As a longtime resident of…

As a longtime resident of rural Hamilton who lives beside one of our many beautiful waterfalls and uses HCA trails daily, I do NOT support the proposed changes to the boundaries of provincial conservation authorities. The popularity of nearby HCA resources has grown exponentially in the past 5 years and as a result, the HCA has responded to community members' concerns about traffic and accessibility issues by instituting solutions that have required close attention to local road usage and unique community concerns. This ability to create local solutions to local problems would be greatly diminished by creation of the proposed mega conservation authority. If, as the government claims, the proposed change would address the issue of differing standards among existing conservation authorities, then the obvious solution would be to undertake the creation of a set of province-wide standards to govern all existing conservation authorities. I am also concerned about the lack of consultation with stakeholders like us prior to tabling of this proposed major change. There is also no reason why investment in a common permitting portal cannot proceed once a shared set of standards has been identified. It seems clear that the government's real reason for proposing this change is to diminish the influence of conservation authorities in hopes of using sensitive and protected lands to build housing. That seems like a laudable goal, given the housing crisis, although what is often omitted from this rationale is the fact that the type of housing that developers would build on these lands is not the type that is actually most needed. Developers want to build and sell high priced single family homes, not affordable homes or apartment buildings. I wish the government would incentivize developers to create the accessible and affordable types of housing that lower income people actually need. Thank you for the opportunity to provide a comment on this disastrous proposed change.