!00% opposed to amending the…

!00% opposed to amending the Provincial Parks and Conservations Reserves Act and the Historical Parks Act

Reasons:
• Opening these Acts to facilitate a request by a municipality for a land transfer is an undeniable and dangerous precedent with no defense; “the Government gave provincial park land to Wasaga – they can do the same thing here” arguments will be applied by those making the request simply by saying their need is for tourism.
• On or about November 1975 members of the Federation of Ontario Naturalists opined “We are prepared to accept the area currently being planned as provincial park (Wasaga Beach Provincial Park), only because we believe that it offers the sole hope for protecting any of the provincially significant, biological areas which occur at Wasaga Beach” (see page 218, Protected Places, by Gerald Killan). This perspective was offered in the context of increasing needs for recreational opportunities by Ontario residents. What was said 50 years ago is even more relevant now with increased urbanization and population growth in southern Ontario, especially the GTA.
• The Town has opined that Nancy Island is historically very significant, and a significant part of the tourism proposal. The former statement is correct. However, the narrow piece of land between Nancy Island and the Beach, for the most part all Town owned land, has been turned over to a local developer to build townhouse condos. Had the condos provided some historical architectural connection to the Nancy Island this might have worked, but these are condos found in any subdivision in Ontario. This action of turning culturally significant municipal land over to a developer for typical subdivision condos does not support tourism nor distinguish Wasaga Beach in any manner. This is the precedent for any provincial part land turned over to the Town.
• People in Wasaga, and probably the politicians too, have been told there will be no building on the beach. This would appear to a careful choice of words for it provides for building up-shore from high-water line demarking the edge of the beach. Once this provincial park land is in municipal hands there will be no barrier stopping the Town from turning the current provincial park land over to developers, as has been done with the municipal lands by Nancy Island.
• The Town proposals have all said that the Beach will always be accessible. However, the Town has already posted signs in other beach areas advising that the historically used beach access paths are no longer available for use. As the saying goes: actions speak louder than words, and this action indicates limited access to the “publicly available beach”
• People use cars to access the Park. In fact, the management of cars was one of the reasons for establishing back-land parking zones within the Park 50 years ago. Contrary to other opinions, these parking zones are well-used on the weekends, as originally intended. Despite repeated requests by residents of where is the parking none of the schemes provided have shown any parking. So the question remains, other than for the residents of the condos being built where are people going to park to access the Beach.

In summary, to open the Acts and transfer the provincial park lands to the municipality is simply a disaster waiting to happen. Do not open the Acts to enable this proposal.