Wednesday, March 18, 2015

Grand River water protection comment period opens


The Lake Erie Sourcewater Protection Committee has opened a 40-day public comment period on its proposals for the Grand River watershed.

Now's the time to speak up, not after the province approves the plan and various regulatory bodies begin to implement restrictions.

The plan embraces an area that stretches from Shelburne’s potato-growing area to Dunnville, where the river empties into Lake Erie.

It involves some of Canada’s best farms, many of them within zones around municipal wells and river intakes.

In general terms, those who comply with Nutrient Management Plan standards will face no more issues with these proposals.

That is, however, a generalization and there will be some cases where farmers will have to take extra precautions, such as no logner cropping parts of fields that drain into a municipal wellhead or water intake.

The detailed plans are posted on the website managed by the Grand River Conservation Authority.

Public meetings will be held between March 31 and April 16 in Amaranth, Fergus, Guelph, Waterloo, Cambridge, Brantford, Paris and Dunnville.