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CHESTERVILLE — Bill 43 is opposed by Ontario’s major farm organizations, but local watershed authorities are continuing to lay the groundwork for Ontario’s Clean Water Act.
In Eastern Ontario’s most eastern reaches, the South Nation and Raisin River conservation authorities are undertaking a new “esker study” that will help further define controversial well-head protection zones that were already mapped out in a previous municipal water study released in 2004.
Funded by the Ministry of the Environment, the first phase of the esker study will look at an underground esker complex serving an area from Winchester to Vars at a cost of $240,000, says South Nation Conservation source water coordinator Angela Coleman.
The old study, performed by consultants on behalf of the Eastern Ontario Water Resources Committee, has been described as flawed. Nonetheless, the proposed protective zones around Eastern Ontario municipal wells outlined in that study aren’t about to trashed.
Coleman, who spoke to The AgriNews April 27, says the new esker study will help “build a new layer” of “localized” data that will help delineate the well-head zones further. “We’re not necessarily pulling off the old layer right away,” she said, referring to the previous study.
But without the new study to add to the available data, there’s a risk the Ministry of the Environment may impose the protection zones as proposed in the original study, according to Coleman.
The “right lines” need to be in place around the wells, she emphasized, so the information can be used by a so-called Source Water Protection Committee, which will be involved in drawing up a regional Source Water Protection Plan.
While the committee “can’t be formed until the Clean Water Act is passed,” she suggested that could happen as early as June. The new committee will have up to 16 members and will serve under the SNC and the Raisin River Conservation authorities- which will act as the Source Water Protection Authority. Although the legislation so far speaks to setting aside one third of the committee seats for municipal politicians, the SNC also intends to reserve a third of them for representatives from the farming community, she said.
On top of everything else, the protection zones won’t be limited to municipal well-heads. They also take in municipal water intake pipes in rivers and lakes.
Provincially-funded studies to establish such zones around intakes on the St. Lawrence River — including those in Cornwall, Long Sault, Morrisburg and Prescott — and the Ottawa River are about to get under way.
And that’s just one part of Eastern Ontario.
Conservation authorities across the province are engaged in similar activities. In the meantime, nobody really knows what restrictions will apply inside the well-head and intake protection zones that are being drawn up and refined.
Ostensibly, it’s all about protecting public drinking water supplies. But the possibilities of further restrictions have left farmers unimpressed.
Earlier this year, the Ontario Farm Environmental Coalition — which includes the Ontario Federation of Agriculture and Christian Farmers Federation of Ontario and other — made clear that it won’t support Bill 43 unless the government makes several key amendments before third reading.
Among other recommendations, the OFEC wants the new source water protection committees to have the “lead role” in the development of regional source water protection plans, rather than play second fiddle to the new source water protection authorities.
It also wants the legislation to require municipalities to purchase or lease the protection zones from the affected landowners, thus ensuring adequate compensation for the burden of added restrictions.