Nelson quarry gets okay from Simcoe County councillors
By Kate Harries AWARE News Network
Simcoe County councillors today approved an aggregate development in Adjala-Tosorontio after receiving assurances from Mayor Mary Small Brett that she and her council are “comfortable” with the application by Nelson Aggregate, owned by Richard and Joyce Donnelly.
The decision has to be ratified by council at its next meeting.
Responding to a question from Springwater Mayor Bill French, Small Brett said Adjala-Tosorontio council “as a whole is very comfortable with this going forward as designated. This property was designated aggregate. The bylaw that we passed was to change it from aggregate resource to aggregate extraction.”
The development, at 5556 and 5670 County Road 13 at 5 Sideroad, has been opposed by residents for a number of reasons, including the impact on the aquifer of below-the-water-table extraction.
Oro-Medonte Deputy Mayor Ralph Hough asked to what depth the company plans to excavate. Debbie Korolnek, the county’s manager of engineering and transportation, said she didn’t have that information.
Noting that most of the approval process is regulated by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, Small Brett added that all of the “planning qualifications’’ were addressed before council made its decision. Two open houses were held and the consultant Burnside peer-reviewed the application twice, she said. “The questions have been answered to the satisfaction of our planner.”
Small Brett said that 38 acres of the 180-acre site designated aggregate is now to be designated environmental protection, “and we feel that is a great benefit to the community, so yes, we’re comfortable with it.”
French commented that he has read that the demand in the GTA over the next five years is going to be for 1.5 billion tons of aggregate and in 2009, it was found that there was only 103 million tons within 50 kilometres of the GTA. “The problem with the GTA is that they’ve build over their valuable aggregate resources and now they’re spreading it out to 100 and then 200 kilometres,” French said. “There’s going to be holes dug everywhere and we’d better be aware of that.”
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