I have a number of concerns…

I have a number of concerns regarding Bill 66. As a resident in both rural and urban areas I have seen the effects of poor management and control over environmental concerns, particularly with respect to safe drinking water, the water tables (quarries, industry, selling water etc). Controls were put in place for reasons and should not be randomly discarded or passed over. Additionally, the prospect of opening the green belt or any other swath of good farmland to development is short-sighted. Another aspect of concern is with the heritage laws and the potential to disregard the inconvenient aspects of heritage, eg archeological testing that costs money and delays to development but is very important to telling the story of those who came before. In the past 30 years this aspect of heritage has risen from emergency rescues of a few sites to excavations on a scale that provide scope for truly meaningful research. More recently, the interaction between First Nations, archaeologists and the public around such sites has increased our awareness of history and its effect on the present and future. The positive outcomes of increased knowledge and understanding cannot be enumerated in dollars and cents. I am opposed to Bill 66 in its current form.