Housing and environmental issues were at the heart of the last municipal elections. Municipalities already have several tools to act on them. On the other hand, the current Quebec expropriation regime remains a considerable obstacle to the emergence of green and inclusive cities. The challenges of our time, including the climate crisis, demand reform of the regime.
Currently, this framework causes significant delays and makes it excessively expensive to carry out many projects of public interest, such as schools, social housing, public transport. The regime also limits the possibility of protecting and enhancing natural environments to make them into parks, which are nevertheless essential in sustainable living environments.
Expropriation is a legal tool of last resort which allows the public authorities “to appropriate a building or a dismemberment of the right of ownership over a building, for purposes of public utility, in return for the payment of fair compensation. and prior ”. This power found its foundations in Quebec for the construction of the first roads and aqueducts in the 19th century.e century.
Under the Expropriation Act, when the expropriation process initiated by a municipality ends up in court, it often ends with compensation much higher than market value. In fact, in Quebec, cities must pay the value to the owner as compensation. This value, set by the court, often exceeds the addition of the actual market value and the quantifiable harm. In one case, linked to the extension of the Montreal metro, the government had to pay several times the price initially assessed! Another example: a small town that wishes to support the construction of a school in a central and accessible sector will very likely face expropriation costs that will exceed the ability to pay of its several thousand citizens.
Rethinking expropriation
Speculators are also using a mechanism to challenge the validity of the expropriation by taking advantage of the sense of urgency that drives public power. Since the expropriated party is rarely successful, this has the main effect of delaying the project and increasing the cost of the expropriation, the land having often increased in value in the meantime. The government already recognizes that this mechanism is a problem, since it has suspended it for projects such as the Structuring Network of Public Transport of Quebec and others.
The power to expropriate must remain a solution of last resort and be regulated. The expropriation procedure should not however be an obstacle to the realization of collective projects. In the context of demographic and climatic changes, which modify municipal priorities compared to the previous century, collective projects and nature protection must be facilitated, while of course respecting the time necessary to make them good projects. To do this, we must reform the Expropriation Act. It is not normal that the realization of collective projects is slower in Quebec than elsewhere.
The rules of the game in terms of expropriation are expensive for taxpayers and harm the general interest; in particular, compensation should be more consistent with market value, as is already the case elsewhere in Canada. It does not make sense that compensation could be based on the theoretical profits that would be generated by another use (for example a large-scale real estate development) of an expropriated territory. Down to earth rules are needed today to close the door to those who ask for the moon.
The reform of the expropriation framework must therefore have as its objective the protection of natural environments, a better location of services, better control of the costs of public facilities and more efficient implementation of projects. The legislator should also include the fight against climate change as a reason for public utility or municipal purpose in the said reform.
We must give free rein to projects to improve the quality of living environments of municipal administrations that are currently being put in place. The reform of the Expropriation Law is essential and the current development of the National Architecture and Land Use Planning Policy is an opportunity to move forward.