Premier McGuinty,
As you are aware, Bill 10, the Local Municipality Democracy Act, 2011, will be introduced on Dec. 1. The bill seeks to restore local democracy to planning decisions for renewable energy projects that the Green Energy Act stripped nearly three years ago. Rural Ontarians will be watching closely and expect you to support restoring local democracy.
Your declaration that you are prepared to listen to Bill 10 is a positive step to address all that has happened since Feb. 11 2009 when you stated you would not hesitate to 'foist' renewable energy projects on communities, and lashed out at concerned citizens.
Until your speech that day in London, I was a proud Ontario Liberal. I joined the Liberal Party when I was 14. My first summer job as a university student was at Queen's Park as an intern at the Liberal Caucus Services Bureau. I went on to work for MPP Brad Duguid that fall, was elected riding director of the Ontario Young Liberals and served as the Liberal Party of Canada riding president for Scarborough Guildwood for three years.
It was your decision to accuse Scarborough Bluffs residents of NIMBYism for opposition to a project your government has since agreed was unreasonable for the reasons we stated, that forced me to leave the Liberal party, and join Wind Concerns Ontario as a spokesperson and later President.
I've had the opportunity to travel to over 80 municipalities throughout Ontario and work with many concerned citizens and elected municipal officials to seek to express their concerns to those very projects you've sought to "foist" on them. The concerns are real, and need to be addressed.
Seventy-nine municipal councils have moved motions of moratorium urging your government to stop approvals until local control is restored and they've got a proper health study to inform safe setbacks from homes. It has been disheartening to watch these motions, which have been forwarded to you and your ministers, only to be ignored.
That's why during the last election we took direct political action as a last resort. As I travelled from community to community, I met many former Liberals who, like me, would be voting for another party for the first time because they too had lost faith in your government over your Green Energy policies. The results were seen on election night when Liberal veterans fell throughout northern and rural Ontario.
The Green Energy Act has done a lot of damage to communities in rural Ontario. Neighbours aren't speaking, people are getting sick, citizens have been compelled to go to great lengths to resist the fundamentally anti-democratic approach. As a consequence, your government has only been able to approve 12 wind turbines under the regulations that the Green Energy Act brought in over two years ago.
Liberal MPPs received thousands of concerns, ministers had all the information they needed and 79 motions from municipal councils crossed your desk. If you fail to act to allow this bill to pass second reading, the question becomes, what must citizens do to be heard in your Ontario? You must ask yourself if you have any moral authority to govern rural Ontario from the cities and impose upon rural residents through a failed process citizens have clearly articulated their opposition to.
It important that you listen to citizens and municipalities who have clearly tried a number of ways over the last three years to tell you this isn't working.
Demonstrate good faith for rural Ontario's concerns by doing more than just listening, but facilitating discussion to address the concerns with Ontario's Green Energy Act. Support the bill at the second reading so it can get to a committee where it can be made acceptable to all involved before returning to the legislature for third reading.
I would also encourage you to help put together a working group made up of an equal number of MPPs, municipal politicians from communities who have expressed concerns, Wind Concerns Ontario members and CanWEA members to discuss solutions that can work for all involved. If there is a desire by your government to listen, then this might be the best way to find a workable solution to address the urban-rural divide the Green Energy Act has created.
Tens of thousands of rural Ontarians will be watching on Thursday, I hope for everyone's sake they will see their Premier standing in support of local democracy.
Sincerely
John Laforet
Former President
Wind Concerns Ontario
Follow John Laforet on Twitter: www.twitter.com/laforet
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Fossil fuels aren't the answer either because of the greenhouse gas produced. Furthermore, we are nearing the point where crude oil production will be insufficient to meet demands. At that point the cost of crude will skyrocket and will certainly impact the cost of alternative fuels like coal and natural gas.
Unpopular as it is, nuclear is the only viable way forward, but we are already past peak uranium production, so even more unpopular concepts like breeder reactors and fuel reprocessing will be needed. Naysayers and NIMBYs, please look into the molten salt thorium breeder reactor before dismissing this.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molten_salt_reactor
These people (yourself included Mr. Laforet) as so selfish and focused on their own small, petty lives that they will do whatever it takes to thwart the efforts of people trying to better the environment and more importantly move away from fossil energy. They would sacrifice the future economy and growth of the country because they don't like how these energy providing generators look from their twenty five acres estates. I feel sorry for these people because they are so short sited and self centered that the bigger picture in meaningless when compared to their own self interests and the real estate value of their homes.
Now tell me Mr. Laforet, there have been studies that show that wind turbines do not effect health, but you don't care, so now our tax dollars are going towards funding more studies which will prove the exact same thing... at that point will you and your constituents lay off and drop it? I think not, which will sadden me even more.
Choosing to criticize people, not arguments demonstrates your distain for the democratic process. Your comments further re-enforce this dark view of the role of citizens in society.
How many turbines would you like in your community Allen? Do you honestly believe we should just become a plutocracy and all become selfless to special and foreign interests?
Do you honestly believe 'bigger picture' thinking by a select few should result in the removal of individual rights and freedoms? Is Canada a worse place because of our Charter? That seems to be the essence of your argument, which is a frightening prospect and certainly not my Canada.
You say studies show people don't get sick. Show me a study from a community where people live in Ontario that shows that? There isn't one. But there are studies that show people in Ontario are sick. Industry buy-outs prove they agree there is a problem as well. How about 1200 pages of documents from MOE recording health effects? Not enough?
Ask yourself why does the government refuse to study it but will commit all of us to spending $87 billion subsiding these projects. You're concerned about spending a couple of million on a proper health study to protect people?
Your arguments are
1) The wind turbines are too high that they break municipal height bylaws (yet the turbines are being built away from town centres).
2) People are complaining that these turbines are making them sick (which there is exactly ZERO evidence for. In fact there is concrete evidence that shows that wind turbines pose no health risk).
3) Not in your letter but what I deduced from interviews of people living in the vicinity of wind turbines on CBC; Property value is decreasing because there is a turbine close by.
There are people living in squalor in this country and you choose to represent the people who don't like wind turbine nearby (over half a kilometer away)? You my friend are the one with the dark view of the role of citizens in society.
How many wind turbines would I like in my community? As many as you can fit. If these devices mean we kick our addiction to fossil fuels, reduce pollution in our environment, create a sustainable renewable energy future not to mention a future for my children I will take them all.
You say individual rights and freedoms are being removed, would you mind outlining which rights and freedoms exactly and provide clinical evidence/studies for your accusations?
Do you honestly believe that Ontarians don't want wind turbines? It's not a select few like you suggest, but a majority who democratically voted for a party brave enough to act upon a "bigger picture" which takes the environment seriously. I'm not entirely sure what you're talking about anymore.
Your MOE recordings are not a study in fact there is no science that can be acted on in there at all. Fortunately for you I can be convinced. Show me the scientific proof that these wind turbines are directly impacting health and I will do a 180 in a heartbeat. In the meantime how about I show you studies which show there is no correlation between health and wind turbines in areas with a higher concentration of both people and turbines? Not enough?
All I am asking the Premier to do is bring everyone together to find a suitable way forward. Winner take all for the industry hasn't worked. It's time to find a new way that includes citizens, industry, municipalities and MPPs. This government and industry are killing themselves pretending everything is OK.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't think what is being asked of McGuinty is unreasonable and he should be made to answer for his rough-shod treatment of communities in this regard. But something about your role in this just doesn't ring true. You chose to go over to the Harper Conservatives who have given a new meaning to 'rough-shod' when it comes to overriding peoples concerns or even a right to a voice. Now I have no doubt that will make you a choir boy among the right wing, probably how you got this blog in the first place but when this issue is resolved what then? How does a lifelong Liberal (even though your life has been relatively short at 25 or so) become a Conservative?
I'm not sure what you're talking about with Bob Rae and Stephen Harper. They are federal party leaders. This was not an issue during the federal campaign and did not guide my vote. In fact, in that election I voted based on the local candidate and whom I thought would do the best job representing my community.
I do not belong to any political parties at any level these days, and voted PC for the first time in my short life in this last election in large part because Tim Hudak was prepared to listen to rural municipalities.
As far as working inside the Liberal party goes, it is a good point and something I had been doing from August 2008 through February 2009 on this issue when the Premier singled out members of my community for ridicule, while passing legislation to take our rights again.
When the Minister of Energy publicly calls one's arguments absurd, and accuses a community of 'working itself into an artificial lather' it becomes clear they don't want to work with you.
Then you have a choice, community? or party? I chose community.
What other piece of legislation has resulted in this much turmoil?
The Premier has a chance to fix it though, and I hope he does. It is in everyone's interest to.