Thursday June 22nd, 2017…

Thursday June 22nd, 2017

Mr. Sanjay Coelho - Senior Policy Analyst Ministry of Environment & Climate Change Land & Water Policy Branch 40 St. Clair Avenue West 10TH Floor, Toronto, Ontario, M4V 1M2

Subject:Excess Soil Management Regulatory Proposal Environmental Registry EBR Number: 013-0299

In response to the Ministry of Environment & Climate Change (MOECC) request for comments by June 23rd, 2017 respecting your posting of EBR Number 013-0299 and as a municipality continuously under pressure to receive excess soils from the GTA, the Town of Mono is pleased to provide you with the following comments for your consideration as summarized below:

1.We recommend the creation of an MOECC telephone hotline or web based on-line portal to provide Ontario citizens with a straight forward approach for reporting suspected unauthorized excess soil activities as well as reporting concerns about activities not otherwise subject to an ESMP. The hotline or web portal should provide options whereby incoming calls or online posts are first put through a screening check to ensure that messages can only be left after the concerned caller first verifies through the on-line ESMP registry that their concern has not been previously addressed through the new Regulations in order to avoid “false alarms.”

2.Specific amendments to the Conservation Authorities Act need clarification to foster aligned and seamless enforcement actions in partnership with Provincial ministries, municipalities and conservation authorities;

3.It is imperative to ensure that funding tools, permit application fees, review fees, performance securities and enforcement fines fully match their respective and combined explicit and implicit costing implications;

4.In view of the Loopstra Nixon paper entitled, “Site Alteration By-laws and the Dirty Business of “Clean Fill” presented to the International Municipal Lawyers Association (IMLA) on May 29th 2014, there is a clear need to assign stricter non-compliant and/or un-permitted excess soils activities on both source site owners and haulage contractors that includes a municipal bylaw enforcement ticket system similar to those permitted under the Highway Traffic Act;

5.Clarity is needed regarding the transfer of liability throughout the conveyance process of transfer of ownership or custody of excess soils once they leave the source site and this includes regulatory provisions to examine any rural or farmland purchases by source site owners and/or haulage contractors to prohibit loop hole incidents pertaining to the proposed regulatory permissions whereby an owner of both a source site and receiving site is one and the same;

6.Lengthen the period of receiving site re-use period from 90 days to no more than 180 days to better align with building construction seasonal time periods;

7.There is no apparent mention of any aligned Federal involvement respecting excess soils from both source sites and receiving sites (e.g. aerodromes);

8.Clarity regarding receiving sites within any Provincial Plans jurisdictions such that approved placement of excess soils or any site alterations also conform to the provisions of the Plan such that the higher standard prevails;

9.Proposed volume thresholds that would exempt a source site from preparation of an ESMP does not appear to be adequately defined other than reference to total volume of less than 1000m3;

10.Require enhanced pit and quarry rehabilitations programs with OMNRF including better use of excess soils wherever feasible and in view of the broader public demand for enhanced pit and quarry rehabilitation requirements. Repository tipping royalties for the municipal authority should also be assigned in similar fashion to those for extracting aggregates;

11.Consider regulatory provisions to require a comparable ESMP similar to those for volumes exceeding 1000m3 but for total volumes between 999m3 and about 500m3;

12.Presently there does not seem to be any creative alternatives being considered for the majority of excess soils that are being generated from development in the GTA and these could include:

i)Land reclamation within identified GTA waterfront locations to enhance land supplies for affordable or non-profit housing; ii)Waterfront parkland enhancements; iii)Recreational facilities enhancements (i.e., alpine ski resorts whether or not in a Provincial Plan); iv)Industrial site or port site enhancements; v)Off-shore fisheries habitats (i.e., similar to the Lake Simcoe Kempenfelt Bay project).

Yours very truly, Town of Mono

David Trotman Director of Planning

C.C.Mayor Laura Ryan Members of Town Council

[Original Comment ID: 209798]