A dispute in the heart of Niagara-on-the-Lake’s booming wine country is consuming the picturesque town. Some residents fear a GTA builder is trying to exploit the region’s success. The developer believes he’s being turned into a convenient villain.

At 43.5 degrees north — the same latitude as southern France’s Bordeaux region — Niagara-on-the-Lake is an ideal location for producing wine varietals desired around the world. The old town’s colonial architecture is surrounded by hundreds of acres of vineyards and dozens of wineries. Each year more than three million people visit the area. Investors, many with new money, have followed.

Benny Marotta’s aptly named Two Sisters winery opened in the town in 2014, with his daughters at the helm. For decades, Marotta has made his fortune building family homes across southern Ontario with his company, Solmar Development. Wine, he says, was always his other passion. He has become enamoured with the Niagara area, recently building a sprawling family estate near his vineyard.

But now there are worries of GTA-style subdivisions as Marotta buys up properties around his winery. He questions why some people are raising concerns about his activities, and fears he’s being turned into the enemy by those opposing growth in a town seeking a United Nations world heritage site designation.

Here are the key players in this unfolding story:

The developer

“They should put a sign outside the town saying, ‘Developers or investors not welcomed in Niagara-on-the-Lake.’ But then they have no one to attack to become popular.”

Benny Marotta is upset. It’s a Tuesday, the morning after a town council meeting where concerns about trees he removed from a property next to his winery — under a forestry permit — were publicly aired.

He feels he’s being attacked, by one councillor in particular, who questioned if Marotta had additional trees removed and is assembling adjacent lands because he wants to build subdivisions, even on protected areas within the Greenbelt, where such development is not allowed.

“She misrepresented (the position of) her own councillors,” Marotta says of Betty Disero’s comments at the meeting, explaining that council knows his tree removal permit was for the eventual expansion of his vineyard. In February, Disero brought forward a motion seeking answers to questions such as whether Marotta received approval from the property owner next to his winery to remove trees, before his deal to buy the property is finalized in November.

The Star obtained the Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority’s permit for the tree removal and its letter explaining that Marotta had written approval from the current owner “in preparation for agricultural activity.”

The authority’s letter also states an emerald ash borer infestation required the removal of additional trees, that a forester examined the site and that the work was “routinely monitored.” The authority said it has “no grounds” to pursue any action against Marotta.

It’s not the only business Solmar has recently done in town. It had previously bought the rights to a 235-unit subdivision outside the old town area. It is sold out and near completion. Marotta has another townhouse development underway in the historic old town.

But much of his energy is now spent on the winery.

With its neoclassical Italian architecture, Two Sisters rises like a fortress above its surrounding vineyards, where grapes for Cabernet Franc, Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon are grown. Reservations at its restaurant are filled at least two weeks in advance.

Marotta says he has not yet decided what he will do with the land next door, once it’s his, beyond the work to extend the vineyard on a small portion of it.

“If local politicians work with developers, investors, to try to do something that complements the existing, and the politicians work with them, I think great things can be achieved,” he says.

“There’s something called progress, which makes the world go around. Unless you get new blood, new money in a community, it will deteriorate.”

Marotta wants residents and elected officials to sit down with him to work constructively.

“They need to work with newcomers and make things happen positively. Niagara, for me, it’s like a paradise, and I would like to make it better.”

The councillor

“So let’s figure out how we got here today, to this issue that’s become polarized,” Councillor Betty Disero said on Monday at the council meeting, regarding the property next to the Two Sisters winery on the edge of the historic old town.

“I wanted members of council to understand why the public is so upset by the clear-cutting that’s been going on there.”

“I went to the developer, who is here with us this evening, and said to him, ‘Mr. Marotta, you should be ashamed of yourself with what you did with those trees in that area.’”

Disero pressed on, pointing out that council members opposed to her stance on the issue had voted in October to ask the province for an urban boundary expansion. At the time, Queen’s Park was conducting a review of policies to protect the Greenbelt from continued growth-related pressures. That council vote to support urban expansion into what are now provincially protected Greenbelt lands included the entire property next to Two Sisters winery that Marotta is set to acquire.

Disero pointed out that, about the same time, Marotta was working to get his tree removal permit. It allowed for the clearing of areas — currently within the Greenbelt — on the property next to his winery.

She also pointed out that Marotta supported the town’s initiative to take that area of the property he was acquiring out of the Greenbelt.

“All of a sudden the trees were coming down,” she told council. “People were in a panic … that’s why I came to you in (February), asking, ‘Let’s get some answers.’” But her motion in February to get the answers she was seeking was defeated 6-1, and her council colleagues have continued to point to the approval for the tree removal by the conservation authority.

Disero told the Star in an email that her February motion and her continued questioning of Marotta’s actions are to find out what is being planned for the lands surrounding the winery.

“I had heard different stories from our planning department, from the developer, the residents and the (conservation authority), so I wanted to get everything documented and to figure out what the real explanation was.”

Asked why Solmar sent a letter in October in support of the town’s request to remove all of the property being acquired next to the winery from the Greenbelt, Marotta said it was for future considerations.

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He said the support of the town’s initiative to bring all of the property out of the Greenbelt was “for future use — in 20 years, in 30 years, you can use it.”

“Things change,” he said. “I don’t know if I’m going to own it. To me it was strictly a suggestion to the town.”

The other councillors

“It’s almost to the point now where we’re saying to the developers, ‘You know what, we really don’t want you in town.’ It almost seems like we’re heading in that direction and that’s the concern that I have.” Those were the words of Niagara-on-the-Lake Councillor Terry Flynn during Monday evening’s council meeting, when the issue of tree removal, in most cases for already approved developments, was being debated.

He told those gathered in the chamber that he supports the regeneration of trees and forested areas that are removed where development is occurring, but he fears sending the wrong message about the town’s willingness to partner with investors.

Councillor Paolo Miele stood up after his colleague and echoed that sentiment.

“We need developers,” he said. “You can’t grow a community without them. Who the heck is going to build?”

Lord Mayor Pat Darte was asked by the Star why he did not support Betty Disero’s motion in February to get further clarification about the removal of trees next to Two Sisters winery, including how a tree removal permit was issued on the request of the winery, even though its deal to acquire the property next door where the trees were removed does not close until November.

“I voted against Councillor Disero’s motion as I felt the issue had already been dealt with at great length by NPCA (the conservation authority) as they are the governing body,” Darte wrote in an email. Darte sits on the authority’s board of directors.

“It is my understanding the land that was cleared was mainly dead or dying ash trees. There is a plan to replant the area with a vineyard. This practice happens regularly on farms as crops are rotated.”

Darte was asked about the concerns of residents that growth and development pressures are challenging the town’s unique character and some of the natural features that are protected under various local, provincial and federal policies.

“Niagara-on-the-Lake is a fiercely independent, economically empowered town offering a rich tapestry of recreational, historical, cultural and educational opportunities, public green spaces and a uniquely valuable agricultural area,” he responded, citing an official vision statement.

“Our stunning landscape offers a rich experience where the journey equals the destination. We are a community for everyone. We are a resilient, distinctive and dynamic town in which to live, work and learn. Through responsible stewardship, we preserve the balance of values that makes us a world-class destination. Although we dream big, we stay true to our small town roots.”

The resident

“We’ve never had this much development at once,” says Tom Elltoft, a local real estate agent who grew up in Niagara-on-the-Lake. “Yes, we’re going to get growth, but … we are a Greenbelt community. We are restricted as to what can become urbanized.”

Elltoft, one of many residents raising concerns about Marotta’s plans, points to a paragraph at the top of the NPCA permit that was issued to Two Sisters winery for the tree removal on the adjacent property it has moved to acquire.

It states: “The woodland where harvesting is planned has been designated as a ‘Key Natural Heritage Feature: Significant Woodland’ within the Provincial Greenbelt Plan’s Natural Heritage System.”

Elltoft was so concerned about the removal of trees from this natural heritage feature that he hired an Ottawa-based ecologist and forestry consultant to analyze what had happened.

“The actual tree-clearing, however, substantially exceeded the cut area identified in the permit,” Brunton Consulting Services reported. “Although it has been suggested that ‘the majority of the trees were dead ash’ (by an NPCA forester and bylaw officer), the woodland habitat formerly dominating the subject property appears to have been ecologically sound.”

The report was raised at Monday’s council meeting, but Disero’s motion to have the provincial Ministry of Natural Resources look into its findings and concerns was deferred to a meeting in June.

Elltoft describes the problem with mismanaging ecologically sensitive lands. “If it’s paved and tarmacked and the watershed’s altered and everything else is gone from it, you won’t be able to grow on it. It’s gone.”

He believes Niagara-on-the-Lake is at a tipping point, a collision between its past and its future.

“This could be that transformation. Over 200 years of its history, it’s slowly grown. You would see some little extra spurts here and there, but over the last 10 years and the next 10 years the growth is going to surpass past growth by so much. I’ve already said that we’ve preserved it for 200 years, we’re going to ruin it in 10, and that’s what it’s starting to feel like.

“If you can take out a natural heritage system forest, then no forest is safe.”