As a taxpaying Ontario…

As a taxpaying Ontario resident of 70 years, I am against this proposal to amend the Provincial Parks and Conservations Reserves Act of 2006 to support Wasaga Beach Tourism Enhancement. The Ontario government must protect our established provincial parks and must protect an endangered species.

Bulletins issued by Birds Canada, Environmental Defense, and the Green Party of Ontario advise the Ontario government proposes to sell 60% of the Georgian Bay shorelines and habitats located within Wasaga Beach Provincial Park. Empowered and emboldened by recent changes in Bill 5, the MPs can override important laws in place for decades to make way for housing or economic development. This action would reduce the population of the Piping Plover, an endangered shorebird, as the nesting habitat along the beaches and the water release from dams into rivers prevents it from breeding in its prime habitat. As per a July 28, 2025 Environmental Defense article, “The Point”, located in Beach Area 1 which is one of those targeted to be removed, is designated as a provincially significant earth science Area of Natural and Scientific Interest (ANSI).” The Provincial Government and MPs are blatantly ignoring this designation.

The Georgian Bay shorelines and habitat within the Wasaga Beach Provincial Park boundaries are owned by the people of Ontario – hundreds of thousands of visitors a year. There is no justification to sell land to develop the business plan for Wasaga Beach township, which will include selling land to developers to build “a few” multi-billion-dollar homes – this is not adding economic value and is not solving a housing crisis.

A 2011 article published by the Canadian Journal of Zoology (link below) provided this peer-reviewing scientific information:
- Only 5000 piping plovers remain in the Americas, reduced from 10’s of thousands in the early 1900’s.
- In 1916-1918 both the Canadian and the US governments passed laws to protect the Piping Plover.
- In 1985, the Federal Government listed it as endangered under the Species at Risk Act.
- Its habitat has been gravely reduced in the Great Lakes, and now only breeds in the Canadian Prairies south area and northeast coast of North American, from Nova Scotia to Carolinas.

The Ontario Government’s mandate is to protect this endangered species. The minimum action required is.

• Keep Wasaga Beach intact and protected. It cannot be sold.
• Use scientific management plans and co-operation of the Ontario experts (provincial, federal, municipal government) and consult with trusted organizations such as the authors of the Canadian Journal of Zoology, and Birds Canada.
• Commit provincial funding to protect, conserve, and steward Piping Plovers, their nests, and their habitats.
• Restrict mechanical raking so that the habitat is not destroyed, prohibiting dune alteration, and protecting nests with fenced buffer zones and natural predator mitigations.