The Ontario government has proposed major changes to two important laws that protect life and property in Ontario.
The proposed changes would put public health at greater risk from flooding and other natural hazards such as erosion.
The changes would also limit our ability to protect water, soil, and habitat in your watershed community.
We need your help now.
Please call or write to your local MPP, let them know you support local conservation, and ask them to drop Schedule 6 from the budget bill (Bill 229).
If you prefer not to write a letter, you may fill out this simple-to-use form below, from Ontario Nature. Simply click the green button, or link, below to complete the short form:
Help us to continue to protect life, property, and watershed resources.
Keep the protections Ontario's people have today.
Your voice is needed right now.
Groups across Ontario are defending
local watershed management
– we need your voice heard as well
We would like to thank all the local people who have spoken up in favour of local conservation.
We also thank groups across Ontario that are coming to the defence of local watershed management principles.
Ontario Nature, the Canadian Environmental Law Association, Environmental Defence, and many others are speaking up against the proposed changes in Schedule 6 of Bill 229.
Your voice is needed too.
We need your help so we can continue to help you and your community.
We need your support and your voice so we can continue to protect people and property in this rural part of Ontario. #WeNeedCAs
Take action. Please click the blue button, or link, below:
A Letter from Brian Horner, General Manager and Secretary-Treasurer of Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA)
To Friends of Conservation:
I hope you, and your family and friends, are keeping well during these exceptional times.
The year 2020 has been challenging for all of us. We can take comfort, however, that the spirt of community is alive in our watershed, even during a pandemic. In fact, public appreciation of the value of natural areas and water and soil and habitat, has never been greater than this year. During recent storm events, our watershed residents have appreciated the work we do to protect lives and to protect property.
For these reasons, among others, I ask you today for your support.
The Province of Ontario has proposed a sweeping budget bill called Bill 229. The government tabled this law, on November 5, 2020, to help Ontario to “Protect, Support, and Recover from COVID-19.” This bill, however, is about more than just the coronavirus. It is about more than economic recovery. It could rewrite the history of Ontario’s successful watershed management model that is almost 75 years old.
The proposed changes, in Schedule 6, would weaken the ability of conservation authorities, including ours, to protect life and property and water and soil and habitat in your watershed community.
Tell your MPP that Section 6 should be removed. You may phone your MPP, write them, or simply fill out the easy-to-use online form from Ontario Nature (the link is included in this newsletter).
Our conservation authority was formed because of a need identified by municipal and provincial leaders, in 1946, almost 75 years ago. We have protected life and property and watershed resources since that time. Schedule 6, of Bill 229, would greatly weaken and reduce our ability to do that needed work.
Around the country and around the world, the conservation authority model is praised as a working model to follow. We are needed now more than ever. Please make your voice heard.
The time is now.
The proposed changes are in an omnibus bill so there is no posting on the environmental registry and no comment period. That’s why we are asking you to speak up right away, before it is too late.
We are sending a letter to the Premier, cabinet ministers, and local members of provincial parliament. We need you to do the same.
Show your support for conservation. Make a call. Write a letter. Fill out the easy-to-use form from Ontario Nature. Share our social media posts letting the public know about how the omnibus bill negatively affects your local watershed health.
Tell our provincial government that they can protect Ontario’s watershed management model by removing Schedule 6 from Bill 229.
I thank you for your past support, your continued support, and I ask you to save watershed conservation now by making your voice heard.
Thank you,
Brian
Why We Are Concerned
Why are we concerned with proposed changes in Schedule 6 of Bill 229?
Here are some of our serious concerns with the Province of Ontario’s sweeping new law:
1) Schedule 6 could give developers the ability to bypass conservation authority review.
This means there is less protection for you and other local property owners and more risk from flooding and erosion.
We have a duty to ensure development does not occur in areas of natural hazards such as flooding and erosion.
We want to ensure development takes place in the right way in the right areas to protect everyone now and for the long term.
We have a duty to ensure our groundwater, our creeks and rivers and lake, and our wetlands are not adversely impacted.
Using a watershed-wide understanding of science, mapping, and impacts we help to keep local communities safe and livable and to ensure development is thoughtful and balanced.
The Province of Ontario’s proposed changes would allow developers to ‘go around’ the conservation authority and get permits directly from the Province. This reduces protection, negatively impacts our local communities, and adds bureaucracy and costs to all involved.
2) Bill 229 could limit our ability to continue to preserve natural areas and to offer conservation area parks and recreation services.
Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA) has been a leader protecting conservation areas and conservation lands for the benefit of people and all living things. We are proud of our historic role and our continuing leadership in land preservation and natural enjoyment opportunities that are so important.
Safe nature enjoyment and outdoor recreation and conservation education are more important than ever, especially during a pandemic when people need the recreational and mental health benefits of green spaces. We are proud to be able to provide these spaces. They provide benefits to water and soil and habitat for living things – they also provide health and recreation and economic benefits including tourism and employment opportunities.
When our conservation areas were closed, temporarily, during the pandemic – it became clearer than ever how important these areas are. We have worked hard to reopen these areas, for public benefit, in a way that meets public health recommendations. We manage our properties in a financially responsible way.
The Province of Ontario wants to be able to set fees and limits on what they are now calling “non-mandatory” programs and services, even in cases where the community has asked us for these services. This could limit our ability to provide conservation areas and programs and services.
The Province of Ontario’s changes could make it harder for conservation authorities to manage properties and programs effectively and responsibly.
3) The proposed changes in Ontario’s omnibus bill could reduce our ability to remain above special interests.
Since our beginning, over a period of almost 75 years, we have worked cooperatively and productively with all governments of all political stripes and we continue to do so. We have provided independent and apolitical administration. Ontario’s proposed changes could make the composition of our Boards of Directors more ‘political.’
The local, municipally-appointed directors capably fulfil their fiduciary responsibilities. They review and approve policies and make decisions with the corporation (conservation authority) in mind and with watershed-wide impacts in mind and with the community and provincial and municipal responsibilities in mind.
Changes that would ask directors to put municipal interests above the interests of the watershed community, and the organization, would hurt our local governance model. The proposed changes would be impractical for our rural watershed and our rural municipalities and it would reduce municipal discretion on board appointments.
4) Schedule 6, of Bill 229, would reduce our ability to monitor, restore, and grow natural areas in your watershed.
More than 30 people in the watershed community, from all walks of life, developed the mission and vision for Ausable Bayfield Conservation. These community members told us our mission is to “protect, improve, conserve, and restore the watershed in partnership with the community” and that our vision is one of “healthy watersheds where our needs and the needs of the natural environment are in balance.”
The Province of Ontario’s proposed changes would redefine our role and limit our ability to provide conservation education, to monitor and to improve water quality and soil health, to preserve natural areas, and to restore wetlands and to protect forest conditions.
We want a stronger future for Ontario, not a weaker one.
We want to deal with the current health pandemic and we want Ontario to grow. Protecting our watershed resources is a foundation for that growth. Increasing risk from natural hazards is not good for the economy. Reducing protection for water and soil is not good for our economy.
We all have a duty to be stewards of our land for our children and our grandchildren.
We need local data and research and science. We need to educate our current and future generations about needed conservation. We need support for local land stewardship and we need ‘boots on the ground.’
Ontario, and the world, face great challenges.
Ontario can help us deal better with the pandemic and economic recovery by removing Schedule 6 of Bill 229. The Province can prevent increased risk to life and property by removing Schedule 6.
We believe that sincerely. Please tell your MPP if you agree.
