Complete copy of comments is…

Complete copy of comments is included as a link due to the large size of the comments.

This isn’t likely the intended feedback in response to the proposed changes to the management of excess construction soil and brownfields redevelopment, ERO number 013-5000. These are however valid comments centered on factual evidence and therefore should qualify and meet the criteria set out on the Environmental Registry of Ontario website. Uncontrolled large-scale soil dumping is definitely a systemic problem involving the Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks in Ontario (MECP) and the Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs, and is directly related to the widespread destruction of Ontario’s environment. The problem of large-scale soil dumping isn’t improving despite assurances that MECP regulations are to be improved in the future. It has become clear that the majority of Ontario government agencies associated in title with protecting Ontario’s environment consider the term rural as equivalent to saying abandoned land, which can be abused as needed for the sake of urban development.

There is more than one large scale soil dumping site in the Township of Ramara. The attached map of Ramara Township indicates the five known large-scale soil dumping sites in Ramara Township and one close by in Carden Township, City of Kawartha Lakes. These are just the sites that are known.
Noncompliance is the issue. The protective measures of Ramara Township Fill Bylaw 2012.70, now Ramara Township Fill Bylaw 2018.64, A Bylaw To Prohibit Or Regulate The Placing Or Dumping Of Fill In The Township Of Ramara has never been properly applied or enforced, thus allowing unmonitored large scale soil dumping of many thousands of cubic metres of soil to take place at these sites. There is very limited soil testing information available through submitted Freedom of Information requests and it is only available for two dump site locations. The soil samples were taken from huge source site piles of material and analyzed months before the soil was eventually moved. The soil analysis of three soil samples was supposed to be representative of the many thousands of cubic metres of soil of potentially contaminated soil that has been dumped at these sites. At the one location proposed to be a gun range over 50,000 cubic metres of soil has been dumped and Simcoe County representatives have informed us that a further 100 trucks per day for three to six months of additional soil is planned to be dumped at the site.

It is a reasonable assumption that Ramara Township’s lack of due diligence has emboldened unscrupulous operators to initiate further large-scale soil dumping activities in Ramara Township. Additional dumping sites are expected to be identified, and why shouldn’t this be predictable when it has been determined that Ramara Township has repeatedly demonstrated neglect by not applying and enforcing their Ramara Township Fill Bylaw.

As the development of the GTA has progressed and large industrial areas have been excavated there has been a concerted effort to move the soil to large holding areas where brokers are actively marketing the soil and providing very lucrative financial incentives to anyone who is willing to take the soil. Two of the most commonly used justifications for hauling and dumping this potentially contaminated soil is the claim of developing a gun range or aerodrome. In some instances, these projects turned out to simply be a front for pocketing the financial incentive of accepting soil. Some of the other setups include initial reported projects that are often a hoax and the net result is a property owner, which can often be a numbered company, selling the property and leaving the many thousands of cubic metres of potentially contaminated soil for someone else to deal with.

A distinction needs to be made between landfills needed to manage Toronto’s garbage problem (that is apparently in the process of becoming rural Ontario’s problem) and the soil excavations of potentially contaminated soil in the GTA being offered with financial compensation to be dumped in any rural Ontario municipality that will allow large scale soil dumping. There are similarities, however the quiet targeting of municipalities for potential landfill sites for future Toronto garbage by private landfill operators differs from the ongoing problem of large-scale soil dumping activity because this destructive practise is continually being secretively dispersed into discreet areas all-over rural Ontario. This activity has existed for a while now and has been rapidly taking place over the past few years due to the unprecedented construction activity in the GTA and the continuous sprawling development of expropriated farmland. The incentive to redevelop old contaminated industrial sites has never been greater and the excavated soils have created huge volumes of soil to be removed, especially from the GTA.

The Ontario Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks, should be the responsible provincial ministry, however all they have been offering is voluntary guidelines, thus downloading the responsibility onto municipalities. The actual responsibility for the importation of soil solely belongs to municipalities and most municipalities have been ill prepared to handle the huge influx of soil that is being moved onto rural Ontario properties in their jurisdiction. Therefore, the Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs has a direct responsibility to ensure municipalities are adequately supported financially and administratively to manage the huge influx of responsibilities associated with large scale soil dumping. Many Ontario municipalities do not have effective Fill Bylaws or the staffing resources to address the many aspects of concern involving large scale soil dumping. A much greater level of training is necessary to properly manage and provide the desperately needed oversight that large scale soil dumping imposes upon limited municipal resources.

The following excerpt is from a letter received from the District Manager, Barrie District Office, Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks, which emphasizes that the responsibility for regulating fill placement belongs to the municipalities and conservation authorities. The municipalities don’t understand or recognize the level of significance that has been placed on them to apply and enforce their local Fill Bylaws and permits. The conservation authorities, although their expected involvement is thoroughly documented, appear to have had their teeth pulled as municipalities are opting out of conservation authority collaborations.

“As indicated in my letter dated March 19, 2018, municipalities and conservation authorities are responsible for regulating fill placement through their related by-laws and permits. The Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change (ministry) has read your original Letter of Concern, and will continue to direct your concerns to the Township of Ramara, who is the regulatory authority for fill placement.”
Municipal councils and staff are being overwhelmed with the demands being placed upon them to address large scale soil dumping. In the case of Ramara Township and other municipalities including the Township of Scugog and the City of Kawartha Lakes environmental concerns were not initially properly evaluated and given the level of priority that is necessary. Financially strapped municipalities like Ramara Township are keen to accept any version of development and will take a defensive stance against any resistance to development, regardless of environmental destruction, contravention of Official Plans or objections from Ramara Township residents.

The Management of Excess Soil - A Guide for Best Management Practices has been repeatedly mentioned when talking to Ramara Township representatives, including the Chief Building Official. The people who aren’t effectively utilizing this document are the people who are proposing the development and the same Ramara Township officials responsible for applying and enforcing the local Fill Bylaws. It is time that the MECP accepts the obvious fact that simply providing a set of guidelines to developers and owners of source & receiving sites and encouraging municipalities and Conservation Authorities to follow the guidelines is ridiculously ineffective. Environmental concerns have been identified at several Ramara Township properties due to large scale soil dumping activities and this is due to noncompliance with the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw. We are regularly being told by Ramara Township representatives that "what is done is done” and they will consider using the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw in the future. It is absurd to believe that the individuals entrusted with applying and enforcing the protective measures of the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw, who have repeatedly manipulated exemptions to the use of the Fill Bylaw to fabricate blame for the large-scale soil dumping, can possibly be trusted to properly apply the bylaw at all.

The province's solution to the excess GTA soil problems is currently to scatter the soils all over the rural Ontario countryside. The province and the MECP are not taking any responsibility for this large-scale soil dumping activity, and unscrupulous operators are seeing an opportunity to make an easy buck finding rural locations to hide the potentially contaminated soil. In the case of Ramara Township, as it has been targeted with multiple large-scale soil dumping sites, the Ramara Township representatives have been strictly denying the activity and then slowly reacting to the fallout after it becomes impossible to deny any further.

The MECP must get involved where large scale soil dumping is concerned. The credibility of the Ontario Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks is very much in question. Why does this ministry funded by Ontario tax payers exist if it doesn’t have a mandate to step up and responsibly become involved with regulating a serious environmental hazard like widespread uncontrolled large-scale soil dumping of potentially contaminated soils?

The MECP must take full responsibility for the regulation of the huge source sites and remediation sites. The excavated soils must remain in and be remediated in the municipalities they originated in. The carbon foot print of thousands of truckloads of soil being hauled many kilometres north, east and west of the GTA must be stopped. Take care of the problem where it was created. Rural Ontario must not continue to be made the dumping ground for urban Ontario’s legacy of dirty environmental secrets. We must protect our rural water sources from dirty dirt.

On November 28, 2018 the Canadian Urban Institute (CUI) hosted the second annual Excess Soil Symposium that took place at the Ajax Convention Centre. The Soil Symposium was well attended by over 300 people from the business of development, excavation, movement, and tracking of soil and from municipalities dealing with receiving it, and from the communities and neighbours affected. We also attended the event and were thoroughly amazed at the vast scale that Large Scale Soil Dumping has grown to as an industry that is very seriously endorsed by the current provincial government. This industry involves large scale soil brokers and many municipalities in the affluent GTA or Golden Horseshoe eager to find inexpensive and readily accessible areas to market and pay land owners to accept the excess soils. Despite all the rhetoric from lobby groups and the current provincial government of improvements to the management of excess soils this newly discovered lucrative industry to a large degree simply involves huge source site stock piles of many types of soils and materials that is distributed throughout the province based on a minuscule amount of testing of the soils. The most cost effective and direct movement of the soils has been accomplished by lining up private trucking operators willing to basically haul anything anywhere for a price. At the Excess Soil Symposium there was a whole session on illegal dumping, starting with the illegal dumping by organized crime in Quebec, where the law found it difficult to prosecute and the government lost in court. Quebec then began to educate landowners about the dangers of allowing soils onto their property and the illegal dumping gradually began to drop off. Just in the Lake Simcoe Regional Conservation Authorities jurisdiction there are 100 illegal dump sites in its regulated area. As long as the federal, provincial and municipal governments who are supposed to represent our interests and our environment are engaged in a system where payments are made to landowners to find locations for the excess soil, while at the same time are incapable of applying and enforcing the necessary protective measures, then this industry will naturally and inevitably expand. At $100 per truckload to the land owner, which has been reported by one of the truck drivers at one known site, and 200 truckloads per day over a 30-day period the landowner pockets $600,000. Much higher figures than $100 per truck load have been reported. When municipalities are unable or disinterested in applying or enforcing their Fill Bylaws then there is little or possibly no expense involved on the part of the landowner. Organized crime has a long-established history of exploiting publicly funded enterprises that have been foolishly set up for failure by various levels of government at the cost of our environment.

The following comment was provided to the Environmental Registry of Ontario regarding ERO# 013-4208, entitled Preserving and Protecting our Environment for Future Generations: A Made-in-Ontario Environmental Plan.

During the recent 2018 Ontario Excess Soil Symposium, hosted by the Canadian Urban Institute, that took place on November 28, 2018 at the Ajax Convention Centre, two questions were asked of the participating panel speakers.

1. What training is available to municipal staff and councillors to assist in coping with the large-scale soil dumping that has been proposed and, in many cases, forced on municipalities?

Despite one of the panel speakers repeatedly mentioning the importance of outreach and training there wasn't any known training offered as available to municipal staff or councillors to prepare them for the responsibilities of managing the large-scale soil dumping where they have been made responsible for managing the application and enforcement of municipal Fill Bylaws.

2. How can municipalities be compelled to enforce their own Fill Bylaws?

One of the panel speakers representing the application of municipal law responded that, "municipalities are not required to follow their own bylaws". The panelist went on to explain that to compel a municipality to follow their own Bylaws would require the application of a lawsuit against the municipality. The panelist was very blunt and to the point. A costly and very likely lengthy lawsuit stands as the only method available to a municipal resident when a municipality insists on not applying or enforcing their Fill Bylaw. No other oversight or accountability for Ontario's municipal bylaws was available from the vast spectrum of participants at a symposium representing Ontario's excess soil interests.

Where is the substance to the stated "GUIDING PRINCIPLES TO ENSURE WE ADDRESS ENVIRONMENTAL CHALLENGES IN THE MOST RESPONSIBLE, EFFECTIVE, MEASURABLE AND BALANCED WAY" that is mentioned in ERO# 013-4208?

Clear rules - strong enforcement: We will ensure that polluters are held accountable with tougher penalties, while reducing regulatory burden for responsible businesses

Trust and transparency: We will provide Ontarians with the information and tools required – with a particular focus on real-time monitoring – to understand the current environmental challenges we face and how these challenges impact individuals, businesses and communities across the province

Resilient communities and local solutions: We recognize that environmental impacts faced by communities across Ontario may be very different. We will work with these communities and use best scientific practices and other evidence-based methods to develop unique solutions to their challenges

Rural municipalities east, west and north of the GTA are carrying the heavy responsibilities of managing all of the liabilities associated with the final destinations for the vast majority of Ontario's excess soil. Without properly recognizing the need to adequately support the municipalities that are expected to receive the ever-increasing volume of excess soil that is being generated in Ontario the guiding principles are empty words. The management of excess soils in Ontario, from the point of view of many rural municipalities, has become synonymous with the long-term responsibilities of uncontrolled large-scale soil dumping, where it is common knowledge that illicit activities and organized crime are well involved. As more and more municipalities decide it isn't in their best interest to accept excess soils, what does the current provincial government propose as a solution to managing excess soils in Ontario into the future?

Several stories of other Ontario municipalities allowing large scale soil dumping in their jurisdictions and the accounts of the costly consequences have been well documented and made available. Contacting any of these municipalities should easily provide the critical information of how destructive large-scale soil dumping has proven to be. There aren’t any viable excuses for not knowing of the dangers of large-scale soil dumping, as it currently exists in Ontario.

We are dealing with a situation in the City of Kawartha Lakes, Carden Township. The site is called ‘ ‘ Farms; however, it has nothing to do with farming. There isn’t a building on the property and the back of the place borders on Lake Dalrymple. The property was sold about 3 or 4 years ago and the people who have it now simply haul soil onto the property. Most of the trucks are apparently coming from the West end of Toronto with soil, they dump their loads up here and then pick up a load of aggregate from one of the local quarries for their return trip to Toronto. The City of Kawartha Lakes bylaw office has placed a stop work order on the property and are in the process of collecting evidence to lay charges. At one point the City of Kawartha Lakes bylaw officer was run off the road by one of the operators of the property, as well as other aggressive tactics have been demonstrated by the operators of this site. The collecting of evidence to lay charges is quite a lengthy process and although people are willing to complain about the soil dumping activity there are very few witnesses willing to go to court and especially when this level of intimidation is taking place.

The destructive legacy in the Township of Scugog involving the Greenbank aerodrome is well known. The contamination at this seriously contaminated site was discovered three years ago and continues to be unresolved. One of the same source sites that supplied the soil dumping at the Greenbank aerodrome also supplied soil dumped at one or more of the Ramara Township properties, following the same ineffective level of soil analysis.

Large scale soil dumping involving the Tottenham Aerodrome has consistently been in the news and on April 10, 2017 the New Tecumseth council agreed to withdraw the Tottenham Airport Corporation’s fill permit over concerns about soil contamination involving the discovery of PCBs at the site. In February, 2018 the Tottenham Airport Corporation was back in the news due to the flooding of neighbouring properties caused by the large-scale soil dumping taking place at the site.

The following statement from the Residential and Civil Alliance of Ontario describes the scale of the problem and the protective measures municipalities have decided to adopt.

“Millions of cubic metres of soil will need to be trucked from construction projects to disposal sites over the next decade or two, the Residential and Civil Alliance of Ontario (RCCAO) notes in a statement. Some municipalities are now restricting or banning the importation of soils from outside their jurisdictions because of uncertainties around applying Ontario’s regulations governing soil quality and placement.”

Communications and oversight involving the Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks in Ontario (MECP) and the Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs is extremely lacking. The following is an example of this stark reality of ineffective management and betrayal of their responsibility to represent the interests of Ontario citizens and taxpayers.

Ramara Township decided to update their Fill Bylaw shortly after the City of Kawartha Lakes updated theirs, which was just before the fall municipal election in October, 2018. Unfortunately, the Fill Bylaw whether in Ramara Township or in the City of Kawartha Lakes is only as good as the ability or will of the municipality to apply and enforce it. The original Fill Bylaw in Ramara Township contained all the protective measures like soil sampling; however, Ramara Township prefers to offer an exemption to circumvent the protective measures of the Fill Bylaw. If the property owner intends to put up a building or implies that they intend to put up a building then the Fill Bylaw has routinely been deemed unnecessary. So far, the Fill Bylaw in Ramara Township has never been applied or enforced, and when a young bylaw officer took the initiative to properly place a stop work order on two large scale soil dumping sites, the Freedom of Information report stated he resigned, while rumours say he was fired. When the Fill Bylaw update was completed and the Bylaw was ratified at the Ramara Township council meeting in October, 2018 the following question was asked, “when does Ramara Township ever intend to use their Fill Bylaw?” The Mayor and councillors said nothing.

The Ramara Township Fill Bylaw received the agreed upon amendments through the Ramara Township consultant, which were discussed at the Ramara Township council meeting on Monday, October 1st, and at the Ramara Township council meeting on Tuesday, October 9th the revised Ramara Township Fill Bylaw was ratified. At the Monday, October 1st Ramara Township council meeting a letter containing questions to the Ramara Township council members was included as part of the council meeting agenda. This letter dated April 16, 2018 was on hold for a reply until the revised Ramara Township Fill Bylaw returned to council, and may have influenced the decision that the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw be updated. It was Ramara Township council that tied the revision of the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw to any response to the letter and questions to council dated April 16, 2018. The original intention of the correspondence was to ask straight forward questions of the Ramara Township council and hopefully receive a reasonable response matched by the needed corrective actions. The correspondence containing the questions was instead forwarded to the Ramara Township consultant for answering based on a decision by Ramara Township council on Monday, October 1st, and the following is the Ramara Township consultant’s response to some of the questions.

In the case of large-scale soil dumping on several of the Ramara Township sites the Ramara Township consultant responded to the questions asked in the letter to Ramara Township council dated April 16, 2018 as follows.

Will a Site Plan Agreement including conditions be drafted and presented to the owner of the ‘ ’ site and will the Site Plan Agreement including conditions come back to council before ratification?

(Ramara Township consultant response) A Site Alteration Agreement and Site alteration permit is required under the proposed Site Alteration Bylaw.

Will Ramara Township insist on taking their own audit test samples and recoup the test sampling costs based on a charge for each truck load of fill?

(Ramara Township consultant response) The Township is expected to retain a Qualified person, at the applicant’s expense, who will be responsible for certifying the quality of imported fill to provincial standards.

Will Ramara Township place a standard on the fill quality and remove the Fill Permit for failed test analysis?

(Ramara Township consultant response) In this case, a Site Alteration Permit should not be issued. Unauthorized fill should be ordered by the municipality to be removed.

Will Ramara Township require soil be removed for a failed test analysis and designate the volume to be removed in advance of entering into a Site Plan Agreement?

(Ramara Township consultant response) In this case, a Site Alteration Permit should not be issued. Unauthorized fill should be ordered by the municipality to be removed.

Will Ramara Township take into consideration and apply the necessary improvements to Ramara Township Bylaw 2012.70, A Bylaw To Prohibit Or Regulate The Placing Or Dumping Of Fill In The Township Of Ramara that the Ontario Soil Regulation Task Force has recommended?

(Ramara Township consultant response) The proposed Site Alteration Bylaw is an update to Bylaw 2012.70. It includes provisions based on provincial policies and insight from the provincial Excess Soil Management Policy Framework, as amended. Reference to the OSRTF documents has been made in crafting the Bylaw.

Will Ramara Township insist on applying an exact figure to a Site Plan Agreement of the volume of soil to be dumped on the ‘ ’ property, beyond the current extremely rough estimate of 100 trucks per day for 3 to 4 months or based on a construction schedule that so far has not been divulged?

(Ramara Township consultant response) This should be determined in the formal application for a Site Alteration permit.

Will Ramara Township produce the actual soil analysis test results for each of the 5,000 truckloads of soil that Ramara Township has claimed exists beyond the three soil test results provided by the soil source sites in January 2017?

(Ramara Township consultant response) This should be determined by the Qualified person retained by the Township.

According to the Ramara Township consultant the soil at several of the Ramara Township large scale soil dumping sites should be sampled and analyzed as part of the responsibilities of the Qualified Person, who has been retained at the applicant’s expense, and who will be responsible for certifying the quality of imported fill to provincial standards. In the case of failed test analysis results a Site Alteration Permit should not be issued and unauthorized fill should be ordered by the municipality to be removed.

The Ramara Township consultant was hired by Ramara Township as a consultant to revise the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw, that may or may not ever prove to be any more effective than the version that it replaced. This was likely partially done as an awkward attempt to avoid responding to a letter containing questions to Ramara Township council. Ratification of the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw was rushed through during two council meetings before the municipal election, with minimal public input. Ramara Township council never did respond directly to the letter and questions dated April 16, 2018, but instead six months later asked the consultant to respond. It is recognized at the very end of the last council meeting before the October 22nd election that the payed consultant has responded logically to the April 16, 2018 correspondence and questions by stating that the protective measures of the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw must be followed. A last-minute decision on the part of Ramara Township council is made to defer a decision to request an opinion from Ramara Township’s legal advisors until the next Ramara Township council COW on November 5th, and after the October 22, 2018 municipal election. Ramara Township council decided at the COW meeting on November 5th to avoid embarrassment and responsibility for the unmonitored large-scale soil dumping and voted against requesting an opinion from Ramara Township’s legal advisors. In the words of the Ramara Township Mayor, “What is done is done.”.

The protective measures of the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw have been repeatedly and deliberately ignored and although we are being told that the bylaw will be adhered to in the future, it is the same Ramara Township representatives who circumvented the bylaw that are being entrusted with properly applying and enforcing it in the future. Unfortunately, Ramara Township repeatedly demonstrates their inability to exercise due diligence. We tend to keep hearing the phrase “Whats Done Is Done” from our elected officials on Ramara Township council and that all will be well in the future with a proposed commercial gun range, which is one of the sites that has dumped over 50,000 cubic meteres of untested soil. This is dangerously irresponsible and demonstrates that Ramara Township council simply wants the issue of large-scale soil dumping to disappear. There are five currently known large scale soil dumping sites existing in or near Ramara Township and there are very likely other currently unknown sites. There is a realistic argument that much of this activity would not have taken place if Ramara Township had recognized the potential for large scale soil dumping moving into Ramara Township, just as it has in other townships north, east and west of the GTA over the past few years. As the stewards of the health and welfare of Ramara Township residents the Ramara Township representatives must demonstrate due diligence, and at a very minimum properly apply and enforce the Ramara Township Fill Bylaw, A Bylaw To Prohibit Or Regulate The Placing Or Dumping Of Fill In The Township Of Ramara.

Large portions of Ramara Township are justifiably identified as part of the County of Simcoe Official Plan, Provincially Significant Wetland and the County of Simcoe Official Plan, Highly Vulnerable Aquifers and therefore the Ramara Township Official Plan must also reflect our environmental significance, and Environmental Impact Studies must become absolutely necessary for further development involving large scale soil dumping.

Link to County of Simcoe Official Plan, Streams and Evaluated Wetlands

https://www.simcoe.ca/Planning/Documents/OMB%20Approved_Sch5_2_2ccc.pdf

Link to County of Simcoe Official Plan, Highly Vulnerable Aquifers

https://www.simcoe.ca/Planning/Documents/OPA1_SCH5_2_5.pdf