Dear Editor,
I am writing about the advertisement in the WA by the Ontario Stone, Sand and Gravel Association (OSSGA) relating to the fact or fiction statement about aggregate extraction and the wonderful pictures of corn now growing on a rehabilitated unidentified gravel pit.
It appears that community groups are making this association (whose members are both small companies and huge multi-national billion dollar aggregate companies) quite uncomfortable as these groups question the benefits of aggregate extraction and identify the clearly negative impacts to our water, air and environment not to mention the lost of productive agricultural land.
The industry now has taken the position that they must use false advertising to convince the community that gravel pits or quarries are aggressively restored to their original agricultural land use. One only has to look at Erin or Puslinch to see that very little restoration to agricultural land has occurred with their sand and gravel pits. In addition, under the water table quarries cannot be restored to agricultural land use as the top soil, gravel/sand and bedrock has been removed and it is just not economically viable or possible to restore this land back to agricultural use. What you have left in this situation is the promise of a beautiful lake that usually occurs 5 decades or more from the initial extraction phase. It may never occur and your community may have to fight another battle that relates to the use of these empty 90ft+ holes that can span 100 acres or more for recycling or garbage dumping.
The FACTS should be shown by the media in balance. I am more than willing to write an article for WA about the negative impacts of aggregate extraction that is FACT and not FICTION.
Stephanie De Grandis