The conservation authorities…

The conservation authorities have overreached their authority on private property. Rather than focus on their original mandate to oversee the watershed, they were quick to rear their head to focus on private property owners, to find a violation so they could take people to court. In turn they gained notoriety as bullies and for creating more bylaws at a rate no one was able to keep up with. They created a need for themselves so one had to ask for a permit for practically everything you can think of, creating further hardships. The revenue garnered through permits helped the conservation authorities to buy more land; eventually becoming the second largest land owner in the province. Over the years they gained power over the private property owner, as the courts would only address the violation (lower court overseen by a Justice of the Peace). People's rights to the ownership of their properties were totally ignored. The cost of the conservation authorities ignoring the watershed is now probably in the billions. People living along Lake Ontario and Erie fear their cottages will eventually fall into the lake. Erosion has stripped complete backyards from some cottages. The insurance companies refuse to insure cottagers for flood damage.

I am very happy to see that our provincial government is reigning in the conservation authorities and taking some of their misdirected power away from them. I know of several people whose properties were falsely labelled by the personnel of the conservation authorities causing great financial hardships for the owners, who had to deal with all the restrictions the labelling brought forth.

I commend the Ford government for finally addressing the conservation authorities powers, mostly gained by their own devious manipulation to gain yet more power and land. Land we need to build homes on so that we have homes for everyone in the province. Prime Minister Trudeau is going to increase immigration to 500,000 a year. They will need to live somewhere. Taking back the land from the conservation authorities will help us house everyone including our immigrants. After all the land was donated or bought with taxpayers money. We have better use for it rather than letting it sit empty.