I'm very worried about the…

I'm very worried about the proposed amalgamation of the 36 Conservation Authorities into 7 Regional CAs. This goes against everything I've learned about government and communities working together to build local trust and partnerships.

Our local voices will no longer be heard, we will have reduced service levels and the trust will be gone. Each community has different needs and these needs have to be addressed individually and locally. Specialists in our areas can educate our local decision makers and residents.

It is our local decision makers that need to make the decisions and be held accountable. They can only do that if the Conservation Authorities remain local.

In this time of climate change and extreme weather, we need our local conservation authorities to carefully manage our watersheds and to ensure best practices are followed for farming, fishing and other activities. Flooding and fish kills and drought are all going to make a horrible impact on our lives and we must have local experts available when disasters occur, as well as to make good decisions to ensure fewer disasters.

These are scary times and we need more specialist and experts, not fewer. How will you feel when your roads flood and you have to call someone from the Province, many, many kilometres away? Do you really believe they will come running to your immediate rescue? No, but our local conservation authorities will.