Council Chambers of Oakville filled up with residents and quickly overflowed into the atrium to hear if the decision by Councillors would be to issue a notice to designate the Glen Abbey Property as a cultural heritage landscape , which was recommended in a staff report of August 10, 2017.

Speaker upon speaker urged councillors to accept the staff report to designate the Glen Abbey as a cultural heritage landscape as outlined under Section 29, Part IV of the Ontario Heritage Act.

Ontario Cultural Heritage Landscape Designation

Under the Ontario Heritage Act, Oakville can pass bylaws to formally designate properties of cultural heritage value or interest. Formal designation of heritage properties is one way of publicly acknowledging a property’s heritage value to a community. At the same time, designation helps to ensure the conservation of these important places for the benefit and enjoyment of present and future generations.

There are six key steps to designating the Glen Abbey property under section 29 of the Ontario Heritage Act. These include:

Identifying the property as a candidate for designation; Researching and evaluating the property; Serving Notice of Intention to Designate, with an opportunity for objection; Passing and registering the designation bylaw; Listing the property on the municipal register; and Listing on the provincial register.

The next step in issuing a notice to designate Glen Abbey as a Cultural Heritage Landscape the following has to happen:

Oakville must notify the owner as well as the Ontario Heritage Trust, and

Publish a Notice of Intention to Designate in the Oakville Beaver, and hopefully in OakvilleNews.Org.

Under section 29 of the Ontario Heritage Act, the notice to ClubLink and the Ontario Heritage Trust must include the following:

The Description of the Glen Abbey Property so that it can be readily ascertained;

The Statement of Cultural Heritage Value or Interest, which identifies the Glen Abbey property’s heritage significance;

The Description of Heritage Attributes outlining the particular features that should be protected for the future; and

A statement that notice of objection to the designation must by filed with the municipality within 30 days after the date of publication of the newspaper notice.

ClubLink will likely file an objection to the notice of designation with Oakville within the 30-day requirement. Oakville council must refer ClubLink's objection to the Conservation Review Board (CRB) for a hearing. After the hearing, the CRB will provide a recommendation to either the Oakville council or the Honourable Eleanor McMahon the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Sport, who have the final decision.

Town Councillors have started the process to designate the Glen Abbey Property as a cultural heritage landscape. However, ClubLink will go to extreme lengths in order to rezone the property as a subdivision. Their application was forced to a stay of one year, and then to a second year as the town prepared studies needed to make a decision. They appealed the first stay, and went to the OMB to appeal the second stay, which ClubLink lost. Then, they went to the OMB in order to force the town to make a decision regarding ClubLinks Application for Development. The OMB agreed that the application was complete. This has forced the town to consider the application on September 26, 2017, with out fully completed studies.

On August 21, 2017, the Town of Oakville Council unanimously decided to issue a notice to designate the Glen Abbey property as a cultural heritage landscape. After the decision was made Council Chambers filled with applause. However, this is not over yet.