The Council heard a public meeting “That Council of the Township of Whitewater Region:
- Receive the Cobden Area Agricultural Stormwater Assessment Draft Final Report, prepared by Jp2G Consultants Inc., as a guiding document; and
- Direct staff to incorporate any action items into existing 2022 departmental work-plan initiatives and report back as necessary.”
Planner Burton introduced Brent Parsons, principal and senior aquatics scientist based out of a Bracebridge, and Brian Whitehead, a Pembroke based principal of planning services for JP2G Consulting.
Planner Burton said that the province funded ‘in the range of 70,000” in support for the Muskrat Watershed Council.
Whitehead said that the purpose of the report was to “identify priority areas for the implementation of best management practices [BMPS] to reduce nutrient loading to Muskrat Lake and wetlands” and to “recommend best management practices best suited for implementation within priority areas based on input from farmers and property owners.”
Brent Parsons said that there was “lots of data needed to be reinvented.” within the Muskrat Lake Watershed.
“We first looked at where were the nutrient source areas? They were the highest nutrient concentrations. Monthly samples were collected from 2014 and 2019.” he said,
“We found that the highest concentrations were found at SC-02.” he said.
Due to connection issues, it was difficult to understand Parsons, and the Council asked Whitehead to take over again.
“Huchinson environmental are probably one of the leading firms in Ontario for this kind of study.” he said. “They bring a lot of credibility to the product. The study looked at the two wetlands out of the two inflows of the Muskrat river and the Snake River.”
He said that the Snake River was the priority River, and that other priority areas included an Unnamed Creek part of a region called SC-02, where a high level of nutrient loading occurs flowing into the Snake River.
“ In that map that you’re looking at, they reviewed the science that’s already available, and there’s a lot of science available due. To the Muskrat Watershed Council.”
He said that S302, a monitoring station that has a lot of ‘nutrient loading’ in the unnamed creek in the area, he said.
“That sub-watershed is about one third of the watershed, and about two thirds of the watershed goes into the Admaston/Bromley portion.”
He said that they also had a database prepared by Navcan during the 2019 flood, and had a meeting on December 8th of 2021 to meet with farmers and non-government areas in a virtual public meeting.
“The questions were quite good.” he said. “It set up for individual meetings the following day.”
“We had about nine or ten individual small-group meetings with individual areas”, which he said covered “nearly fifty percent of the study area.”
“We found that the input was very good.” Parson said. “we found it easy to identify solutions in the best interests of the property owners not have their fertilizers flow off of the property.”
“What were able to do based on the consultations with the residents is redefine the areas of SC-02 to include areas on both sides of the unnamed creek.”
He said that they had spoken with a Newmarket area farmer, Mr. Harrison, who was “looking to move up here.”
“We see an opportunity for an end-source solution there, in form of a pond of some kind. He said. “Mr. Harrison is actually quite receptive to that. He was receptive to working in partnership with the Township.”
“This could potentially be a win win.” Parson said, saying that the study included solutions to prevent nutrient runoff including vegetative buffers and burns.
He said that the farming areas were “very receptive” to the studies and were helpful in ‘providing short-listed’ solutions.
He said the action plan included providing the study’s findings publicly as well as pursuing further discussion and planning with local owners.
“This study doesn’t have to end here.” He said. “There is the potential to expand the information to residents in the form of a brochure. If there’s additional property owners and they would like to have a site meeting to talk about how these best management practices can be applied to their properties.”
“What you have this study is a solid piece of science that’s backed up by resident input.” he said. “This is one of those opportunities where if backed up by the community, there’s a lot of opportunity for funding.”
He suggested that the Council expand their community expansion plan to include the best practices outlined in this study.
“I think that the farming community is generally willing to talk if there’s some benefit to them.” he said. “And that’s really what it’s going to take to make a difference in the watershed going forward.”
“This won’t necessarily solve Muskrat Lake, but this will send a message to higher levels of government that there’s some organization in finding solutions.”
Councillor Nicholson asked if there were interest funding from the farm unions and other agricultural organizations and if there were opportunities to partner with them.
Parsons said that there was ‘technical support’ from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment on all of the science committees..
“I know that there’s money out there.” he said. “You only have to look at Lake Erie and Lake Simcoe, which are similar situations to this.”
He called the report a ‘step in the right direction.”
“How do we engage with our neighboring municipalities?” Nicholson asked “There’s no conservation authority, we’re all doing our own thing within our boundaries, but watersheds don’t care about boundaries.“
“The answer that it’s everybody’s responsibility.” Whitehead said. “A lot of these discussions have to occur one-on-one and on small group levels. When I was involved with the Watershed Council, what we would do was have updates for the other municipalities, but it’s so hard for the Council to do that over time due to the lack of supports. It’s about communication, it’s about getting the information out to individuals within the municipalities.
“I’m gonna get into trouble when I say this, but as you go over the hill past Opeongo school, there’s no ditch, there’s supposed to be a 50 foot buffer.” Councillor Mackay said. “Every time I say that, people get mad because they lose land. A fifty foot buffer can be anything, it could be hay. The environment should be doing it, not us. That whole valley where everything drains you could never do anything. You can’t say it now, I’ll probably get stoned when I get out of here. But that’s the law, the MOE should be on that, not us.”
Councillor Daryl McLaughlin asked for clarification on the unnamed creek’s area, and how much was in Whitewater, which Parsons confirmed that one third was in Whitewater, and two thirds in neighboring Admaston/Bromley.
“We have no jurisdiction over there.” Councillor McLaughlin said. “We need to talk with our neighboring municipalities, with this we can get more input and more studies done and maybe get better management into it. I’ve talked about it a lot and they always say “it’s not in our municipality.” and it’s not fair.”
Mayor Moore asked if there was potential to do a study every year if the funding was available.
“There’s no reason if the study’s can’t be enlarged.” Parsons said. “There’s no reason we couldn’t do the entire watershed. When you’re talking neighboring municipalities, you’re talking mostly Admaston/Bromley, and North Algona/Wilderforce, and a bit of Laurentian Valley, and possibly a bit of Pembroke but that’s really on the fringe.
There were no further questions and Mayor Moore thanked the presenters, and the motion to accept was carried.
