LUISA D'AMATO TAKES OFFENCE AT THE REST OF US BEING CALLED "GOLDEN RETRIEVERS"

Jeff McIntyre of the Grand Valley Construction Association really is a horse's patootie. What was he thinking when he referenced his like for Non Disclosure Agreements because he's on the inside while the rest of us are golden retrievers waiting by the door for news. No politician worth his salt would make such a stupid comment but then maybe Mr. McIntyre is a much better human being than most politicians (granted a low standard) . Maybe he's at exactly where he should be but really he should be a tad more careful in his public choice of words.

Ms. D'Amato makes a very strong case for the public being in the loop and immediately apprised of new facts or plans whether good or bad. She also bluntly puts the committee members/working group of councillors, developers and builders in their place when she advises that "We, the public, are the owners, not the companion animals. We will decide what happens to the water, and who gets elected in the fall."

I've been warning Woolwich councillors for some time now that their futures, their reputations and legacies are at risk regarding the Elmira water crisis. Perhaps we will have a regional housecleaning first over the regional water crisis and the Woolwich one four years later after the mandated 2026 failure and fallout occurs. Who knows though. It could be a doubleheader this fall during the 2026 elections.     

CHURCH'S HOUSING DEVELOPMENT VERSUS GRAVEL PITS: WHO SHOULD GET THE WATER?

 

One article in today's K-W Record (front page) written by Bill Jackson discusses the refusal to give the former Trinity United Church in Elmira a building permit and the other on page 3. by Bill Doucet is an article in which local M.P.P. Aislinn Clancy is asking the Ontario Minister of Environment to stop issuing industrial and commercial water taking permits. In particular she is not happy with local gravel pits putting in applications for large water taking permits. 

For me this is an easy choice. We've got more gravel pits than we need and more pits are simply to reduce distance and costs to transport aggregate to building sites, cement and asphalt facilities. In other words to boost aggregate producers profits which isn't necessarily on it's face a bad thing. I however vote in favour of  water permits going to the new housing being developed on the former Church property on Arthur St. in Elmira.

Now here's a twist.  Elmira supposedly is legally mandated to have our Uniroyal Chemical contaminated ground water rehabilitated and restored by 2028.  If that were to occur (it won't) then I dare say that Woolwich could have pretty much gone ahead with OUR water and given the new housing development the building permit they require for construction this summer. Maybe a little more support and citizen involvement over the years/decades would have lit a fire under all the guilty/recalcitrant local buggers including politicians who have gone along deferentially with the go through the motions status quo for so long.

TRAC MEETING OF FEBRUARY !9, 2026

 

First of all I'm late posting this because of human error at the Township. A staff person simply forgot to put the link to their You Tube video on the Township's website (look for "Council Calendar") after uploading the meeting to You Tube . That said I'm going to grudgingly, unhappily and with an overall lack of grace thank a Woolwich councillor whom I have many times in the past sharply criticized environmentally.  Nathan Cadeau when informed by me promptly fixed the matter. Thank you Nathan.

Hmm O.K. that wasn't as painful as I thought it would be. Maybe that's because I view my environmental criticism as factual but not personal. We were advised by Lanxess (Hadley) about the results of some bench scale remediation testing. Now I believe she was talking about aerobic (with oxygen) and anaerobic (without oxygen) use of either bacteria or possibly amendments to soils that hopefully stimulate the bacteria to degrade NDMA and or chlorobenzene. The aerobic degradation was much better than the anaerobic degradation for chlorobenzene. For NDMA however the degradation both ways was much less than that for chlorobenzene. This testing will continue halfway through 2026.

Public consultation was discussed for the upcoming 2028 instrument whatever it's name such as Control Order or Certificate of Approval etc.  This of course is the new instrument post the mandated (but failed) groundwater cleanup deadline of 2028. A rose by any other name smells as sweet and another pile of horse manure from the MECP (Min. of Environment) will be equally as useless as all the rest. 

Mayor Shantz suggested that the current Waterloo Region water quantity crisis may be conflated with Elmira's water quality crisis involving NDMA, chlorobenzene, dioxins and so much more. Personally I believe that the two crises are interconnected. If she and the other guilty parties had done their jobs one or two decades ago our aquifers could have been in much better shape by now. She also would like to know if there is a better place to discharge the treated groundwater under Elmira to other than the Canagagigue Creek. Look out folks still contaminated water is looking for a home near you.

Hadley Stamm (Lanxess) made a reasonably dumb statement when she suggested that the treated groundwater being discharged to the Creek was at drinking water standards. Well Lou Almeida (GHD) swooped in and rescued her from that . Clearly Lanxess are more about PR and appearances as Hadley is the point person constantly interrupting and talking over Lou. Lou is a middle aged male of average appearance who has a ton of local Elmira experience versus Hadley's five minutes or so. One of these days Lou just might snap and non affectionately tell Hadley to "Shut the *#ck up !" Hope springs eternal.

Karl Belan of the Region of Waterloo made it clear that the Region were not interested in further treating discharged ground water to bring it up to drinking water standards. There was also discussion about the stigma of drinking former Uniroyal chemically contaminated water. 

I was pleased to see that TRAC are flexible enough to shift gears somewhat in mid stream and discuss the current Waterloo Region alleged quantity crisis. I say alleged because although not yet fully proven it sure looks like we are in water supply (quantity) trouble plus quantity IS related to quality. When you have a number of wellfields shut down due to contamination as we do then certainly water quality is affecting quantity. Well E10 at the south end of Elmira is being looked at although I find it odd that the well shed or housing has been removed. Yes the pipe is sticking out of the ground there but why expose it unnecessarily? Also I have heard recently that the Region are looking elsewhere near Elmira for more water.  Well that should be interesting as we see them attempt to pump uncontaminated water from the same aquifer(s). In fact buddy (?) Nathan Cadeau actually suggested that the Region could drill somewhere else in the aquifer and have clean water. Well, well, well.

Hadley got into an interesting conversation with Karl (Region) when she appeared to say simultaneously that the Region Do/Don't intentionally pump drinking water from contaminated aquifers elsewhere than Elmira.  Maybe Lanxess would care to clean up the treated groundwater further for use as drinking water??? Eric Hodgins (former Region hydroG) maybe pointedly commented that the Ontario Safe Drinking Water Act does have provisions for fines and jail for violators. Hmm.

There was much discussion about a survey from Lanxess to determine local interest in these issues. Frankly I think that all Lanxess want to do is quietly get the heck out of the aquifer remediation business as soon as possible and that means keeping everything on the downlow. 

I am seeing which way the wind is blowing and it's all about winding this thing up gracefully and looking good spending the least amount of money possible. Thank you Region of Waterloo for putting water back in the spotlight. 

RESIDENTS & CITIZENS SPEAK TRUTH, M.P.P. MIKE HARRIS LIES & BSs FOR HIS POLITICAL MASTER

 

I must say that it is a pleasure reading almost every day about the Region of Waterloo's incompetence and negligence regarding our mutual water systems.  Today I will be mentioning the hot air and absolute stupid comments from M.P.P. Mike Harris regarding the Region's water crisis as well as more first hand evidence from rural citizens living on the west side of Kitchener whom I may carefully compare to frogs in a pot of slowly, increasingly hotter water. No offence is meant by this metaphor. 

Mike Harris Jr. Jr.'s comments are published in great detail in this week's Woolwich Observer newspaper. The residents and citizens knowledge has been passed on to the public both in today's K-W Record by Terry Pender and in previous days and is straightforward and clear. Some of Mr. Harris Jr. Jr.'s asinine comments include "These infrastructure challenges are not a reason for critical infrastructure builds or housing projects to stall,". He also suggested that "  We expect the Region to continue to provide clear updates on how additional capacity will be delivered and timelines for when it is brought online." Clearly Mr. Harris Jr. Jr. isn't worried about how much water is left in our aquifers. Maybe he will reassure us by stating that God is a Progressive Conservative who would never let our aquifers run dry.

Two longtime local residents of Wilmot Township have spoken of their personal experiences with the falling water table for decades. This has included sinking multiple new wells and going deeper for the water that they need. The Waterloo Moraine is an incredible resource and it certainly appears that it has been abused and taken for granted by our authorities. 

There are two options. Firstly serious investigation into the groundwater levels throughout the Waterloo Moraine. Maybe the data is already available. Secondly if the water levels are better than expected and that we've been led to believe, then  I would question what was the motive for this scare, this alleged crisis.  Are our provincial and regional authorities so corrupt that they would attempt to manufacture a crisis in order to promote a multi billion dollar pipeline from Lake Erie to here? Somebodies will make millions of dollars profits on any such pipeline that we the taxpayers will pay for. 

So if there is a legitimate water supply crisis than our regional councillors (and some staff ?) need to get the boot and quickly for incompetence and negligence. If the crisis is a fake then some of the above along with provincial politicians need some long term rest and relaxation in a provincial institution (i.e. jail).

    

WHO'S LYING: STAFF, REGIONAL COUNCILLORS OR BOTH?

 

Well, well, well the mud is starting to fly. Today's K-W Record has a story by Terry Pender titled "Regional councillor wants probe into water crisis".  Reporter Luisa D'Amato apparently also attended last Wednesday's Waterloo Region council meeting and spoke about it in her Opinion piece titled "For some of us, the water crisis has already arrived". The good news is that both reporters picked up on the same strange occurrences at that council meeting.

The biggest and baddest is the announcement that both the public and regional councillors have been misled factually regarding water taking from Wilmot Township.  I was aware of the 1980 agreement between the Region and Wilmot Township that the township's water would not be unilaterally diverted by the Region towards other parts of the Region in particular to the tri cities. That appeared to be changed when the mayor of Wilmot, Ms. Salonen recently gave agreement in principle for the Region to take 30 litres per second from her township for use in the water short areas of K-W and Woolwich. That agreement appears to need to be ratified by her council (Wilmot) as well. Last Wednesday's regional council meeting had a major revelation. In fact the Region indeed did divert Wilmot water to the cities six or seven years ago and it's been ongoing! Nicely done Region of Waterloo. You've now admitted to lying to the public, Wilmot Township and presumably to most of your own regional councillors. WOW !!!

That betrayal and worse will take decades to live down if ever. Meanwhile councillor Doug Craig wants an independent probe into the causes of the water supply crisis. He's not the only one but skeptic that I am I have to ask is this for real or simple politics? Mr. Craig has also appropriately condemned the use of Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs). What I am left wondering and unclear from both these articles is whether regional staff actually were going to divert and pump an additional 30 litres per second to K-W and Woolwich or were they simply gilding the lily about the diversion they did back in 2019 ?

One other major point. To date I have only seen reporter Luisa D'Amato twice reference wells being taken offline due to contamination.  That is a huge element to the alleged Quantity only (i.e. Supply) problems in our water systems.  Do not most reasonable people understand that shut down wells due to industrial contamination in Elmira and Kitchener affect the Supply of water available? Then there is the reality that there are also operating wells in both Waterloo and Cambridge with toxic trichloroethylene (TCE) in them that are still operating thanks to dilution and mixing with the rest of the water supply. Can that go on forever? 

Whether self-serving or not Doug Craig's asking the right questions as did councillor Joe Gowing recently. Councillor Huinink just got added to my regular e-mail list due to her published skepticism about agreeing to allocating water for growth at this time. Meanwhile Melissa Durell, Mr. Puopolo and other self-serving developers and builders can go suck on a raw egg at least until both the public and the Region really know where we stand on water supply.  

NDAs TO HIDE WORKING GROUP DISCUSSIONS ABOUT PUTTING CONTAMINATED WELLS BACK INTO OUR DRINKING WATER SYSTEM

 

DISCRIMINATORY NOT TO INCLUDE ELMIRA'S NDMA WATER INTO THE MIX

If Kitchener and Cambridge are allowed to put their trichloroethylene (and more) contaminated water into the big regional Integrated Urban System (IUS) drinking water pot then why not Elmira as well? Lanxess Canada have been moaning and groaning for the last couple of years about wastefulness as they dump somewhat treated groundwater into the Canagagigue Creek. If the Region are seriously planning on using retread wells (Woolner, Pompeii, Greenbrook & Parkway Wellfields)  with long histories of contamination then how dare you discriminate against our fine, Mennonite, contaminated water. Is our chlorobenzene, NDMA and maybe even dioxin contaminated water not good enough for you? Who knows, the state of knowledge whether toxicity or health related is so limited that maybe the various contaminants might cancel each other out.

I see two possibilities here. We could develop a two tier water system whereby our politicians, developers, builders and real estate folks are serviced from the industrially uncontaminated wells and the rest of us can drink from the leftover, retreaded and refurbished chemically enhanced wells. Hmm maybe we might want to include doctors, hospital staff and  police in the favoured status, unenhanced wells. Certainly we shouldn't charge the unsophisticated masses a premium for the extra additives that they will receive.

The other plan is to begin deporting older, useless retired citizens like me who are no longer contributing to the general good. Now by "deporting" I only mean to kick them out of Waterloo Region in order to make room for all the vibrant, hard working newcomers that Doug Ford and the Region are set on.  Just think of the advantages. Bringing in an additional 300,000 people by 2051 is a piece of cake if no upgrades are needed to our wastewater treatment systems (sewage treatment plants), our hospitals and health care and our drinking water systems. Furthermore if you squeeze your eyes, just so, you can see that we might actually be increasing the lifespans of our older, more health challenged citizens by not making them drink our NDMA, dioxin, chlorobenzene, trichloroethylene, benzene etc. mostly low level contaminated water. Talk about a Win-Win !

Non Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) are not everybodies cup of tea. There will be shouts of hooliganism, lying, non-transparency and non-accountability but that happens every time when elites (smarter/richer)  focus on who really matters which is them not us. For progress to happen you can't let the majority (non elite masses) run the show and it is so much easier to control them by keeping them in the dark. Hence the huge advantages to NDAs keeping difficult information from the uninformed public who wouldn't understand it anyways.  Or as Jeff MacIntyre (builder) stated in today's Record article titled "Region pushes NDAs for water talks";  he likes NDAs because he doesn't want to sit by the door like a Golden Retriever (the public) waiting for a report. Right on Mr. MacIntyre !

P.S. Just because Elmira water isn't good enough for us right now doesn't mean it's not good enough if a little diluted for the rest of the Region of Waterloo. Afterall wouldn't you drink a really fine wine from a jug just because someone peed in it the night before, emptied it and then filled it with a vintage beverage for you?   

THANK YOU TERRY PENDER, JIM POLING, BRENT JOLLY FOR YOUR CORRECTION IN TODAY'S K-W RECORD

 

Gosh that wasn't so difficult now was it? Your CORRECTION on page A2 with the title "Re: Councillor wants halt on new water-taking permits in Waterloo Region" was clear and concise. I certainly didn't need any thanks or applause or public adulation for doing what I've been doing here in Dogpatch (Elmira) for the last 36 years plus. My volunteer work has always been in the public interest and yes besides environmental failures that also includes picking up on mathematical failures that have gotten by reporters and editors. Based upon Record Editor Jim Poling and National Media Council Brent Jolly's pathetic mishandling of my polite and courteous request for a Correction/Retraction on the Lanxess Canada/Elmira Water Crisis story in late November 2025 written by Terry Pender; I decided this time to be a hard a*s about it. Instead of approaching initially only Terry Pender and Jim Poling and later Brent Jolly as I did last November, this time I sent out my Blog posting immediately to Woolwich Council, Waterloo Region Council, TRAC, MECP,  Lanxess, Woolwich Observer, and the K-W Record plus maybe a few more. Gosh I wonder how pissed all your developer friends were when they figured out that the Record instead of downplaying or minimizing the crisis you were actually (unintentionally probably) artificially increasing it with your sloppy mathematics. Now after that slap to the back of your heads just let me say this: WELL DONE! Your series on the Region's water crisis has been terrific so far. I am however still wondering when you are going to publish the truth about the retread wells the Region want to put back in service in order to supplement the volume of our water supply.

Today's Record article titled "Third-generation Wilmot resident has witnessed the water table drop" certainly casts doubt upon the demands and claims of developers and builders suggesting that this Region wide water crisis is an engineering problem only. I have no doubt that our friends at the University of Waterloo who have been studying groundwater recharge, discharge and elevations for decades have a good idea whether or not putting more straws into the communal milkshake will continue to lower the water levels to dangerous levels or not. Personally until I see peer accepted, proven and verified data on the Waterloo Moraine Aquifers in particular, I am very skeptical that those who have personally made tons of money through development and building are speaking for the public interest.  

K-W Record I applaud your Correction in today's newspaper. I really don't believe that your readers will hold it against Mr. Pender that he made an honest mistake. I expect that they, like myself, will be more impressed that the Record quickly acknowledged and corrected that mistake.