Protestors outside Picton Terminals called on the province to deny the County’s application for a Ministerial Zoning Order for the port.

An MZO is meant to fast-track housing development and other projects of economic interest. It bypasses municipal land planning and appeal processes. 

Then-CAO Marcia Wallace submitted the request to the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing in January 2025. A five-week public comment period opened in June. Yet there has still been no decision. 

If approved, the Order would rezone the entirety of the lands Picton Terminals owns along White Chapel Road to MX-Industrial. 

Since the County entered into a settlement agreement with the owners of Picton Terminals, it has doubled its landholdings on Picton Bay, acquiring a series of neighbouring farm properties.
The property has increased from 25 hectares to 60 (or from 62 acres to 148). 

Since the County entered into the settlement agreement with ABNA Investments, owners of Picton Terminals, the company has more than doubled its landholdings on Picton Bay. The acquisition of a series of neighbouring farm properties has brought the property from 25 hectares to 60 (or from 62 acres to 148). It now extends far north as well as south of White Chapel Road.

It could all, presumably, be turned into a rock quarry should the Terminals apply for and receive an Aggregate Extraction license after the MZO.

But the MZO request makes no mention of rock quarrying. The stated rationale is to enable container shipping and storage on the property. 

If the MZO is denied, then the County will resume the court proceeding it opened in 2023, citing the company’s failure to respect municipal bylaws against container shipment and storage. 

Protestor Bill Beckett, one of four residents who brought a case against ABNA Investments earlier this year,  said the province should deny the MZO application because it was requested under the false pretence of “port development.”

“An MZO for Picton Terminals will only be used for further illegal, unlicensed and unregulated quarrying,” he said. 

“The fallacy of port development, the excuse the Doornekamps have used to justify its rock quarry, has been debunked through our analysis of shipping revenue vs. aggregate revenue for the past 10 years.” 

Mr. Beckett’s suit amassed evidence that showed the Terminals had quarried and sold an estimated 1 to 1.5 million tonnes of limestone from the escarpment on Picton Bay for at least $62 million dollars over 8 years. 

Drone footage documented the massive changes to the once quiet port acquired by the Doornekamp family in 2014. It was enough to convince a judge to convene a hearing on a charge of illegal quarrying. 

As an unlicensed quarry, the company doesn’t have to abide by any regulations. It doesn’t pay the municipality any duties on its millions of dollars in aggregate sales, just to start. 

The Ministry of Natural Resources intervened, however, to stay the charge, saying that any illegal rock quarrying at Picton Terminals was the result of its own lack of oversight, and, therefore an “officially induced error.”

Mr. Beckett said his group wants the municipality  to investigate and report on whether the quarrying contravenes the 2018 Ontario Superior Court ruling issued by Justice Wolf Tausendfreund.

In a 2018 judgement delivered in Belleville’s  Superior Court, Justice Tausendfreund took into account historical zoning, land uses and grandfathered permissions at the site dating back to its use as an iron ore dock in the 1950s by Bethlehem Steel.

“To the extent that portable industrial equipment is stored and aggregate material stockpiled,” said the Justice, “it is not permitted under the current by-law. It must be removed.” 

Mr. Beckett said the County could bring the decision of Justice Tausendfreund and the evidence of quarrying to the attention of MNR and request it to ensure the quarrying and sale of aggregate is only undertaken at the Terminals with a license, in accordance with the Aggregate Resources Act.

“I would say, in all fairness, that not only has the community been deceived, but the municipality and the Ministry of Natural Resources as well,” said Mr. Beckett. “All along this has been an unlicensed quarry disguised as a port.”