Lake of Bays holds off on road license agreements for 180 days

At its August 13 meeting, Lake of Bays Council passed a resolution placing a 180-day moratorium on the issuance of road license agreements for all existing private roads and driveways on unopened municipal road allowances.

The moratorium will provide affected residents an opportunity to attend a public meeting and express their concerns about the requirements, which will then be taken into consideration by the municipality, according to Mayor Terry Glover

The moratorium does not apply to new development or newly constructed access to private property, as road license agreement requirements will continue to apply to those.

The program, as Glover referred to the municipality’s license of occupation requirement for using unopened road allowances, has to date been primarily triggered by planning submissions such as an application to operate a short-term rental. It has not been positively received by many of those affected, or those who will be affected, because it requires that they provide a survey of the road allowance, that they insure the municipal property for liability in the amount of at least $5 million, that they pay an annual fee to the Township and, in some instances, that the road allowance be brought up to standards, standards that are unique in every situation and dictated by the municipality—in order to ensure emergency vehicles can get through.

Glover maintains that the requirements are necessary to ensure the municipality does not face liability issues, but Lake of Bays Councillor Nancy Tapley brought forward a notice of motion at the Aug. 13 council meeting to establish a moratorium on the requirements, noting that the Township did not solicit input from those who would be affected and said it was put in place too quickly and it represented an exorbitant cost for some people.”We’re forcing people into LOCs (License of Occupations), which are not cheap, and every year it continues, and we all know prices go up, they never go down…”

Tapley suggested a longer moratorium, but Glover, later in the meeting, pushed for 180 days instead. The initial motion would’ve also allowed applications already in progress to proceed but staff suggested the moratorium be placed on everything to make it easier.

Councillor Jacqueline Godard said she agreed with a moratorium. “I was just wondering if we have time to do another public meeting on this. Would staff have time,” she asked. Glover responded: “So today’s a public meeting; however, no one asked to speak, but yes, we could have another public meeting.”

Councillor Mike Peppard said he also agreed with a moratorium and suggested that the issue be revisited and then a public meeting be held.

Glover, who said councillors needed to give proper direction to staff, asked: “Exactly why do we need to pause it?” Tapley responded: “I think we need to pause it because this was brought on too quickly. It blindsided me completely. I had no idea this was coming… and we didn’t have enough time to discuss it. I imagine it halfway blinded staff as well. We’re writing policies after the fact… it should be the other way around. Staff should have ample time to do their jobs. There shouldn’t be a rush, and they should have lots of time to do their job with input from the public. There was no input from the public,” she added.

Tapley also questioned why such an excessive amount of liability insurance is required. “Are we asking something that is ridiculous to ask and expensive to ask of our public? We need to have more discussion on this,” she said. Applause from the audience at that point solicited a warning from the mayor, who said he would shut down the meeting. It would be the second warning while the issue was being discussed. There were about a dozen people in attendance to hear council discuss the subject.

Long-time residents say they have been using unopened road allowances to get to their property for many years, and it’s never been a problem. Glover has maintained that the use creates a liability issue for the entire municipality, but those who oppose the requirement argue that there is no evidence of any liability issue ever occurring on unopened road allowances in the Township of Lake of Bays.

Glover was on CBC radio the morning before the council meeting and indicated that no one had contacted him about the issue. Resident Peter Ham, who lives on Billie Bear Road, said he was amazed. He brought the interview to Doppler’s attention and said he had spoken via telephone to the mayor at his Township office three times about the issue and knows of others who have as well. Resident Linda Mullins, who lives on Pine Lane Road, said the mayor had received emails of objection from several residents on that road, including her son (Doppler was copied on two of those emails).

Glover also described to the CBC the concerns expressed by residents as a small group of vocal people who he said were good at getting media attention. He further said social media created misconceptions in the community, although he did not indicate what those misconceptions might be.

Doppler has heard from four residents who expressed concern with the municipality’s requirements. They have recently created a private Facebook group, which organizers say has 112 members. A petition is also circulating, which, as of August 13, 2024, had been signed by 567 people (see below).

Glover told those present at the council meeting that the issue is not going away. “This happened way before all of us were ever sitting here, and then the government decided to say, the provincial government decided to say, Ok municipality, you’ve got to deal with this issue, and that’s why we’re dealing with this issue, and then I also want to say that as the Mayor of the Township of Lake of Bays, my job is to protect the best interests of all residents in the Township of Lake of Bays. So this issue affects folks on private roads that may or may not have an issue with a road allowance,” he said, adding that ten groups have signed on “to the package, and we have five in the process… I also want to state that this is going on all over. You can go on the FOCA (Federation of Ontario Cottagers’ Association) website and find out, there’s actually insurance companies reaching out saying we can help too,” said Glover, referring to claims that insurance companies would not insure property that does not belong to the residents.

“This is a small percentage of people that are on private roads, not all roads, so I’ve had to speak at cottage associations about this, and none of them are affected by this, and so people are looking at me because, of course, it’s got a ton of social media attention and that’s due to the finesse of a small group that are good at that, and that’s great,” he told councillors.

He also said the agreements with property owners will vary. “Because there’s all kinds of situations that will be different. Some will have wetlands, some will be quite lengthy, there might be all kinds of things… There’s so many different things that I’ve learned about. They could just make this go away for them, but they need to contact us. So I would suggest that Councillor Tapley, and Lake of Bays Association and a couple of others that wanted some sort of a moratorium, I’m suggesting 180 days… so in 180 days that gives an awful lot of time for people to stop and, you know what, you really need to read the facts… I’ve come across groups calling me and saying what about this and this and this—they’re all on that fact sheet that’s on the website.”

Glover said a public meeting could be held about 90 days into the moratorium, “where if anybody wants to come and make comments, we’ll take their comments, and we’ll look at them…”

Councillor George Anderson declared a conflict at the meeting and recused himself from discussions related to the Towship’s requirements for the use of parts or entire unopened road allowances to get to private property because he owns property that would be subject to such an agreement.

You can watch the council meeting Here.

Read the information about Roads License Agreement requirements on the Township website Here

Read information about purchasing the unopened road allowance (new) Here

Hear Lake of Bays Mayor Terry Glover talk about the issue on CBC Here

The petition by residents Here and a related story below:

Lake of Bays residents up in arms over required access agreements

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