CEA in the News

Guest column: Think about the beaches

By Derek Coronado, The Windsor Star, February 1, 2014

This winter might be a strange time to be thinking about a trip to the beach. But now is actually an excellent time to be asking ourselves if our wintry weather is setting us up for another round of damaging spring flooding and beach closures around the Great Lakes.

Last spring, heavy spring rains and a late thaw led to massive damage in a number of Ontario communities. Later, we saw a rainstorm in the Toronto area that was more like a biblical deluge than a conventional summer storm. It’s all part of a pattern of more unstable and unpredictable weather driven by climate change.

But besides these individual events, we are also starting to see the growing impact of continuing trends, such as lower lake levels caused by higher evaporation rates, which in turn are tied to higher summer temperatures and less ice cover in winter. Similarly, we are seeing warmer waters supporting more toxic algae blooms, coating shorelines with unpleasant green gunk.

The threats to our Great Lakes — the source of drinking water as well as a place to swim, boat and fish for millions of people — don’t just stop at climate change, however.

We still have a problem with sewage discharge and agricultural runoff leading to a nutrient overload in some parts of the lakes. Aging infrastructure isn’t going to make the problem any better. Nor is pressure to cultivate every inch of agricultural land to maximize harvests, especially in the face of less and less reliable growing conditions.

The list of problems affecting the health of our lakes can make pretty depressing reading. And that is why the environmental community has pushed hard for passage of the Great Lakes Protection Act so that we can better address the complex array of problems facing our lakes.

Right now, responsibility for stewarding these fantastic inland seas is divided between various government ministries and local, national and international agencies. The first thing we need is greater coordination of efforts, both to restore the health of the lakes and to protect them from further harm.

The Great Lakes Protection Act that is currently before the Ontario Legislature will make it possible for the provincial government to better coordinate action to protect and restore the lakes through a new Great Lakes Guardians Council.

It will also help communities to clean up and restore beaches and other waterfront areas and improve local water quality and aquatic ecosystems through new “Geographically Focused Initiatives” that bring together local citizens and different levels of government to address problems in a way that makes sense for their area.

But despite general agreement that the legislation is needed and addresses some important failings in our current lake stewardship efforts, it has become the victim of political jockeying at Queen’s Park.

Instead of the parties working together to make needed improvements — such as setting strong targets for everything from protecting wetlands and other natural areas to improving lake science — the bill has been subject to stalling tactics.

It’s a shame, because the current disjointed and often underfunded approach to lake stewardship is costing us dearly with underused urban waterfronts, toxic hotspots waiting decades for clean up, struggling aquatic ecosystems that we ask to support everything from commercial fisheries to the weekend angler, and more costly water treatment as we continue to try to remove contaminants instead of preventing their release.

But if the Great Lakes Protection Act is not passed quickly, one of the biggest things we may lose is a chance to remind Ontarians that they live beside four of the five Great Lakes, which are immensely valuable to our health, our economy and our quality of life.

The Great Lakes Basin supports 56 million jobs and a $5.1 trillion collective economy. A lot of that success is thanks to the abundance of clean water and resources we draw from our lakes.

We really owe it to the natural systems that provide us with such a wide array of benefits — from secret swimming spots and fabulous fishing holes to massive amounts of power production and the efficient movement of millions of tonnes of goods every year — to take better care.

Let’s stop playing political games with one of our most valuable natural assets.

Derek Coronado is Coordinator of the Citizens Environment Alliance of Southwestern Ontario.