This is coming from someone…

This is coming from someone who works in Herpetological conservation, which is the conservation of reptiles and amphibians. These changes would be catastrophic for our wildlife and ecosystems, and I need to urge you to not let this bill pass. It does not, in fact, "take too long" or "affect housing". I have seen so many success stories come from conservation, and doing this will absolutely undo all our hard work. Most of my work isn't even paid because our funding has been cut and we mostly rely on the public visiting our trails and attending our events, but it's something I'm very passionate about and know firsthand that what we do is important. I've watched populations of turtles, snakes, amphibians, all grow and heal because of our tireless work. We work long, unpaid hours to rehabilitate wildlife, clear invasive species and human waste from natural habitats, raise and release young animals, build hibernaculums, etc. I'm very proud of all the work we've done over the years and my favourite part is seeing how much it benefits not only the animals we work with, but the entire local ecosystem. All this will do is cause even more destruction and make our work harder. Conservation does work. If you want to help with housing, there are many, many unoccupied condos, luxury homes, townhouses, mansions, all around Ontario. Many in my own town. The reason why so many of them are unoccupied is because the price of these homes are unaffordable. There are too many homes built with rich folk in mind that just lay stagnant. How about we take advantage of those homes before they fall apart or get torn down and make them affordable? Whether that includes modifications, etc, it would be much more efficient than targeting conservation.