{"id":8558,"date":"2017-12-06T12:56:22","date_gmt":"2017-12-06T17:56:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/?p=8558"},"modified":"2017-12-06T13:24:29","modified_gmt":"2017-12-06T18:24:29","slug":"the-moecc-should-be-protecting-the-environment-not-catering-to-an-irresponsible-developer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/?p=8558","title":{"rendered":"The MOECC should be protecting the environment, not catering to an irresponsible developer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As a result of our November 23, 2017 letter to the Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change (posted <a href=\"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/?p=8553\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">here<\/a>), the MOECC sent us this <a href=\"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/ResponseToM.Shnier,Nov%2023-17corresp.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">December 1, 2017 letter<\/a>\u00a0in reply.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The MOECC&#8217;s reply letter contains environmentally-significant factual errors \u2013 for example that the proponent&#8217;s current non-compliant water treatment system is equivalent to what was approved and that it has adequate capacity. Given this non-compliant water treatment system overflowed for days, it clearly is not equivalent and it does not have adequate capacity.<br \/>\n \u00a0<\/li>\n<li>The MOECC&#8217;s reply letter is very troubling as it claims that if the proponent&#8217;s work releases\u00a0polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), the proponent could and would clean it up. It is not possible to &#8220;clean up&#8221; PCBs released to a river.<br \/>\n \u00a0<\/li>\n<li>But the biggest concern is that the proponent&#8217;s work should be treated as a brownfields redevelopment, as it is the site of an abandoned waterfront industrial facility. The MOECC has procedures for\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ontario.ca\/page\/brownfields-redevelopment\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">brownfields redevelopment here<\/a>, yet they are not requiring the proponent to follow these requirements.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>That is, instead of fulfulling their mandate of protecting the environment, the MOECC is catering to an irresponsible developer that is months behind schedule.<\/p>\n<p>We have therefore sent <a href=\"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/MinisterMOECC,BrownfieldsRedevelopment,20171206.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">this letter<\/a> to the Minister of the MOECC, and we await their reply.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As a result of our November 23, 2017 letter to the Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change (posted here), the MOECC sent us this December 1, 2017 letter\u00a0in reply. The MOECC&#8217;s reply letter contains environmentally-significant factual errors \u2013 for example that the proponent&#8217;s current non-compliant water treatment system is equivalent to what was approved <a href='https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/?p=8558' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-background","category-3-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8558"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8563,"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8558\/revisions\/8563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/savethebalafalls.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}