Ontario developers who benefitted from Ford government decisions on Greenbelt and MZOs dined with the premier at his daughter’s wedding

Developers whose lands stand to benefit from recent provincial government decisions attended the premier’s daughter’s wedding — with some sitting at Premier Doug Ford’s table.

Sitting with Ford at Table 10, according to a picture of the reception’s seating plan, was Mario Cortellucci, whose family’s companies have benefitted from at least four minister’s zoning orders that fast-track development since Ford’s Progressive Conservatives came into power.

Also invited to the September wedding, according to the seating chart, was Shakir Rehmatullah — one of the developers who stands to benefit from the Ford government’s Greenbelt land swap. In November, a 102-acre parcel of Markham land he owns through his company Flato Upper Markham Village Inc. was removed from the Greenbelt to be developed.

Premier Ford said the wedding festivities were private events and he has done nothing improper, telling Ontario’s integrity commissioner the developers who attended were personal friends.

The Star reached out to the developers named in this article about their attendance and whether government business was discussed, but received no response by deadline.

It was in January, after a reporter started asking Ford’s office questions about the wedding, that the premier’s office sought the opinion of the province’s integrity commissioner on whether the developers’ attendance four months earlier was offside.

Integrity commissioner J. David Wake concluded, based on the information the premier’s office provided including that Ford had no knowledge of gifts given to his daughter and son-in-law, that there was no indication of non-compliance with MPP ethics rules.

On Thursday, Global News first reported how Ford had sought advice about developers having attended an August pre-wedding event.

On Friday, Ford bristled at questions about his daughter’s wedding festivities, calling the questions “ridiculous” and saying no conflict of interest rules had been broken.

“I know the difference between what we should and shouldn’t do,” Ford said. “I know hundreds of developers and hundreds of private-sector folks. I know hundreds of health-care workers and police officers.

“Our family has been in politics for 30 years, met tens of thousands of people, and I went to the integrity commissioner and he cleared it 1,000 per cent — not 999 — 1,000 per cent.”

“It’s the first time it’s ever come out in Canadian history, someone asking about someone’s daughter’s wedding,” he said.

The premier would not answer why he only approached the integrity commissioner about the events months after the fact.

Ontario’s integrity commissioner was asked by Ford’s office in late January to review the developers’ attendance at the wedding and an Aug. 11 stag-and-doe party — a pre-wedding event meant to raise money to cover the costs of a wedding.

The premier confirmed the developer guests were “friends of the Ford family, and in some cases have been for decades,” according to the office of the integrity commissioner.

Based on information provided by Ford’s office, the commissioner “was of the opinion that there was nothing to indicate non-compliance with the Members’ Integrity Act,” his office said.

That determination was based on the premier saying he “had no knowledge of gifts given to his daughter and son-in-law,” and that “there was no discussion of government business,” the commissioner’s office said.

Ontario’s Members’ Integrity Act allows MPPs, including the premier, to ask the commissioner to provide their opinion on how to handle certain situations. The commissioner has provided 277 opinions to MPPs under this section in 2021-2022.

In these cases, the commissioner will tell the MPP whether they broke any members’ ethical laws, based on the information the MPP shared. This is not the same as an official inquiry, which can only be started by a complaint by another MPP.

The opinion provided to Ford “is not a finding or the result of an investigation into a matter,” the integrity commissioner’s office said.

Details of the guest list emerge as the Ford government faces increasing scrutiny over its ties to developers and criticism over its controversial decision to open up parts of the environmentally-sensitive Greenbelt for development despite initially promising not to.

The government faces two separate probes over its decision and whether developers were secretly tipped off about the controversial land swap. Ontario’s integrity commissioner is probing whether Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister Steve Clark broke conflict of interest and insider information rules, and the provincial auditor is doing a value-for-money audit into the Greenbelt decision. Meanwhile, officers with the Ontario Provincial Police’s anti-rackets branch are reviewing requests to investigate.’

Both Clark and Ford, who in 2018 was recorded telling a private audience he would “open a big chunk” of the protected area should he become premier, have denied developers were given advance notice.

Seated at Table 10 alongside the premier and his wife was Carmine Nigro, president and CEO of Craft Development Corp. and current part-time chair of the LCBO board, according to the seating chart.

Nigro was vice-chair of the PC Party’s fundraising arm until a few years ago. His company, Craft, received a zoning order for a project in Lindsay in 2020 to build 500 homes, and a 100,000-square foot commercial building.

Ford’s cabinet made Nigro chair of the Ontario Place Corporation in March. The Ontario Crown agency is working with the Therme Group, a private company, on a controversial redevelopment of a chunk of Toronto’s waterfront.

Also seated at Table 10, according to the wedding’s seating chart, was developer Cortellucci. Since Ford’s PCs came into power in 2018, at least four development projects by Cortellucci family companies have benefited from minister’s zoning orders (MZOs), a 2021 Star investigation found. An MZO allows the provincial government to unilaterally change zoning to fast-track developments.

The Ford government has handed out dozens of MZOs since 2019.

According to a 2021 Torstar/Canada’s National Observer investigation, the Cortellucci family owns 600 acres of property near the planned route for Highway 413 — a 60-kilometre highway project revived by the Ford government, which would connect Milton to Vaughan but pave 400 acres of the Greenbelt.

Cortellucci was recently appointed by Ford’s cabinet to the York Regional Police Services Board for a three-year term.

Rehmatullah, founder and president of Flato Developments, was listed on the seating chart at a different table than the premier.

Rehmatullah has been one of the few developers to benefit from both the government’s increased use of zoning orders as well as the Greenbelt land swap.

A 102-acre plot of land bought by Rehmatullah’s Flato Upper Markham Village Inc. in 2017 for $15 million, is part of the land being removed from the Greenbelt for development.

In 2021, Rehmatullah received four minister’s zoning orders on the border of Markham-Stouffville to fast-track development on land that sits adjacent to this Greenbelt parcel. He plans to build out numerous subdivisions, which would include single-detached homes, townhouses and apartment buildings.

Flato also received an MZO in 2021 to fast-track and develop a 115-hectare parcel of land into a mixed-use community with a diversity of housing options in Lindsay, near the Kawartha Lakes, despite resistance from local residents.

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