A member of Lakeshore council is expressing concerns over the Ontario government's plan to merge its 36 conservation authorities, including the Essex Region Conservation Authority.
Ian Ruston, who's also a farmer, told AM800's Mornings with Mike and Meg that there are many programs that farmers work on with ERCA, ranging from funding for phosphorus reduction to tree planting to protect the soil.
"A lot of them conserve things to protect the environment but at the same time enhance what we do. As a farmer, we are stewards of the land, and sometimes that doesn't come across, but we've developed this relationship with ERCA doing these programs locally," he says.
The Ontario government will consolidate its 36 conservation authorities into nine across the province.
The new authorities will operate under the newly created Ontario Provincial Conservation Agency, with consolidation of the various conservation authorities set to begin in May and be complete by early 2027.
The conservation authorities are responsible for issuing permits for various types of housing and infrastructure development in floodplains, shorelines, and wetlands.
Ruston says there's no one size fits all.
"In Windsor-Essex, we're very unique with our hydrology with the watershed and everything; we have water on three sides of our area. What they do up in London or in Sarnia and how that affects them, we're different. They're different than us. That one-size-fits-all model, to me, doesn't work," he says.
In terms of the proposed governance structure, upper and single-tier municipalities would still play a role in appointing members to conservation authority boards, but lower-tier municipalities like towns and townships would not.
Ruston says right now the ERCA board includes representatives from all the local municipalities, but they're not sure what kind of say they will have under the new system.
"If somebody has a problem with something, right now they can go to that elected official that's on that committee and say, 'Hey, I have a problem with ERCA on this, this, and this. ' When we move forward, we don't know how that's going to look. You're not going to have the representation, and we're still going to be funding this," he says.
The nine proposed regional conservation authorities to replace the current system in Southern Ontario will include (from west to east) Western Lake Erie, Lake Huron, Eastern Lake Erie, Western Lake Ontario, Central Lake Ontario, Eastern Lake Ontario, and St. Lawrence River.
The Northwestern Regional Conservation Authority would serve the Thunder Bay Area, while the Northeastern Regional Conservation Authority would serve Timmins, Sault Ste. Marie, Sudbury, and North Bay.
Ruston says Lakeshore council has sent letters to the ministry, local MPPs, and Premier Doug Ford voicing concerns over the plan.