Multicultural planning practices in the GTA

Final report 

Beth Moore Milroy, PhD, MCIP, RPP - Principal investigator

Professor, School of Urban and Regional Planning, Ryerson

and

Marcia Wallace, PhD

formerly: Assistant Professor, Urban Studies Programme, York University

currently: Planner, Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing

and 

with the assistance of a steering committee whose members were:

Tim Rees, of the City of Toronto's Office of Access and Equity

Dan Nicholson, of the Ontario Professional Planners Institute

Larry King, of the City of Toronto's Urban Development Services Department

Kazi Hoque, of The Community Social Planning Council of Toronto

Heather Dryden, of The Urban Alliance on Race Relations

(Please note that steering committee members were not formally representing their organizations' views)

PART A NARRATIVE SUMMARY

1. ORIGINAL OBJECTIVES

State the original objectives defined in your research proposal and describe the extent to which they were achieved.

The original objectives defined for this project were to find out "how demographic changes . . . are challenging the way planning is done [in the Greater Toronto Area, or GTA], the way decisions are made, the way the public interest is understood, and the way planners accommodate participation by diverse groups". The intended objectives were achieved.

The focus for the study was the activities of urban planners working for the 25 municipalities of the GTA. This includes their day-to-day activities, the official plans created under the Ontario Planning Act and the relations between planning staff and other municipal departments, agencies, boards, commissions, and citizens.

The research used a survey questionnaire that was sent to respondents in advance. Respondents answered the questions during telephone interviews, except in two cases where respondents mailed written answers. The research was carried out in the late fall of 2000 and early 2001. Results are reported for 23 of the GTA's 25 municipalities; two municipalities declined to participate. In each municipality the interview was with the director of planning or the person who knew most about the planning policies of the jurisdiction. In addition, the four planning districts of the new City of Toronto were asked to answer a reduced set of questions. Three municipalities with small populations do not have planning departments so we were referred to their consulting planner or a town administrator for answers. We supplemented the survey responses with an analysis of certain documents: the official plans for selected municipalities, the four existing regions, and the former Metropolitan Toronto; and policies and reports of committees on race relations, equity, or similar preoccupations.

Our findings based on the survey data and the analyses of documents and committee structures can be grouped into four themes. The findings themselves are described in the next section:

(1) information - the extent to which information about ethnoracial diversity is specifically sought out and used in the planning process in each of the jurisdictions;

(2) public participation - the degree to which planners reach out to ethnoracial groups and what precipitates participation mechanisms beyond those mandated under the Ontario Planning Act;

(3) planning outcomes - how ethnoracial diversity is evident in physical planning outcomes and the means being used to address ethnoracial issues in the process of making municipal plans; and

(4) policy - the degree to which ethnoracial diversity is acknowledged in planning and other municipal policies.

 

2. ADVANCEMENT OF KNOWLEDGE

Describe how this research contributed to the advancement of knowledge in the field and discipline.

No study of this kind appears to have been done before in Canada, although there are examples of similar investigations in Britain and Australia. Therefore, all the findings are new information for planners in the Canadian setting. However, because it was a small study that sought baseline information, we do not presume it is directly applicable outside the GTA. Still, the method and findings could be useful for a study elsewhere in Canada, or beyond. The national and international interest already shown in the study, to which we refer in later sections of this report, gives some credibility to this claim.

With respect to findings: using the themes noted above, here are the main ones in summary form. They are described in detail in our main report on the research project, and appear there in conjunction with analyses of the findings and recommendations for policies and actions.

a. Information: Information about ethnoracial diversity is available to all municipal planning offices, but the information is hardly used. If it is used it is mainly as background rather than as a substantive part of decision-making.

b. Public participation: Planners feel they should be doing more to elicit the views of ethnoracial minorities but experience three principal problems with going ahead with this. First, they fear treating people unequally. That is, if they specifically seek the views of an ethnoracial minority will they be giving them special treatment not accorded to others? Second, they rarely have the mandate to do this from their municipality's official plans and policies. Third, they are short of time and money to engage in any but the mandatory consultation.

c. Planning outcomes: Ethnoracial minorities are achieving built forms that are distinctive and doing so using the formal regulations. This does not work all the time but is reasonably successful. However, reliance on the formal system alone does not handle the hostility and conflict that can arise from building these new forms. Effective forums, especially informal ones, for debate about new forms are not widely available.

d. Policy: Acknowledgement of the ethnoracial diversity of the GTA is all but absent from official plans, and planning departments are rarely connected to municipal initiatives such as committees on race relations.

 

3. RESEARCH TRAINING

Describe how your research contributed to the training of future researchers -- e.g. the role played by student and research assistants.

Two research assistants were employed:

1 senior undergraduate student at Ryerson for 2 terms: she learned research project organization; managed the contacts with interviewees; learned document retrieval and analysis (especially analyzing official plans). This student has now proceeded to a graduate program.

1 master's student at York: she learned document retrieval and analysis (her focus was municipal committee structures and mandates, and municipal policies on race relations). She is continuing her master's program.

Both students attended steering committee meetings at which they presented their on-going research findings to the group.

4. RESEARCH TEAM

Assess the overall effectiveness of using a team approach to your research program and describe any particular benefits or difficulties flowing from it.

The research team worked well. It was effective to have steering committee members from the community in this particular research project because they offered good counsel regarding the development of the survey questionnaire, the analysis of findings, and making sure the report on the project was both clear and usable by community organizations. It is also a difficult way to organize research in that voluntary and non-profit organizations find it difficult to give the time of their members to research endeavours. However, on balance it was positive and committee members are now developing specific uses for findings. For example, the City of Toronto used the report in a large internal planning meeting concerning the new official plan. The committee member who is also a member of the Ontario Professional Planners Institute is preparing a short article for the Ontario professional journal.

5. INTERNATIONAL ASPECTS

Describe any international facets of your research program.

The actual research project examined Canadian experience and more specifically that in the GTA. We used knowledge of previous work in Australia and Great Britain in the course of data gathering and analysis. We also benefited from connections with researchers in other countries made through the international Metropolis project, of which CERIS is a part. See also the section on communication of research results.

6. PRESERVATION OF DATA

Describe arrangements made to preserve data resulting from your research (including machine readable files and computer databases) and arrangements for making the data available to others.

Survey questionnaires: Data were hand-assembled because there were a small number of respondents, and because responses were open-ended as well as closed-ended.

Official plans, committee reports and municipal policies on race relations: documents are available for further use upon request. Of course they are time-sensitive.

7. ISSUES OR PROBLEMS

Discuss any other issues or problems that you encountered concerning your research grant, and as applicable, give your suggestions on how SSHRC could help address such situations more effectively.

a. The manner of paying research assistants via Ryerson's system is cumbersome in the extreme. Suggestion: SSHRC could ask Ryerson to review its r.a. payment procedures, reduce the input of the payroll office, and bring the procedures into line with best practices in other universities.

b. The amount of money available for communicating results at conferences is totally inadequate. $500 barely deals with transportation let alone conference fees and accommodation. Top-ups from university department sources are uneven and rarely available more than once per year.

PART B COMMUNICATION ACTIVITIES

Report all communications activities resulting from this grant,

a. Scholarly conference papers:

2001 "Current state of planning for ethnoracial diversity in the Toronto region", Fourth Biennial of Towns and Town Planners in Europe. Rotterdam. September. Also printed in conference proceedings, Cultures of cities: transformations generating new opportunities, 137-139.

2001 "Ethnoracial diversity and planning practices in the Greater Toronto Area", Annual conference, Canadian Institute of Planners, Ottawa. July.

2000 "Ethnoracial planning practices in the Greater Toronto Area", 5th International Metropolis Conference, Vancouver, November.

b. Working paper:

2001 Ethnoracial diversity and planning practices in the Greater Toronto Area. Working Paper #18, December 2001. CERIS. Accepted for publication; currently being edited for December publication.

c. Scholarly journal article:

2001 "Ethnoracial diversity and planning practices in the Greater Toronto Area". Plan Canada 41, 3. Accepted for publication; in the process of being published.

d. Public lecture:

2001 "Integrating ethnoracial diversity in the urban planning of Toronto". Presented at the Centre d'études et de coopération canadienne, Université de Nice. November.

e. Community activities:

2001 Report presented at City of Toronto, Race and Ethnic Relations Committee meeting, November 6.

2001 Report obtained by Ontario's Provincial Ombudsman Office, September.

2001 Report used in faculty retreat, University of Toronto Planning Program, for discussion about ethnoracial diversity issues in the curriculum (Professor Katherine Rankin)

f. Other communication activities underway:

Synopsis of research project and findings for the Ontario Professional Planners Journal; being prepared by one of the Steering Committee members

Article on the research focusing on method and findings for Journal of the American Planning Association.

Synopsis of research project and findings for the web-site of the Commonwealth Association of Planners

Discussion of findings with Professor Huw Thomas of Cardiff University who has written extensively on this subject in the British and European context.

Discussion of findings with Professor Judith Allen of the University of Westminster, London, who is engaged in European research groups working on related topics.

 

C. STATISTICAL INFORMATION

1. NUMBER OF PEOPLE EMPLOYED UNDER THIS GRANT

1 undergraduate

1 master's student

(consumed about 86% of the overall budget)

 

2. NUMBER OF MAJOR ACQUISITIONS/RENTALS FUNDED BY THE RESEARCH GRANt

zero

 

3. APPROXIMATE EXPENDITURES FROM THE RESEARCH GRANT USED TO COMMUNICATE ITS RESULTS

Include all forms of dissemination, e.g. pre-publications, circulation of papers, etc.

In responding to this category we include only non-travel expenses related to communication: about $1300, or about 12%

4. APPROXIMATE AMOUNT OF THE TRAVEL EXPENDITURES FROM THE RESEARCH GRANT USED FOR RESEARCH-RELATED FIELD TRIPS, CONFERENCES, SEMINARS, ETC.

Not permitted to use any of the grant for travel to conferences. Used about $350 for travel around the GTA to gather documents and meet with people, about 3%.

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