Wednesday December 5: prehearing on possible threat to purest water

Simcoe Uplands Moraine from Site 41. -AWARE Simcoe photo

AWARE News Network

There will be a prehearing conference this week on an application to change the zoning of properties on the Simcoe Uplands Moraine to allow for the expansion of the Teedon gravel pit owned by CRH Canada Group Inc.

The Simcoe Uplands Moraine is the recharge area for an aquifer that has been shown to have the cleanest water ever tested. In 2009, the Anishinaabe Kweag joined with farmers, cottagers and residents to stop a landfill (Dump Site 41) from being built on top of this aquifer.

The land is presently designated ‘rural,’ ‘environment protection I’ and ‘mineral aggregate resource II.’ CRH Canada Group wants to the designations changed to ‘mineral resources I,’ and is challenging the municipality’s failure to make a decision on the matter.

One day has been set aside for the prehearing, to be held at the Tiny Township municipal office, 130 Balm Beach Rd. W. It is scheduled to start at 10:30 am on Wednesday December 5, 2018 and is open to the public.

The purpose of the prehearing is for the Local Planning Appeal Tribunal (LPAT), formerly known as the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB), to identify parties (those who intend to take an active role in proceedings), participants (those who wish to make a statement), the issues at stake as well as other matters.

A full hearing will probably not be held until late 2019.

Note this warning from the tribunal’s official notice: “If you do not attend the prehearing conference, the Local Planning Appeal Tribunal may proceed in your absence and you will not be entitled to any further notice of these proceedings. The Tribunal may finalize the list of appellants, parties and/or participants at this prehearing conference, and may order that no additional appellants, parties and/or participants be added or included in this proceeding, without leave of the Tribunal.”

For more information, follow this link. 

A local group is organizing a protest. For more details, follow this link.

See also this link.

Meanwhile the Ontario Ministry of the Environment is still reviewing CRH’s application for a renewal of its permit to take water, for aggregate washing.