Ontario could allow long-term care homes to skip planning rules to boost bed count

The Ford government is working on plans to allow new long-term care homes to sidestep the local planning process, Global News can reveal, as Ontario races to replace homes facing closure and keep up with demand for new beds.

The change could come as Ontario experiences “capacity pressures” on its existing stock of long-term care homes, including the closure of some facilities that have failed to meet updated standards, like the addition of sprinkler systems.

For years, the province has been looking at ways to speed up the construction of long-term care homes, already pushing some projects through the planning process using minister’s zoning orders.

Now, internal plans are underway to make those exemptions permanent and allow developers and companies building new long-term care homes to skip traditional planning hurdles like zoning or official plan updates altogether.

The policy, which has not yet been finalized, would expand privileges recently given to universities. Last year, the government announced that all publicly-supported universities in Ontario would be allowed to build new housing projects without having to go through the rules laid out in the Planning Act.

An internal list of planned housing policy changes obtained by Global News using freedom of information laws shows that new policy is set to be applied to long-term care homes and other priority projects.

“New expedited approval process for public service facilities, beginning with student housing for publicly assisted universities, and in phases extending to long-term care, K-12 public schools, and hospitals,” the document explained.

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Housing Minister Paul Calandra confirmed work was underway on the change in a brief December interview.

“It’s still under consultation and it’s similar to what we did with student housing,” he told Global News.

“Given that long-term care is a provincial priority, how can we speed up the development of long-term care homes more quickly? Of course, we have tools right now such as (enhanced Minister’s Zoning Orders) but even that is showing to be a bit more problematic, so we’re working with (the Association of Municipalities of Ontario) to see if we can extend by right much of the same waivers we’ve given colleges and universities.”

The change Ontario is considering comes as pressure on long-term care capacity in the province grows.

Data compiled by the Ontario Long Term Care Home Association shows waitlists between 2014 and 2024 have doubled from just over 20,000 to almost 48,000 people. As a result, half of those waiting for a long-term care bed are stuck in limbo for more than six months.

The group calculates that Ontario, which has roughly 76,000 long-term care beds, needs another 30,000 new spaces to meet current demands. By 2029, an extra 48,000 spaces are needed.

Long-Term Care Minister Natalia Kusendova-Bashta admitted Ontario has a problem with the number of beds but said urgent work is underway to hit long-term care goals.

“We’re certainly looking at capacity pressures that we are experiencing,” she said in December, blaming the number of beds built by the previous government. “Certainly, there is a capacity pressure but we’re building all across Ontario. So many projects have been successful through our construction subsidy.”

Calandra, who himself served as long-term care minister, said a push to build more long-term care homes was bringing projects to new communities, which had no previous experience of handling them.

Allowing the homes to bypass the Planning Act could help new communities which aren’t used to those kinds of approvals, he said.

“We’re starting to bring them into a lot of smaller communities across the province that have never had the experience of dealing with the approvals that go along with building long-term care homes in small communities,” Calandra said.

“It’s their first time dealing with something like that — the housing and the people that come with it.”

Ontario Liberal MPP John Fraser, however, has raised concerns the move could be seized upon by companies looking to put profits ahead of care.

“When they bypassed the planning act the last time, that was for publicly-owned, essentially publicly-funded institutions,” he said.

“The vast majority of long-term care homes are owned by private corporations and part of the reason they do business is to build equity. There’s a lot of real estate companies involved in (long-term care). Yes, we have to speed up building, but I always ask myself who benefits from a change the government makes.”

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