Graham Churchill says:

On Sunday, December 19th, 2021, I listened to the all-candidates meeting for the January 24th, 2022 Richmond Hill Mayoral By-election organized by Active Community Engagement (ACE). I became enraged by Regional Councillor Perrelli, one of the mayoral candidates, when he blatantly mischaracterized the events surrounding the development of the David Dunlap Observatory (DDO) lands and then used it to try to paint the other candidates negatively for not supporting his and Councillor Greg Beros’ latest scheme to get the city to pay a developer for a park in Ward 1.

The fact is Mr. Perrelli was never the hero of the DDO saga; he was always one of the villains. The DDO lands are a site of global historical significance. They should be of much pride to Canadians and in particular the residents of Richmond Hill. The David Dunlap Observatory was at one time the second-largest observatory in the world. In 1964, it was used to discover Cygnus X-1, and in 1967 it verified that Cygnus X-1 was a black hole, the first one ever identified.

The public record bears no proof that Mr. Perrelli ever handed in any application to develop the DDO lands, nor that any such application was ever received through the city’s Planning Department or publicly vetted by Council. The only application that was ever dealt with at Council and the OMB between 2008 and 2012, was the original Corsica application.

In his All Candidates speech, Mr. Perrelli conveniently leaves out the fact that the DDO land was conserved. The approved residential development on the DDO lands covers less than half the entire property. The rest of the site, together with all the identified heritage buildings, was saved and protected through years of dedicated hard work of which Mr. Perrelli had no direct hand. In fact, to this day, he continues to be the sole voice on Council to negatively address the mediated settlement, as is evident in his public statement at the December 18th All Candidates Meeting. Today, 111 acres of an original 189 acres known as the DDO Lands, are a protected public entity and a National Historic Site, forever standing as a testament to all those who fought so hard for its notable conservation.

Residents can listen to Mr. Perrelli’s comments, starting at 51:44 in the video, and decide for themselves what Councillor Perrelli’s motivation was in making them, but the fact is his Q3 2021 Event Expense Report shows that as of Q3 Mr. Perrelli had taken $49,200 from developers, of which the largest donation, $18,750, was from Baif Developments, the very company seeking payment from Richmond Hill for the park in Ward 1.