General Meeting – 27 January 1998

GREENSPACE ALLIANCE OF CANADA’S CAPITAL

Minutes of Meeting held January 27, 1998

The meeting was held in the Regional Municipality of Ottawa-Carleton headquarters building and began at approximately 8:00 p. m. Bryan Hawley chaired. Barbara Barr recorded minutes.

Present:

Bryan Hawley (Heron/Walkley Greenspace Coalition/Fairlea C.A.)

Clair Merkley (Heron/Walkley Greenspace Coalition)

Tom Gabor (South Keys/Greenboro C. A.)

Prabha Singh-Sinclair

Donald E. Bright

Barbara Barr (South Keys/Greenboro C.A.)

Christine Hartig (Ottawa-Carleton Urban Ecosystem Stewardship Council)

Shelley Parlow (Hunt Club Corridor Protection Assoc.)

 

Regrets:

Erica Burns, Erwin Dreessen, Amy Kempster, Sue Taylor

 

Minutes: No minutes were read.

 

Announcements and Short Reports:

Bryan Hawley passed along regrets from Erica Burns, Interim Chair, and announced that she was temporarily leaving the Alliance.

Shelley Parlow reported on her participation in putting up four demonstration squirrel boxes in Strathcona Park where nests had been destroyed by the ice storm. The demonstration was reported by some media.

Tom Gabor reported that City Council had voted for residential housing in Balena Park against the wishes of the neighbouring community which wanted to continue public use of the greenspace.  Tom Gabor and

Barbara Barr indicated their willingness to help the Balena Park community draft an appeal to the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) if the community decides to appeal the re-zoning.

Bryan Hawley reported that appeals of the Heron/Walkley OMB hearing situation have been initiated with the Ontario Ombudsman and with the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

Christine Hartig explained the mission of the Ottawa-Carleton Urban Ecosystem Stewardship Council and advised the Alliance that the Council has some funds available to support certain activities.

 

Speaker: Shelley Parlow of the Hunt Club Corridor Protection Association (HCCPA)

Shelley gave an illustrated presentation about the Southern Corridor, an area extending from the Airport Parkway to the Rideau River and including McCarthy Woods. The Corridor is an undeveloped area of diverse habitats with many kinds of plants and animals and is well used by neighbourhood people for enjoyment of the natural environment. The principal landowner is the National Capital Commission which wants to re-zone its land from light-industrial to residential so that the land can be profitably sold for development. The proposed zoning does not reflect the desires of the community for the future of the land. The City is in the process of developing a Neighbourhood Plan for the Southern Corridor which ultimately will involve re-zoning. At present, there are inconsistencies among the Region’s Official Plan, Ottawa’s Official Plan, and the zoning in 2020-Z, the City’s proposed new zoning by-law.

Shelley sought the aid of the Greenspace Alliance and its members to help preserve the Southern Corridor. She passed out a three-page informational handout about the Corridor, including a section on what the Greenspace Alliance can do to help, and an eight-page handout of relevant newspaper clippings. Two upcoming events of importance are: (1) the meeting of Ottawa’s Planning and Economic Development Committee, Thursday, Feb. 19 at 9:15 a.m. at City Hall, which is the final opportunity for public consultation on issues related to 2020-Z; and (2) the Hunt Club Neighbourhood Plan Open House to be held sometime the second week of March, at which time six alternatives for the Southern Corridor can be reviewed by the public.

Questions, suggestions, and discussion took place during and following Shelley’s presentation.

Letters in Support of Greenspace:

There was consensus that Tom Gabor write a letter to the City Council’s Planning and Economic Development Committee in support of Southern Corridor greenspace on behalf of the Greenspace Alliance and that he write a letter to Councillor Karin Howard in support of her effort to protect environmentally sensitive areas by re-zoning them appropriately.

 

Communications Committee and Recruitment Committee:

Bryan Hawley requested and received approval to distribute the Alliance’s Mission Statement, as prepared to date, and the meeting schedule. The Mission Statement lacks the list of groups represented at early meetings. Prabha Singh agreed to find out room numbers for the meeting schedule.  Tom Gabor agreed that his phone number and e-mail address could be used, and Erwin Dreessen had agreed that his postal address could be used for Alliance business. Bryan will post the Mission Statement and meeting schedule on the Freenet and will distribute them as widely as possible.

Tom Gabor discussed the need to put together a list of addresses and e-mail addresses of organizations that might be interested in knowing about the meetings of the Greenspace Alliance.    It was suggested that a good starting point would be to obtain the Region’s community contact list which is on disc. Christine Hartig agreed to share a list of contacts.

Tom suggested that he write a letter to all Regional and City councillors with a list of speakers and date and place of Greenspace Alliance meetings. A suggestion was made that Alliance meetings could be listed at no charge in a community section of the “Ottawa Citizen” newspaper.

Shelley Parlow reported that a priority of the Recruitment Committee is to formulate a recruitment strategy. One suggestion is to target 12 potential-member groups and to go in pairs to these groups to give them a presentation about the Greenspace Alliance. Another suggestion from the Committee is that a fundraising event should be held. The Committee is also discussing the possibility of corporate membership or corporate sponsorship of fundraising and other events.     Shelley suggested that the types of membership need to be worked out and that members who represent a group should contract to attend meetings of both the group they represent and those of the Alliance. A contract would need to be drafted.

 

Scheduling of Meetings:

There was concern by some that there is too little meeting time left after a speaker and discussion to allow for Alliance organizational development.

Bryan Hawley noted that the Alliance needs to get moving on adopting by-laws. It was decided by consensus to reschedule the presentation of Greenboro’ s development and open space issues from February 24 to a later date in order to devote the Feb. 24 meeting entirely to business.

The next meeting will be held Wednesday, February 11, at 7:30 p.m. at the Regional headquarters. A representative from Nortel will be the guest speaker.