The Blue Mountains Council Supports Conserving Green Spaces!

Council voted unanimously to work with regional partners and the province to enhance local land conservation through a formal collaboration process.  

This calls for a celebration! Local residents and environmental advocates were thrilled to witness a 5-0 vote by The Blue Mountains Council to move forward with a proposal to increase the collaboration between stakeholders in order to protect the green spaces along the Niagara Escarpment.  

The motion, put forward by Councillor Alex Maxwell, goes beyond The Blue Mountains and requests that staff collaborate with neighbouring municipal and regional councils and other stakeholders to create planning processes that incorporate natural environment protection and sustainability as guiding principles. The motion acknowledges the importance of our natural environment to all aspects of our regional economy, combatting climate change, and maintaining healthy ecosystems for generations to come.  

The Motion for the Protection of Green Space received strong community support from residents who wrote letters and spoke at the January 23rd Council meeting. Local resident and Escarpment Corridor Alliance (ECA) Director George Knowles informed council members at the meeting that, “we can’t solve all the problems around the world, but it’s up to us to do what we can, where we are, right here, right now, in the Town of The Blue Mountains. And we know that nature doesn’t pay attention to political boundaries, so we need to work in concert with Grey Highlands, Collingwood, and Clearview. As the saying goes, we need to think globally and act locally. This motion offers a chance to act big locally, right here, at home.”  

The ECA is a coalition of local residents, businesses, and organizations who are alarmed plans to turn key parts of the brow and prominent slopes of the Niagara Escarpment into mega-developments. The ECA is encouraged by The Blue Mountains Council’s strong leadership and support of the motion and hopes that it will help municipalities to reconsider inappropriate developments such as the proposal for Castle Glen that would replace over 1,500 acres of forest and ecologically-sensitive wetlands with 1,600 homes, hotels, three golf courses and 54,000 square feet of retail space.   

“Kudos to Town of The Blue Mountains Council for making the right decision and voting to pass this motion recognizing the true value of our natural heritage,” said ECA President Bruce Harbinson. “Land conservation principles don’t necessarily align with political boundaries which is why this motion and having collaboration across all of our region’s municipalities is so important and timely.”  

Support for Save Georgian Bay! 

Support for Save Georgian Bay! 

The fight to protect and preserve our land- is multi-faceted and requires groups and citizens to step up and collaborate wherever possible. Our friends over at Save Georgian Bay are one of these groups and they recently landed an important victory: 

The Independent Electricity System Operator concluded that “TC [Energy’s] [pump storage] proposal did not provide sufficient value to Ontario’s electricity consumers.” 

This is significant pushback against TC Energy and its plan to damage a beautiful and important part of the environment for a shortsighted – and now shown to be not valuable – project.  

However, it’s not over. Ontario’s Minister of Energy, staying true to the Ontario PC’s brand of supporting development over the environment, asked for a re-evaluation of the proposal.  

In other words, Minister Todd Smith wants a second chance for TC Energy.  

And we need to help Save Georgian Bay get as many letters as possible signed to tell IESO Executives and politicians that South Georgian Bay residents oppose the project. It’s an easy process, but time is running out, so please get your letters in ASAP! You can find the information and a form letter HERE.

It is deeply concerning to see the environment under threat on so many fronts. Shortsighted and irresponsible development projects are being proposed in many areas of our beautiful province.  

It can seem overwhelming:  Bill 23, Greenbelt amendments, mega-developments in Castle Glen, energy storage units that don’t deliver value … can we win this? 

From our perspective, there is a silver lining in all of this. Yes, the threats to the environment are seriously troubling and we have a lot of work to do to win these fights. 

However, this government aside, what the past few months have shown us is the number of good people in our region. Citizens that step up and collaborate in multi-partisan ways to fight back. 

In the past few months, we have seen people signing petitions, donating money despite tough economic times for many of us, voting for environmentally conscious councils, signing letters, making calls … the list goes on. 

To be successful, we must continue this level of collaboration and support to ensure that the beautiful and natural biodiversity of the Escarpment continues to exist for future generations. 

Sending the letter to the IESO is one of these tasks that take very little time but has a big impact. It will help Save Georgian Bay be successful, and ultimately helps ECA with our mission to conserve the natural environment in the region. 

We all fight the same fight and if we stick together, we can make the impossible happen. Please click on the link and write your letter today – and help Save Georgian Bay!