To The Editor,
We have a problem, housing, and there are a variety of ideas on how to fix it. It all leaves me wondering where wisdom at the top has gone. Although I have been a life-long Liberal/New Democrat, there have been Conservatives who have appealed to me and shown the wisdom that we need now. Think of Bill Davis; he found that “bland works”.
Another was Peter Lougheed former Premier of Alberta. He is responsible for the Heritage Savings Trust Fund, putting the bounty of financial flows from the provinces oil wealth into a fund for the future development of his province. It was a prudent idea, and did very well until other “Cowboy Premiers” undermined it by unbalanced spending. We see this again in Daniel Smith, Alberta’s Wild Rose, giving away money to Albertans, because it is politically expedient, at a time when oil money should be going into the Trust for the rainy days, that will surely come.
In 2005, a Greenbelt was created around Toronto by the McGuinty government, another act of wisdom.
Here in Ontario, we have a land and housing challenge, and need great wisdom to deal with it. One of my dad’s aphorisms, was never try to fix a problem by creating another, but that seems to be what is happening in Ontario.
Brazil has had had its own problem, and a popular politician, Bolsonaro, who took the easy road to respond, leading to habitat destruction.
Today, within the view of the world’s Biodiversity Congress here in Montreal, we have our own Bolsonaro “Dozer Doug” who is willing to destroy natural habitat in exchange for development.
Doze the wet lands
Doze the forests
Doze political barriers
Doze official plans
Give me a call when you wake up.
John Henning, Chute-à-Blondeau
