June 20, 2003

 

 

Ms. Dawn Landry, Policy Adviser

Strategic Policy Branch

135 St. Clair Avenue West, 11th Floor

Toronto, ON

M4V 1P5

 

Dear Ms. Landry:

 

The purpose of this letter is to comment on the recommendations of the Source Water Protection Advisory Committee posted to the Environmental Bill of Rights on May 21, 2003 as EBR Registry Number XA03E0011.

 

The Ontario Sheep Marketing Agency (OSMA) is a producer-run organization representing 4200 sheep producers in the province of Ontario.   In addition to the marketing and promotion of  lamb and wool, OSMA is responsible for research coordination, advocacy and education.   Farm cash receipts for lamb in 2002 equaled $37 million in Ontario.

 

OSMA is a member of a broader Ontario Livestock Group coalition.   This group represents Ontario Pork, the Ontario Cattlemen’s Association, the Ontario Sheep Marketing Agency, the Dairy Farmers of Ontario, the Chicken Farmers of Ontario, the Ontario Turkey Producer’s Marketing Board, the Ontario Broiler Chicken Hatching Egg Producers Association and the Ontario Egg Producers.   This group has spent considerable energy developing a position that reflects the views of livestock agriculture.  OSMA fully supports the Livestock Groups position regarding the Source Water Protection Advisory Committee Recommendations.  The position is based on a number of key principles as follows:

 

1.      Source water protection must be based on rational risk management derived from best available science, balanced with private landowners’ rights and responsibilities.

 

2.      Drinking water source protection plans should be based on science and not a precautionary principle. Consistent with Justice O’Connor’s view, we do not


3.      support a precautionary approach for source water protection planning jurisdiction over land use.

 

4.      There must be a clear focus on the goal of protecting Ontario’s drinking water sources.  We recommend a tiered approach, starting with an overall scan of Ontario’s drinking water sources with a focus on identifying vulnerable communities

 

5.      The stated Advisory Committee goal of “protecting human health though the protection of current and future sources of water” is inappropriate.  This goal suggests that the human health objective can be protected through source protection planning alone.  Source protection must be appropriately recognized as one important barrier in the context of multiple barriers put in place to achieve the human health objective.

 

6.      There must be a clear distinction between drinking water source protection activities and objectives and the broader watershed planning objectives.  Authority and powers intended for protecting specific direct threats to drinking water should not be inappropriately applied in order to achieve other land use planning objectives.

 

7.      We do not support new powers for municipalities to regulate existing land use unless there is strong evidence that there is a significant direct threat to drinking water sources. We envision that this area would be limited to a relatively small and clearly defined area based on rational criteria (i.e scientifically based 50-day time of travel for bacteria parameters, a scientifically based time of travel for nutrients, a scientifically based time of travel for industrial or urban persistent toxins)

 

8.      There are advantages to using existing legislation to address drinking water source protection and we agree with Justice O’Connor’s recommendations that amendments to the Environmental Protection Act are sufficient to address drinking water source protection requirements. We do not support the concept that new, stand-alone legislation for drinking water source protection is required.  We do not believe that such a radical change in the governance of water and water systems is necessary.

 

9.      We do not support the Advisory Committee recommendation for source protection legislation superceding other more balanced legislative provisions based on vaguely defined ‘risk to human health’ criteria.  We believe that this recommendation goes beyond the spirit and intent of O’Connor’s recommendation, and does not provide further clarity or direction to task of identifying ‘significant direct threats’. ‘Risk to human health’ is a vague and poorly defined phrase, and implies legislative supercedence based on a precautionary principle and beyond the area that poses a ‘significant direct threat’.  The call for drinking water source protection superceding other legislative provisions on a broad scale is also inconsistent with Justice O’Connor’s realistic view that recognized that there is a public and societal need for land use activities that could have a negative effect on water.

 

10.  Agriculture is protecting all drinking water sources by completing a Nutrient Management Plan and an Environmental Farm plan. Based on the Cost Effectiveness and Fairness principle put forward in Advisory Committee Recommendation 6, existing land use must be recognized as an existing right. If these rights are impinged upon through drinking water source protection or any other legislative measures, there must be appropriate compensation.

 

11.  The proposed governance structure needs to be altered to allow more stakeholder involvement. Representation should be proportional to land use.  This proposed governance structure does not reflect the principles of sustainability, comprehensiveness, shared responsibility and stewardship, public participation and transparency, cost effectiveness and fairness, and continuous improvement as put forward in Advisory Committee Recommendation 6. We recommend a model similar to the structure that was used in the development of Remedial Action Plans be considered.  Source protection planning committees should report directly to the Ministry of Environment, not the Conservation Authority’s Board of Directors.

 

12.  There is a need for stakeholder groups to be involved, through technical committees, to assist in developing a risk assessment process for identifying vulnerable areas in the province.

 

13.  There is a need for public consultation beyond the Environmental Bill Registry.

 

 

Please refer to Appendix 2 for a more detailed discussion of these issues.   We have organized our comments in a chart indicating the Advisory Committee Recommendations in comparison to Justice O’Connor’s recommendations as well as the Ontario livestock sectors position on source protection.

 

Thank you for the opportunity to voice our concerns about the Source Water Protection Advisory Committee Recommendations.  As a livestock agriculture group we are fully supportive of the general concept of drinking water source protection.  However, the proposed recommendations do not reflect the views of the agricultural community.  Such recommendations would be prohibitive to the sustainability of a viable agriculture sector in our province.

 

If you have any questions about the details in this submission, please contact Chris Attema, Water Quality Specialist, Ontario Sheep Marketing Agency at 519 824 0334 or myself, at (613) 389-0554.

 

                                                          Yours truly,

 

 

                                                          Chris Kennedy

                                                Vice-Chair,

c/o Ontario Sheep Marketing Agency

                                                          130 Malcolm Road, Guelph, ON    N1K 1B1

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