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LETTER: If province is 'open for business,' where does that leave Ramara?

Letter writer says provincial staff seem 'reluctant' to amend act for benefit of township
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OrilliaMatters received the following letter to the editor from Konrad Brenner regarding sanitary sewage treatment options in Ramara Township:

Ramara council members, meeting in committee of the whole, spent an hour on Monday, March 18, listening to consultants and discussing a legal block they have with the province.

Their decision was to contact the appropriate minister. The issue before them was increased sanitary sewage treatment capacity for the Bayshore area, which the township will have to provide in the not-too-far future. There are two possible solutions. One involves the acquisition of land for an additional effluent spray area. The second one involves the construction of additional treatment. The consensus, by all involved, is that the additional treatment is the preferred route.

However, the hang-up is that the province takes the position that the province can not consider this additional treatment for approval unless the township investigates, in great detail, the “land acquisition” alternative. Such investigation would be costly and the money would likely be wasted. The province’s decision is based on the wording in the Lake Simcoe Protection Act, which did not provide for a reasonable solution to the present difficulties. The obvious solution is a minor amendment to the act, which apparently the provincial staff are reluctant to tackle.

The situation will ultimately work itself out but the interesting question for now is: does Premier Doug Ford mean flexibility when he states “the province is open for business” or is his pronouncement just wind ‘full of sound and fury signifying nothing?’

Konrad Brenner
Ramara Township