Keith McNenly
Special to The Lake Report

Sometimes it helps to reduce complicated issues to “simple truths.” 

I first arrived at that idea decades ago when I was invited by the provincial government to take  part in seminars on provincial and municipal planning policy. What struck me was how often provincial ministries and their consultants went beyond setting broad provincial interests and  instead micromanaged how those interests had to appear in local official plans. 

Their main objective, then as now, was clear: local planning must support economic growth. I did not disagree with that. What I disagreed with was the one-size-fits-all, top-down method of imposing detailed rules on hundreds of very different municipalities. 

My suggestion was simpler. Let the province state its broad goals — its “simple truths” — and let municipalities interpret them according to local realities, with the province retaining final  approval once local plans are completed. 

One of those truths is that a strong economy matters. Another is that a healthy environment matters — and in my view, more. It is always more expensive to repair environmental damage than to prevent it, and in the end those costs fall back on the economy itself. 

Niagara is a perfect example of the connection between nature and prosperity. This extraordinary landscape, created by glacial retreat and the Niagara Escarpment, is not just scenery. It is a foundation for agriculture, tourism, hydroelectric power and regional identity. 

I saw the same principle in the Hockley Valley area, about 100 kilometres north of Toronto, where I served as chief administrative officer. Also partly within the Niagara Escarpment, that area’s glacial gravel deposits created both rich aquifers and valuable aggregate.

The aquifers feed streams, rivers and ultimately the Great Lakes system that supports Niagara Falls. The gravel, meanwhile, helped build the GTA. Both resources served the economy, but they were also in tension. 

That is why planning is not really about choosing one interest over another. It is about balance. Both aquifers and gravel matter. Sustainability, to me, means finding that balance so that growth does not destroy the environment that makes it possible in the first place. 

That is also why one-size-fits-all planning does not work. What suits Toronto or Hamilton cannot simply be imposed on rural towns.

In Mono, we argued successfully that our greatest contribution to the wider regional economy was not development but environmental protection. Our aquifers were just as important in the long term as urban subdivisions elsewhere. They could not be replaced once damaged, and groundwater-based communities cannot be expected to contribute in the same way as cities drawing on Lake Ontario. 

The same simple truth applies in Niagara-on-the-Lake. If the province wants a strong economy, local people should have the freedom to determine how their community contributes to it. Municipalities are different. Their assets are different. Their solutions should be different, too. 

Here, the central tension is not between gravel and water but between development and heritage. As this newspaper’s columnists argue, built heritage is too often treated as an obstacle to commercial growth, when in fact it is one of the region’s greatest economic strengths. 

People do not travel to stay in hotels. They use hotels so they can experience a place. They come here for the landscape — from the pastoral beauty of wine country to the spectacle of Niagara Falls — and for the built heritage, history, culture and character that make this region unlike anywhere else.

Destroy those things, and the argument for more development begins to collapse. Hotels, housing and attractions should be built without destroying the very assets that bring people here in the first place. 

That is why Niagara-on-the-Lake should not be treated as an extension of a “Vegas North” casino economy. We are not a desert entertainment strip. To borrow parlance from the Shaw Festival, we should not be cast as a rival to the Falls’ main stage, but as a distinct and complementary act in the wider theatre of Niagara. 

The province may need growth, but the best way to achieve it is by allowing communities to shape their own contribution to the larger economy. Local councils, too, when given the opportunity to approve or modify development proposals, should listen to citizens. If local judgment matters, it must mean more than replacing provincial fiat with municipal deafness. 

Niagara-on-the-Lake has a duty: to protect the history, landscape and agricultural character that make this region economically vibrant and unlike anywhere else. The recurring lesson is simple: provinces, regions and big cities use broad brushes, while local communities paint the details. 

Any place can imitate Las Vegas. There is only one Niagara.

Niagara-on-the-Lake resident Keith McNenly was the chief administrator of the Town of Mono for 41 years.