It should be recognized that…

It should be recognized that the environment, including all significant waterways, belongs to the people collectively, and is not subject to private ownership.

It should be further recognized that the major source of water pollution is industrial pollution, and that this is vastly exacerbated by corporate malfeasance.

It is clear by now that the penalties for corporate polluters are insufficient. The penalties need to be sufficiently DEVASTATING to companies to serve as a deterrent. For example, if they are found in deliberate, or obvious negligent violation of our environmental laws, they should forfeit an entire quarters profit, or be fined in the tens of millions of dollars, whichever is greater. There should be the potential for decision makers to be charged criminally. While this is merely an arbitrary example, it is intended to demonstrate the SCALE of the punishment necessary to make bad actors take notice.

Nestle has been illegally STEALING--that is ABSOLUTELY what it is, and we should be calling it that and nothing else--Ontario's water for years now and has faced no meaningful punishment. We should subject them to the absolute maximum punishment the law allows and sending a clear signal that the law is about to get far stricter, such that future offenders will face penalties many orders of magnitude stronger than those that currently exist.

Ontario should also be working with the federal government to assert our rights under the Boundary Waters Treaty via the International Joint Commission to pressure the United States into taking a stronger stance on protecting the Great Lakes watershed. While there is probably little point in pursuing this while the Trump administration remains in power, we should be well-prepared to act in this regard as soon as this is no longer the case.

It should be recognized that business is vastly over-represented in policy making, especially in areas related to the environment. As business has largely been the source, rather than the solution, of environmental problems, they should be divested of the majority of their influence in this regard. Environmental decisions should be made by scientists who recognize that the health of the ecosystem is fundamental to life on earth, and has priority over economic considerations, and particularly over corporate profit. Local communities affected should always be adequately consulted.

Lastly, opportunities for public input, such as this, should be FAR, FAR more highly publicized. It is difficult to access the internet without finding news of some irrelevant fashion trend and what celebrity was spotted wearing it. Important decisions like this should usurp the news cycle from such idiocies. Pay for it out of fines levied against polluting corporations...use the amber alert system, or something like it...but get the word out. As things stand the only people likely to ever comment, other than dedicated environmentalists, are those representing interests who have a financial stake in making things worse (i.e. polluting) at the expense of the health of our environment. Adequately publicizing the public input process would help to ameliorate this.