Shelburne, Ontario – It may be two hours north of Toronto, but the fight against a 2,400 acre limestone quarry near Shelburne has become ground zero for a number of T.O. enviro and local food activists hoping to reproduce the successful urban-rural alliance that nixed Dump 41 in Tiny Township in 2010.
The surging campaign against the massive pit that will be blasted into Ontario’s potato growing capital, Melancthon Township, now has the resources of the Council of Canadians onboard.
And Friday (April 22), Earth Day, activists will take off from Queen’s Park for a five-day walk to the site, spearheaded in part by key Dump 41 organizer, Danny Beaton.
On April 12, our school bus full of Unitarians from east Toronto (there’s a church camp just ten kilometres from the quarry site) and decked out with hand made signs, pulls up at Horning’s Mills, 100 kilometres northwest of Toronto, a quiet hamlet off Highway 124, north of Shelburne. We’re attending a mandated public meeting with the developer. In the past year, crowds of over 300, mostly local residents, have packed local community halls, speaking out against the loss of farmland and potential groundwater contamination from what could be North America’s second largest quarry.
At the Horning’s Mill Hall meeting, potato farmers chat with urban ecos dressed for street protest, while others chant and hold signs and banners with slogans: Preserve Our Water and Land.
Carl Cosack, organic beef farmer, and key player in the North Dufferin Agricultural & Community Taskforce, voices his concerns about threats to the water table and loss of farmland.
Participants ask if water would be safe to drink after it has been reinjected into new wells in the aquifer, following the blasting. Others note safety and noise concerns with the 7,200 trucks on local roads daily, blasting all day and loss of farmland.
Highland Companies, owned by a Boston hedgefund, has been quietly buying out farmers in this economically depressed and sparsely populated pastoral area in recent years. When the community discovered that the intention was to excavate a massive quarry 236 feet down, well below the water table, they stepped up their fight.
The company claims that “the site of the Melancthon Quarry was carefully selected so that our aggregate operations could be conducted in an environmentally, socially and economically responsible manner. Our plan is to progressively rehabilitate the site to agricultural and associated uses. The proposed quarry is designed as a state-of-the-art and modern operation.”
Highland also boasts that 465 jobs will be created and that no municipal water source will be affected. “The proposed quarry”, says the company’s statement, “will not have an adverse effect on the quality, quantity or function of water beyond the project’s property line.”
But residents are not convinced. Local potato farmers are lobbying to get a Specialty Crop Designation from the province for the unique Honeywood Silt Loam soil. Still, they know successive provincial governments have given priority to quarries over farmland. Quarries don’t even require an environmental assessment. Highland has filed three applications including an aggregate licence and opponents are struggling to respond in a tight time period, writing letters to the Ministry of Natural Resources by April 26th.
Requests by local Conservative MPP Sylvia Jones to Liberal Minister Linda Jeffrey for an extension in the comment period have been ignored.
Meanwhile, when meeting a Melancthon delegation last month, Minister Jeffrey said, “It is too bad that this has split your community apart. It is your job to get your community together, get them to think long term about rehabilitation, because this will not be going back to agriculture, but maybe you could get a nice golf course.”
Locals were shocked, but now realize what they are up against. Highlands is exploiting a process heavily weighted in their favour. Environmental Commissioner Gord Miller has raised the alarm about the increasing number of quarries in Ontario that are getting the green light to blast through valuable land and water systems. Miller told the McGuinty Government in 2007 that it needed to provide a new approval system that screens out proposals conflicting with natural heritage or source water protection.
This would be welcome bylocal farmers and environmentalists who spend years and fortunes fighting the aggregate behemoth.
The Council of Canadians is concerned about the threat to 100 million people downstream by disrupted water systems and loss of farmland. The limestone rests at the headwaters of five major rivers – the Pine, the Grand, the Nottawasaga, the Saugeen and the Beaver and farmers have relied on the land for generations.
The picturesque countryside, abutting the Niagara escarpment and sharing the same topography, tells a deep, enchanting story. The porous land is riddled with deep fissures and caves that beckon tourists and locals alike. Will a farmers’ movement backed by urban environmentalists be able to preserve this terrain?
