It is not a well kept secret…

It is not a well kept secret that the current government of Ontario is not a supporter of the Conservation Authorities (CA) that oversee the watershed management of local communities as well as provide critical information about natural hazards that help protect municipalities.

You must only look back to 2019 when the Ford government was first elected to power and began immediately by cutting flood management program funding by 50% to CA's that help to forecast flooding and issue warnings, monitor stream flow, regulate development activities in flood plains, educate the public about flooding and protect natural cover that helps reduce the impacts of flooding. This harms all Ontarians but disproportionately smaller and more rural areas as they depend on local CA's to alert them of potentially dangerous flooding events or other natural hazards that may be imminent in their communities.

CA's have been a part of Ontario since 1946 when the Conservation Authorities Act was first passed in order to help focus on issues like flooding and erosion. CA's roles drastically increased ever since 1954 when Hurricane Hazel produced record rainfall in and around the Greater Toronto Area, leading to millions of dollars of damages and unfortunately some fatalities. These damages would have been even worse if it hadn't been for CA's which had focused flood prevention efforts towards the municipality of Brampton, which was routinely hit by similar devastation from the Etobicoke Creek. Luckily the Etobicoke Creek CA had just recently finished construction on a bypass channel around Brampton that helped to reduce some flooding in the area from this horrendous event.

The Ford government tries to play it both ways sometimes, as we saw when they gave $14 million in funding to the Greenlands Conservation Partnership in 2023 in order to protect ecologically important natural areas and preserve the province’s natural diversity. But why provide such funding when they had just four years prior cut CA's funding by half and eliminated the 50 Million Tree Program? The government has authorities in place to help provide these mandates of ecological protection but wishes to privatize anything it can as we have already seen with the healthcare and education system.

It seems the Ford government has a pretty clear track record of defunding, blaming an organization for its short falls and then praising a private entity on all the good it is doing for the people of Ontario. Now we are seeing it with the consolidation of the CA's where a a provincial board-governed agency would now oversee what the CA's can and more importantly can not do. If the Ford government is so concerned with the fact that each CA is following different policies, standards and fees then maybe it is time to come up with an overarching policy that all CA's can follow to help reduce these issues. In the end the real reason the Ford government is reducing the power, resources and funding to CA's is to as they put "better align conservation authorities’ services with provincial priorities on housing, the economy, infrastructure," by reducing red tape and allowing the speedy construction of new infrastructure in areas that historically have either been protected or deemed unsuitable will lead to increased flood risks and devastation to the environment throughout Ontario.

Local CA's are exactly that local. By creating these seven gigantic condensed CA's the smaller communities that rely on more localized weather updates and information will be lost in the shuffle and will suffer from it. Flooding and major weather events are only becoming more frequent and this requires more investment into these CA's, not less and definitely not trying to remove them of the little power they have left by having them overseen by a government appointed board that will only see to it that the Ford governments demands are met. CA's should have their voices heard when it comes to major projects that are being undertaken in Ontario so they can see that the proper environmental stewardship is being considered. The economy is important I do agree, but the economy isn't the only thing. Without land to enjoy and protect what will this really all be about in the end, the Earth will always be around whether we are or not but it should be considered in all accounts.