Earl Cherniak

The applicants, owners of the Glen Abbey Golf Course, brought an application to quash five municipal by-laws enacted by the respondent Town.

The by-laws aimed to preserve the property's use as a golf course following its designation as a cultural heritage property.

The Superior Court of Justice allowed the application and quashed the by-laws, finding them ultra vires the Town's authority under the Municipal Act, as they improperly required the provision of services related to recreation and culture.

The court also found the by-laws were enacted in bad faith to thwart the applicants' redevelopment plans and were void for vagueness.

Following a damages inquiry in which the defendants were awarded damages including legal costs, the defendants sought additional partial indemnity costs for a prior recusal motion.

The court determined that the costs associated with the recusal motion had already been included in the damages award for legal costs following review of the defendants’ docketed accounts.

Because those costs were already compensated in the earlier award, they could not be recovered again.

The court therefore dismissed the belated request for additional costs and declined to award further costs for the present dispute.

The plaintiffs brought a motion to amend their statement of claim to add a corporate defendant, retain a placeholder defendant, and delete certain words.

The defendants brought a cross-motion to strike the statement of claim for disclosing no reasonable cause of action.

The court granted the plaintiffs' motion to amend, finding that the addition of the corporate defendant was a correction of a misnomer rather than the addition of a new party after the expiry of the limitation period.

The court dismissed the defendants' motion to strike, concluding it was not plain and obvious that the plaintiffs lacked capacity to sue or that their claims for breach of contract, breach of confidence, unjust enrichment, and breach of fiduciary duty would fail.