Council here wants to know why neighbouring Bruce County wants to remove all references to “locally significant wetlands” from its official plan.
Deputy Mayor Terry Fisk raised the issue at the Oct. 21 meeting in response to a notice of a Nov. 20 public meeting on the changes included in council correspondence.
“When and if we ever get our flood plan underway east of town on the Maitland River we’re going to be looking at creating wetlands and here they’re getting rid of them, so obviously they don’t have flooding situations. But wetlands are very important – I really don’t understand. I put a call in to Saugeen Valley (Conservation Authority) … I’m hoping their response will be that they’ll be there and they won’t be in favour.”
An amendment proposing to delete sections of the official plan that deals with locally significant wetlands and also delete them from the constraint map was introduced to Bruce County council in September. Currently development planned within 60 metres of a locally significant wetland requires an environmental impact study to determine the effect of the development on the wetland. Both Saugeen Valley and Maitland Valley conservation authorities provided comments opposing the move when dealt with by Bruce County on Sept. 22.
The proposed official plan amendment, aimed at reducing red tape and simplifying the planning process, would not affect provincially significant wetlands, which are protected under provincial policy.
Council directed staff to provide further information on the proposal, including any potential concerns.
“If it’s covered in another section of the plan or there seems to be some reason for it we’ll pass that on as well,” said CAO Bill White.
“That’s where our water supplies are recharged,” said Fisk. “We’ve just spent hundreds of million dollars on a (province-wide) source water protection plan and that should be part of the source water protection plan and here they’re going to eliminate that from their county plan – so I don’t pretend to understand that,” he added.
“I thought it was a bit strange,” commented Mayor George Bridge.
