While some of her colleagues at other conservation authorities may be afraid to speak up, the chair of the Essex Region Conservation Authority is not holding back.
Molly Allaire says the province's decision to amalgamate 36 conservation authorities into nine regional bodies risks responsible home construction and is a waste of taxpayer money.
"Thirty-six to nine is crazy," she said. "I'm worried about local governance."
She wrote a letter to the province outlining her concerns and will travel to Queen's Park on Wednesday to meet with activists who also object to the $20 million plan.
"ERCA operates in a low-lying floodplain surrounded by three bodies of water, and we are already meeting the very provincial objectives this plan claims to address," she wrote. "This is not reform. It is unnecessary disruption."
She said what the province hopes to achieve with the amalgamation isn't clear. She said ERCA was blindsided by the announcement last October. Even a sidebar conversation with Environment, Conservation and Parks Minister, Todd McCarthy, shed little light on Queen's Parks' objectives. She has also sent a letter as a resident, and the Town of Amherstburg, where Allaire is a councillor, sent one too.
"If the goal is efficiency, then act like it. Work directly with Conservation Authorities to identify gaps, set enforceable standards and streamline approvals where needed. A blanket amalgamation of this scale is a blunt, costly instrument that ignores science, local expertise, and common sense," she wrote.
The Essex Region Conservation Authority and others were created in the early 1970s to address reckless development on flood-prone and erosion-sensitive areas.
Instead of drawing the new boundaries based on watershed conditions, the province based it on population. ERCA will be amalgamated with the Upper Thames River, Lower Thames Valley, and St. Clair conservation authorities into the new Western Lake Erie Regional Conservation Authority.
Allaire also points out that amalgamation is expected to cost the province $20-million.
"What are you doing with that money?" she asked. "If they're saying there are a few authorities that are incapable of doing digital platforming, why don't you use that money, maybe even half of it, to fix those gaps?"
She's spoken with colleagues at other authorities, but "people are scared to speak up," she said. "We still need the provincial government to give us money for other things. So, they're concerned if they speak up right now, their municipalities may not receive that funding."
