinthedepartments of Fisheries and Communities andAgriculture and Land so that all staff responsible for land-use planningare under the same department.

"We're looking at the fall for this new planning section to be developed," MacKinnon-Peters said.

"Our minister has listened to concerns and you know, in the last budget that was approved, we were given the go-ahead to hire new positions and two of those are dedicated planner positions that will come to this team."

Housing can't wait, Greens say

Opposition MLAs at Wednesday's meeting also called for interim measures to address P.E.I.'s housing crisis.

Green MLA Hannah Bell expressed concern that waiting for a land-use plan would be waiting too long.

"It is a planning problem. We've been talking in other spaces about the aggressive population growth strategy that we've been pursuing since 2015 or earlier. Ten thousand people every five years is the growth strategy for P.E.I.," Bell said.

"We can't wait two or three or four years for guidelines on how to provide affordable housing. No one is going to be able to afford to live here, because they can't afford to live here now."