As Great Lakes agreement reaches milestone anniversary, protections as vital as ever

CEA in the News

As Great Lakes agreement reaches milestone anniversary, protections as vital as ever

Dave Battagello, WINDSOR STAR / April 11, 2022

As the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement reaches its 50-year anniversary this week, much in terms of protections and improvements must still be tackled in the years ahead, according to a newly-formed group of activists which includes members in Windsor.

At the time, the Great Lakes agreement signed by former U.S. President Richard Nixon and Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau on April 15, 1972, was a groundbreaking step by the two nations to jointly manage a shared resource.

Across the basin, the lakes were facing widespread pollution and contamination issues so severe their fate was threatened.

Thanks to the agreement, ongoing improvement projects and dedicated research has led to great strides, but there remain ongoing threats such as harmful algal blooms, climate change and new toxic substances, including within the Detroit River, Lake St. Clair and Lake Erie in this area.

“A reasonable approach (due to the agreement) has been laid out around water quality concerns,” said Derek Coronado of the Citizens Environment Alliance in Windsor. “The U.S. and Canada has done a good job in terms of research, but at the same time there is less coordination on management programs. There are also limitations around enforcement and parties not living up to the agreement.”

The local environment alliance has joined the Great Lakes Ecoregion Network (GLEN) — a new initiative to unite members of the Great Lakes environmental community on issues related to the Great Lakes agreement. The group will work towards a continued push on the U.S. and Canadian federal governments to strengthen their commitment to the water quality agreement and ecosystem health in the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Basin.

Aside from Windsor, the new initiative includes a wide array of members along the basin from locales such as Toronto, Kitchener, Toledo, Buffalo, Erie Pa., Madison, Wisc. and other cities.

“We have ongoing concerns,” Coronado said. “The Detroit River is one example where there have been a lot of improvements, but in the lakes there are increasing concerns on algal blooms and toxic pollution. They have been really slow on designating harmful chemicals of concern in the lakes. They have also been slow to respond on climate impacts on the lakes.

“You have mixed bag right now where it’s good we don’t have rivers catching fire any more, but there is still a lot of work to do.”

Also of note, is Windsor will be host this September to a public forum on the Great Lakes and its water quality hosted by Environment and Climate Change Canada — in part to recognize the agreement’s 50th anniversary, but more importantly to allow activists and organizations an opportunity to bring forward their concerns.

An exact date and location in Windsor for the public forum has not yet been announced, Coronado said.