The Ontario government needs to start taking water protection seriously

This World Water Day, the Ontario Headwaters Institute, a registered charity that promotes watershed security, healthy and resilient watersheds that protect regional ecological integrity, social wellbeing, and economic vitality, is concerned that the PC government is not taking the protection of water as seriously as it should, especially as we face increased urban expansion and the twin climate and biodiversity crises. 

Indeed, while indicating a desire to reduce red tape to support the need for more housing while also claiming to maintain or improve environmental protection, the Ontario government has since 2018 conducted virtually no significant public consultation nor sought suggestions on how to actually better protect our environment, especially our water.

Instead, omnibus bills containing amendments to as many as 40 Acts have been frequently pushed through the legislature at torrential speed, with cursory discussion at standing committee and a reliance on short-term internet surveys with shallow questions. 

Since being elected in 2018, the PC government under Premier Doug Ford has systemically weakened policies meant to protect wetlands and other valuable ecosystems.

(Joel Wittnebel/The Pointer files)

Key negative outcomes have included bans on regional planning and green development standards, facilitating both aggregate extraction below the water table and water taking in mine exploration, reduced protections for species at risk, and expanded the use of municipal zoning orders to end-run normal planning. The Province has also restricted the right to appeal permits to those in immediate proximity to the development, silencing individuals and agencies seeking to protect downstream water quality and aquatic life. The PCs are also proposing the privatization of water treatment facilities; and floated endless changes to conservation authorities. More on that below.

Meanwhile, the Made-in-Ontario Environment Plan has been in draft form since November, 2018. The Province has archived its wetland strategy and made it harder to designate a provincially significant wetland, it lacks goals to retain natural heritage, and has no protocols requiring action when provincial water quality objectives have been exceeded. 

In addition, the Province has not released the 10-year review of the Lake Simcoe Protection Plan more than four years after its completion, nor moved on its intention to expand the Greenbelt, although it has tried to take parts of it for housing. It is not enforcing its directive to municipalities to “protect, restore, and improve” water quality and quantity in permitting, has not pursued its own commitment to cumulative monitoring, which may have contributed to the water moratorium in Waterloo, and is struggling with how to reduce the use of road salt, which is corroding infrastructure and concentrating in our waters. 

On the Conservation Authorities Act, it is hard to keep track of how many amendments the government has forced through the legislature. Key mandates for watershed management and the conservation of land have evaporated. Authorities can no longer comment on municipal official plans, they are prohibited from any participation at the Ontario Land Tribunal, and we are now bobbing toward phase three of the proposed consolidation of our 36 authorities. 

Let’s unpack this. The initial phase of the consolidation was one aspect of an omnibus bill that had not been discussed with the authorities, and for which there was virtually no consultation on issues such as establishing common policies, governance of the larger authorities, and an over-sight body called the Ontario Provincial Conservation Agency. 

In phase two, Ontario asked for comments on the boundaries of the proposed regional authorities, not the meat of what was Bill 68, describing which conservation authorities should be in which larger consolidated regional authority. The associated mapping was botched so badly that they were replaced and the deadline for comments was extended.

But then a good thing happened. The government listened at six public meetings with key organizations such as conservation authorities and municipalities, and the dam against public input was inundated by 14,000 submissions. 14,000.

In announcing the completion of phase two, the government indicated that it has altered course by changing the number of regional authorities from seven to nine and, more importantly, has balanced its rhetoric on how conservation authorities must facilitate the Housing Action Plan with a renewed understanding of the importance of healthy watersheds and the role of conservation authorities.

The goal of phase three, announced March 10, is to pass further amendments to the Conservation Authorities Act that are daunting in themselves. These include requiring the Ontario Provincial Conservation Agency to establish nine transition committees, appoint executives and board members, the latter of whom must be elected municipal councillors, and develop a transition plan that must be implemented by the new regional conservation authorities. 

Unfortunately, the government also appears to have reserved for itself a huge swath of powers to suspend, override, and/or supersede conservation authority decision-making on governance, financial and administrative matters, public consultation, and the harmonization of policies. 

The Ontario Headwaters Institute is concerned the government is signalling that it is reverting to the lack of consultation it demonstrated in phase one of this exercise, rather than again tapping the pool of community wisdom it harvested in phase two. As expressed above, there are numerous gaps in how Ontario is addressing watershed security, over and above this proposed consolidation.

We urge the government to continue to conduct fulsome consultation on this file, not just push more legislation through the legislature as it did in phase one, and to expand the discussion. 

Our watersheds need protection, everywhere, not just centralized control in jurisdictions with conservation authorities. 

Andrew McCammon is the executive director of the Ontario Headwaters Institute 

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