Proper planning must take place to ensure the future
EDITOR’S NOTE: The following letter, addressed to the Manitoulin Planning Board, was submitted to The Expositor for publication and appears here at the author’s request.
Dear Manitoulin Planning Board and Central Manitoulin Mayor and Council,
We can all agree that development is a good thing for any community. Economic development, I believe, is best looked at through a circular, communal long-term development lens.
Circular lens meaning: does this development serve, enrich and keep safe, not only the development in question, but the community as a whole, and the environment found around it? Does this development fit into an established, communal, long-term vision and goal? I believe Central Manitoulin currently does not have a long-term plan or a community vision in place yet.
I urge the Manitoulin Planning Board and Central Manitoulin to look at the following questions with this circular lens: ensure that any development will keep the health of our water, air, aquatic life, vegetation, shoreline integrity and community as a whole safe and healthy.
Please ask yourselves, ‘how can we best protect this body of water?’ Lake Mindemoya is our drinking water and increases our quality of life greatly with swimming, all sorts of waters sports, as well as fishing; have we extended the courtesy of seeking approval in principal with M’Chigeeng First Nation and Billings Township so we can collectively attempt to maintain the health of our shared Lake Mindemoya water; we know from water tests results shared by the Lake Mindemoya Stewardship Association that field bed runoff and other contaminations flowing into Lake Mindemoya threaten our water quality; will our decision take into consideration the conservation regulations of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry that are applicable in this case? May it be wise to contemplate building a waste water treatment plant? Not just for this subdivision, but for any significantly sized new development on Manitoulin? Let us remember Mindemoya’s own history of field beds contaminating town wells; should we perhaps aim to service the whole west side of Lake Mindemoya with reliable water and sewer by including Stanley Park, Deerfoot Trail and this new planned subdivision? Would it be wise to anticipate future back-lot development and build growth into that new sewer and water plant? The Green Municipal Fund is currently available for planning and building water sewer treatment plants. Small communities can apply and receive up to 80% to a max of $500,000; can we figure out a smart funding model? Combining many funding opportunities, and including offsetting costs from the new owners that will save by not having to build field beds or drill wells for drinking water, in the amount of the average cost of $ 30-50K each, times the proposed 39 lots; are we assuming that drilling this plot of land potentially 39 times for drinking water is safe? It may pose a threat and cause serious ground water contamination. Do we envision a decentralized growth of Central Manitoulin? This may very well be what we want.
If so, must we not plan that this new community of possibly well over 100 people will want to live here year-round? Most buildings these days are built to four-season standards. Must we not foresee that they will eventually bring the new road up to standard, that it will be assumed by the municipality and that back lots will be sold as more economic development will be needed and wanted, just like we see it everywhere around us? Can we ensure that lakeshore road allowance integrity is maintained that restricts any shore alterations? Are we providing information that no tree or shrub cutting, no landscaping of any kind, no depositing of sand, rocks or any other material along the 66-foot shoreline road allowance is undertaken? Does this plan include a public park (preferably all of lot 1) so that future back lot owners and their families will have adequate public water access? Will these lot owners be eligible for short-term accommodations permits? Does this plan leave the remaining 54 ha farm with water access to irrigate so it can be actively farmed?
I trust you will make the right decisions to allow future healthy economic development on Manitoulin Island as a whole, and Central Manitoulin and neighbouring communities around Lake Mindemoya.
Sincerely
Maja Mielonen
Mindemoya
