NURSING HOME STAFF SHORTAGES & A BRIEF FLIRTATION WITH A POLICE STATE

I am of two minds in regards to Premier Doug Ford's quick reversal on giving police more powers in Ontario however I am incensed by the hypocrisy, stupidity and deception of all players in Long Term Care and Retirement Homes. Why do these players all pretend that the staff shortages are surprising, unavoidable, or somehow inexplicable to them? Please! Let's see now: close to minimum wages, no benefits, no job security, no standard hours of work or even firm schedules, part time work at multiple homes requiring hours of commuting per day, no status and little or no appreciation for a job well done by management or ownership. And that's not even discussing some of the work itself. Good God changing adult diapers. Any parents of very young children can make jokes or otherwise about diaper duty for their own infants whom they love but seriously changing adult diapers! That takes either desperate or very special people willing to help those human beings who have become helpless due to infirmity. My hat goes off to all working in those settings and trying their hardest. ............................................................................................................. Regarding advanced powers to police to stop and interrogate citizens at random either walking or driving: We just appear to have gotten rid of bulls.it "carding" and "street checks" and our idiot Premier reinstated them under a different name. What kind of spineless, stupid advisors does he have around him? That's what terrifies me. That cabinet members, advisers or whoever are closest to him didn't stand up on their hind legs and say no, HELL NO! Also the fact that this abomination didn't even go the legislature. Majority government or not, this is a clear indication of how tenuous our "rights" really are. No debate, no vote, no opposition M.P.P.s had any say whatsoever in this attempt on a very bad, very slippery downhill slide away from democracy and citizens' rights. Shame on Ford and shame on his Cabinet and party. They have just made it clear that democracy is a sham that can be removed by fiat at any time. ............................................................................................................................ To my pleasant astonishment, even several police forces immediately, publicly said "No we will not do it.". Civil rights groups, prominent individuals and opposition members immediately condemned the proclamation. Ford and fellow idiots backed down. They realized that citizens are not yet ripe for removal of their rights. The time is coming but it's not quite time yet without major, costly battles. So on one hand I applaud Ford's immediate reversal. On the other I am appalled at how easy it was to make the initial announcement. To make an unconstitutional, illegal, immoral and undemocratic announcement and there are NO immediate and serious consequences. What the hell, our supposed leaders can go that far and NOT pay a legal price for their attempt to seize our rights by force (i.e. police). My God at the very least I hope that my fellow, white, priveleged citizens can at least begin to understand how many of our fellow non-white, non-priveleged citizens have felt for decades. "Rights" literally are at the mercy of the government of the day and those governments walk with impunity when they decide to reverse those rights. What a contemptible system wrapped in the robes of decency, fair play, democracy and honesty.

POLITICS, COVID & DEBT

Recently two friends and I compared assessments of Doug Ford, Conservative Premier of Ontario. The one friend is a retired teacher. Ooh I didn't expect much praise from that quarter from a retired teacher and in fact he assessed Mr. Ford a two out of ten score. The other friend however is a retired accountant and a supporter of most things Conservative. He assessed Doug Ford with a six out of ten which surprised me as I expected higher. That left my assessment. I have never in my life even considered voting Conservative and in fact have voted Liberal (not recently), NDP and once or twice Green. Well there I was a known "left winger". I was seriously considering either a four or five out of ten assessment but whether sympathy for Ford or more likely sympathy for my Conservative friend who assessed a relatively lowly six score I announced my assessment to be a five. Now keep in mind that assessment was before yesterday's post here titled "An Eye Opening Article In Today's K-W Record". After reading that article regarding alleged intentional abandonment by our provincial government of low income earners in Brampton, Mississauga, Scarborough etc. I would now definitely give at most a four to the Premier while actually suspecting that a three might be more accurate. ................................................................................................................ Today's Waterloo Region Record carries the following story titled "Nursing homes badly prepared for Covid-19, auditor general says". I really don't think that there are too many people out there who would be surprised at those conclusions from the auditor general's report. The first two waves (i.e. prior to any vaccinations) absolutely hammered long term care and retirement homes with especially devastating results in the "for profit" homes. Keep clearly in mind that while the Progressive Conservatives had shown little interest in protecting and assisting residents either in opposition or as the government; the Liberal Party of Ontario were no better even when in government for multiple terms, minority or majority government. The following quotes are shocking and almost beyond comprehension in a wealthy province like Ontario. " the culmination of years of neglect and failure to address known problems", "...overcrowding, poor ministry oversight and a severe staffing shortage that existed before the pandemic struck." Also "...concerns raised repeatedly for years went unaddressed...". ............................................................................................................. Concerning the first two waves of Covid it continues with "Neither the Ministry of Long-Term Care nor the long-term-care sector was sufficiently positioned, prepared or equipped to respond." NDP leader Andrea Horvath was quoted as saying "The Ford government knew the system was a disaster waiting to happen-and they chose to let it happen,". The reality is that she is correct in that the Ford government knew it was a disaster waiting to happen however so did the Liberals when in power and so did the industry itself and particularly the "for profit" homes. .......................................................................................................... I've used the word "debt" in the above title. There is also an interesting opinion piece written by two economists titled "The truth about Canada's debt". It appears to strongly suggest that government debt owed to the Bank of Canada isn't really a significant problem especially for our next generation. Whether or not I agree with that rosy outlook I have to ask this question. How much money did Canadians (and Ontarians) actually save by shortchanging nursing homes for decades? Did the lower than needed expenditures save us that much on our taxes and if they did was it worth the thousands of unnecessary deaths? Or did both our Liberal and Conservative governments actually value all those lives at zero?

AN EYE OPENING COVID ARTICLE IN TODAY'S K-W RECORD

The title of the Opinion piece by Bruce Arthur is "Teen's COVID death a personal tragedy and a systemic failure". While the first part of the title is accurate and obvious I did not at first understand Mr. Arthur's suggestion that it was a "systemic failure". Well after reading it I am beginning to understand. I knew that the big population centres such as Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton etc. had sufferred more from the transmission of the virus and I simply had chalked it up to numbers i.e. more people in close proximity to each other. ....................................................................................................... Well it's more than that. It is about inequity and disparity. It's about living hand to mouth and paycheque to paycheque becaue of low wages in a high rent, high cost of living location. Four people (Mom, Dad two siblings in a two bedroom apartment while the Dad worked in a warehouse. Ironically he was the only one of the family of four who did not recently test positive for Covid. I'd been looking at overall statistics suggesting something like a 2.5% infection rate across the province. The reality however is that lower income families with available work being outside the home are bearing the brunt of the pandemic. .................................................................................................................... Mr. Arthur suggests very strongly that the Ontario government has knowingly not allocated adequate resources including vaccines to the hardest hit areas of the province. That perhaps the poor in high population areas have been intentionally allowed to bear the brunt of the disease. It is difficult to read however he makes a strong case. Peel Region is full of warehouses and factories along with citizens who need their full paycheques, week in and week out. Hence up to 25% of workers in a survey done by the Peel Public health had indicated that they went to work with possible symptoms of Covid. As there is NOT sick pay in this province, non-unionized (especially) workers are not only risking a days pay or more but even their jobs if they stay at home while sick. ................................................................................................................ My friends and family have been avoiding Covid but in hindsight it's because we have been able to work from home and or have an employer who is willing to behave like human beings ought to.

ONLY CO-OPERATIVE, AMENABLE OR CO-OPTED CITIZENS NEED APPLY TO MUNICIPAL CONTROLLED COMMITTEES

I was advised of this reality by an activist who commented on the Cambridge Advocate website possibly ten to fifteen years ago. Her logic was unassailable in that the primary purpose of a municipal committee was both to give the appearance of public consultation on an issue of public interest as well as to have a group to hide behide if something goes wrong. The municipal councillors can deflect criticism from the public by simply saying well we are not the experts, we have dedicated volunteers (citizens) who read all the technical reports and advise us as to what direction we should be taking. Municipalities that are more experinced dealing with difficult issues such as contaminated sites within their borders have also learned the advantages of getting free advice from citizens who have professional backgrounds in the same or similar area. They do this by advertising specifically for citizens with a professional background in areas such as hydrology, hydrogeology, air contamination etc. These municipalities do this for self-serving reasons. Often they know full well how serious the situation is and the last thing they really want are honest, intelligent citizens who have no financial skin in the game. An honest citizen who does not need to worry about jeopardizing their job or alienating a provincial ministry (MOE/MECP) who their employer desperately needs goodwill from, can be dangerous to polluters, regulators and certainly the local power brokers (municipal councils). The actual "cleanup" protocols and processes have evolved over decades into a very comfortable, non-finger pointing, mostly quiet discussions involving Risk Assessments, exposure paths, toxicity levels, and away from blame, health studies, compensation claims etc. As usually the polluters have shared their disposal problems/methods with the regulators beforehand, those regulators (MOE/MECP) often become complicit in the highly optimistic beliefs in things like dilution and natural attenuation. ..................................................................................................................... Under a regieme like that, loud, insistent citizen voices demanding accountability and complete cleanup simply are not appreciated by the MOE/MECP, the polluter or the local authorities. Of course in an inherently honest system it would be the local governemnt, supposedly there on behalf of the people who would support them. Those days if they ever existed are long gone. The vast majority of politicians at all levels of government are there for their benefit not the publics'. Money and politics rule everything instead of what is the right thing to do versus what is the wrong thing. .......................................................................................................................... And so even with generally (not 100%) excellent people involved thirty years ago here in Elmira who were in control of their own committee, that has degenerated into a municipally controlled and stifled two committees today. Yes public consultation since 2000 has been so perverted that even the good people on TAG (Technical Advisory Group) can not make necessary headway. They are set up to be subservient to another group (RAC -Remediation Advisory Committee) who are nothing more than co-opted bureaucrats, municipal and regional politicians and appointees beholden to them. Lanxess Canada and the Ontario Ministry of Environment love it. They had popular, pretend mayor Sandy Shantz lead the charge in 2015 to remove the best public consultaion group there had ever been (CPAC from 2011-August 2015) in Elmira. That said the biggest failure was CPAC in 2000 rolling over and allowing municipal councillor Pat McLean to remove CPAC's independence and put them under municipal control. Dr. Henry Regier, Esther Thur and myself all argued against it but Pat McLean with Susan Bryant's help carried the vote. It's been downhill as far as being in the public interest ever since. I told you so back then. It will remain so as long as the "public consultation" is under municipal council control.

HISTORICAL REVIEW: AN ABSOLUTELY HILARIOUS PUBLIC EXPOSURE OF WOOLWICH COUNCIL

Saturday August 15, 2015. That's not the date that Woolwich Council misbehaved so dramatically but it is the date that several different articles were published describing Councils' shenanigans. It was likely the previous Tuesday's Council meeting where the councillors and pretend Mayor Sandy Shantz walked out on a delegate in mid presentation after repeatedly interrupting his presentation to them. Besides the multiple articles (about to be listed) published in the Woolwich Observer there was also my posting here in the Elmira Advocate (same Aug. 15 date) which took both the Merlihan brothers to task as well as Woolwich Council. The irony of course is that these following articles published in the Observer absolutely hammerred Council's illegal behaviour as well as vindicated me by highlighting Woolwich Council's personal animosity towards myself for stepping up and holding them accountable for their blatantly illegal (Municipal Elections Act, Ontario Municipal Act etc.) behaviour. It's been my experience that governments at all levels prefer to allege and accuse private citizens of bad or illegal behviour than ever have to admit to their own illegalities which they are far more likely to participate in than ordinary citizens. Governments do this for self-serving reasons plus they know that the laws passed by either themselves or other lawmakers will not hold them personally responsible for actions and decisions made by the council/assembly/legislature etc. ............................................................................................................................ The various titles of other relevant articles in the Observer that day (Aug. 15/15) were "Woolwich call to action to M.O.E.", "Auditor finds issues with Hahn's election expenses" and "Ombudsman calls for changes to Woolwich's closed door meetings". Hoo boy were those idiots under attack ironically/simultaneously as CPAC were under vicious and dishonest attack by Woolwich councillors (S. Shantz & M. Bauman). Notice I said ironically/simultaneously, I did not say coincidentally. Those filthy, lying scum made the serious mistake of attacking honest and informed CPAC (Chemtura Public Advisory Committee) members via lying and exaggeration in order to curry favour with the likes of Chemtura Canada and the Ontario Ministry of Environment. Those filthy councillors threw their own appointed (by previous council) citizens under the bus including defaming and false allegations in order to appease the parties most guilty for destroying Elmira's groundwater, drinking water, health and environment. If those filth and tried that shit twenty years earlier they might have gotten themselves tarred and feathered and run out of town. Nope instead they waited until the media and local citizens had forgotten their previous outrage. ....................................................................................................................................... Yes it's true. I made the conscious decision to publicly expose Woolwich Council for their hypocrisy, prevarication and ongoing illegal behaviour. Nothing was made up or even exaggerated. It didn't have to be. Clearly no one had decided to either hold them accountable or take them to task until I did. Their litany of misdeeds, misbehaviour and illegalities were just so blatant and obvious. True the system failed in holding them fully accountable in law as it should have but hey...politicians tend to protect their own whenever possible. Nevertheless in the court of public opinion they got roasted and yes I loved every minute of it. They crapped on good people who were my friends and colleagues and between radio, television and multiple newspapers, they paid the price. The public desperately needed to know that municipal councils can sometimes be filled with petty, stupid people. At one point (July 27/15) there was even a Waterloo Region Record Editorial titled "A wake-up call for Woolwich". It started as follows: "Whatever is in the water in Woolwich?". Also "And now they are gasping for air in a sea of embarrassment." The Record held few punches back in their criticism of Woolwich and did an appropriate public service.

THE FILTH AT THE TOP

Today's on-line news advises us that the Thames Valley District School Board (TVDSB) did not live up to their legal obligations regarding a pervert teacher who was known to secretly video record young female students without their knowledge or consent. The teacher was eventually fired and I believe also spent six quality months in jail for his behaviour all of which took place on school property while he was in a position of trust regarding students. Currently at least one of those former students are now suing the TVDSB for their failure after the teacher was caught to assist the student victims through professional counselling and more. If any of this is ringing any bells for local people then that is because you recall the Ron Archer affair here in Waterloo Region. Mr. Archer was a teacher who sexually harassed and victimized numerous of his junior high students, both male and female. Mr. Archer may have been the original, although certainly not the only, "pass the trash" teacher that the Waterloo Region District School Board (WRDSB) had to offer. He spent twenty years being transferred from school to school, with only the odd brave principal refusing to have him at their school. His reputation for inappropriate, sexualized behaviour with twelve and thirteen year old students was well known within the local educational community (i.e. the WRDSB). .............................................................................................................. Despite this he was allowed free rein with his students which only finally ended when a former student turned eighteen and went to the Waterloo Regional Police with information about how he had been molested etc. by Ron Archer when he was in junior high. Mr. Archer spent four quality years behind bars for convictions which included threatening one male student with a shotgun. At trial, the prior knowledge both within the WRDSB and of his teaching collegues of Mr. Archer's inappropriate and illegal behaviour was astounding. A very few teachers had stood up and demanded action as had one or two principals, all to no avail. For whatever reason including placating and mollifying the teachers union, the WRDSB did nothing significant to stop Mr. Archer's reign of terror within the schools. ........................................................................................................ Today's on-line news article makes it clear that our semi-hopeless court and judicial system are beginning to hold those in charge to a higher standard. The old crap about "well he didn't molest kids in front of me" and other excuses simply aren't good enough. School Boards (TVDSB & WRDSB etc.) know which teachers are the subject of student and or parental complaints. They know from fellow teachers comments when behaviour is either outrageous or illegal and they have a legal duty to both prevent future injurious behaviour as well as to discipline (including removal if necessary) past misbehaviours. Teachers unions serve the purpose of ensuring that discipline is both appropriate and reasonable. My personal experience is with the WRDSB and their behaviour both with Ron Archer and other bad teachers was disgusting and contemptible including attacking parents attempting to protect their children. Presumably long retired now, names like Omand, Stone and maybe Wideman come to mind. They and the WRDSB sometimes received assistance from the police against parents and from certain judicial persons such as the dishonourable Robert Reilly. If there is a hell I wish them a very long time there. They have earned it.

REGION OF WATERLOO'S ERB ST. LANDFILL

Today's Waterloo Region Record carries a story titled "Region's only landfill has more life left in it". Overall it is a good news story in that Waterloo Region citizens have dramatically reduced their garbage output over the last several years with greater use of compost (green bin) and recyclables (blue bin). Hence projections of when the Erb St. landfill will be full have been pushed back five or ten years longer. In fact it is expected now not to be full for another 25 to 30 years. .................................................................................................................... For the vast majority of citizens who don't live near the landfill or even near St. Agatha that is all good news. However spare a moment to think about both the very long term residents who have had homes beside the landfill since the 1960s or 70s. Also think about the expanding residential subdivisions along Erb St. near the landfill. Some of the older residents have been involved with a landfill liason committee since the 1990s. Back then they were advised that the Region would reduce odours with better housekeeping and daily coverage of new garbage and that the landfill was only projected to be active for another decade or so! Wow, can you imagine local homeowners relying on that information then in regards as to whether to pull up stakes or not? .......................................................................................................... Besides odours, noise and loose garbage being blown about there has been another issue for a very long time. That issue is groundwater contamination and the original dump was not engineered with the now mandatory leachate collection and controls. The dump was retrofitted many years ago and the leaxchate collected is sent to one of our local waste water treatment plants for treatment prior to discharge to the Grand River. Meanwhile there is a known contaminant plume in the off-site groundwater. My recollection is that it might contain some DNAPL chemicals as explained in yesterday's post here. Regardless I am not fully confident in undocumented claims that no contaminant plume is heading towards drinking wells in and around St. Agatha. I very much doubt that in today's understanding of aquifer protection that a landfill would ever have been sited where the Erb St. landfill has been for so many decades. ......................................................................................................... There is a reason for NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) attitudes. Those reasons include but are not limited to noise, odours, litter, property values and groundwater protection. It is hoped that the Erb St. Landfill is the last of its' kind in Waterloo Region.

A DNAPL HISTORY LESSON

DNAPL - Dense Non Aqueous Phase Liquid ......................................................................................................................... DNAPLS are a group of chemical compounds often being chlorinated organics such as well known solvents namely chlorobenzene, trichloroethylene, chlorophenols etc. Other DNAPL chemicals include carboxin, MBT and more. They share certain characteristics including low solubility in water and density greater than one which means they tend to sink in the subsurface through water saturated aquifers. .......................................................................................................................... To say that they are a major environmental contaminant and hazard is a huge understatement. Once in groundwater in their pure phase form they can slowly dissolve over decades and centuries to concentrations exceeding the drinking water standards. They are difficult although not impossible to remove from the subsurface once accurately located. Here in Waterloo Region we have ground and drinking water contaminated by them in Kitchener, Waterloo and Cambridge. Trichlorothylene (TCE) is found in our three cities drinking water courtesy of industrial operations such as Electrohome (Deilcraft), Canadian General Tower (possibly shared from nearby drycleaning operations), Canbar, Sunar and even possibly the former Seagram's operation in Waterloo. ......................................................................................................................... Here in Elmira, chlorobenzene is the most well known DNAPL chemical in our groundwater although there are others. Back on October 21, 2010 I posted here about part of the extensive DNAPL coverup by Chemtura, the Ministry of Environment and a couple of local co-opted citizens. The title of the posting (still on line ) is "Pat McLean and Susan Bryant have witheld crucial information from the public". This is in reference to a meeting in January 2007 that I attended with them and Wilf Ruland at the University of Waterloo with Professors and DNAPL experts, Dr. John Cherry and Dr. Beth Parker. That posting describes the advice that we were given regarding removing DNAPL from the subsurface when at all possible to reduce the ongoing and longterm contamination of groundwater. This advice was contrary to past understandings that attempts to remove DNAPL might somehow mobilize it to spread further in the subsurface. It was also grossly contrary to the advice of Conestoga Rovers, client driven consultants to Uniroyal Chemical/Crompton and Chemtura Canada. Unfortunately it was also contrary to behaviour and actions of APT Environment from January 1994 until that time and later. In hindsight I have likely suggested that private deals were agreed to between Uniroyal and a couple of APT members without the knowledge or agreement of either all the APTE co-ordinaters or certainly of the APTE membership. These deals most likely included promises for future creek improvement in exchange for relief on the DNAPL issues. Of course these two (later three) APT members did not remotely have the technical knowledge or expertise or authority from their members to make any such deals but that did not stop them. ................................................................................................................................ They were thus shocked and between a rock and a hard place having me present to that January 2007 DNAPL meeting. Their decision was not to renege on their private, grossly inappropriate deal with Uniroyal but instead to manipulate a removal of yours truly as a CPAC member which they accomplished through their usual methods of lying, backstabbing and bending/breaking of any and all rules necessary to accomplish their self-serving goals. Keep in mind they had already managed to remove Rich Clausi, myself and Esther Thur from APTE back in 1994 over their initial DNAPL acceptance and coverup.

WHY WASTE A PERFECTLY GOOD CRISIS?

Dougie Ford and accompaning syncophants certainly have not wasted the world wide Covid-19 crisis. Under cover of deaths, illnesses and Intensive Care Units (ICU) being overwhelmed, he has systematically begun the Progressive Conservative assault upon the Ontario environment. Ministerial Zoning Orders (MZO) are our developers dreams come true. Bypassing little inconveniences such as Environmental Assessments (EA) and the former Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) now known as LPATs (Local Planning Area Tribunal), a provincial Minister on their own can order the go ahead for certain construction and development projects. Allegedly the province would like the support of local municipal councils but hey most of them are incredibly politicized and right wing anyways and this somewhat allows them to duck accountability and issues that an EA or LPAT hearing might expose to serious scrutiny. We can't have too little of that is the motto of far too many municipalities not to mention higher tier governments. ............................................................................................................. Gravel pits, wetlands, groundwater protection rules are all up to be circumvented and will be. Short term thinking and grabbing profits now have led the entire world to where it is today. Of course that has required bought and paid for law makers to suport and protect the small minority making millions of dollars for personal use. These same exploiters and destroyers of the earth funnel money whether legally or illegally back to the very same lawmakers, their families and or their companies. ........................................................................................................................... Covid-19 is ideal for these miserable excuses for human beings. Prior to it crises simply were too short term and too unreliable except climate change and a few others. As a result often politicians were forced into inventing crises. These could include foreign terrorism/domestic terrorism (especially in the U.S.), the Cold War, the war on drugs, communism, the radical left etc. etc.. .................................................................................................. Locally Woolwich Township politicians (i.e. two of them) invented the CPAC (Chemtura Public Advisory Committee) crisis in early 2015. Allegedly Chemtura and the Ontario Ministry of Environment (MOE/MECP) were emotionally devastated by the verbal assaults of mostly senior citizens appointed to CPAC by the former Woolwich Council. Yes there were some younger (40-60) year old members with both PHd. degrees and professional expertise in the environmental field. Not exactly a bunch of wild eyed radicals but hey when you are professional liars by career choice (i.e. politicians) then you use what you have. Current refusals to have any live public meetings likely will be seized upon in the future by these same swine after Covid-19 is nothing but a painful memory.

LANXESS PROGRESS REPORT OF MARCH 2021

You know it's just bizarre how Lanxess and the Ministry of Environment (MECP) can just continue on, month after month and year after year, constantly failing to achieve the necessary pumping rates that they have claimed for decades would achieve a "cleanup" of the Elmira Aquifers. As per yesterday's post here you can read how next Thursday's RAC (Remediation Advisory Committee) meeting was cancelled/postponed by Woolwich pretend mayor, Sandy Shantz. Maybe besides finally admitting a few years back that they are not going to achieve "cleanup" by 2028 as promised since at least 1998, they could at least publicly pressure the company through the alleged stakeholders' groups who make up the RAC committee. Of course firstly they would have to meet more than four times a year to do so and secondly the entrenched, highly political groups would need to develop just a tad of backbone to do so. RAC consists of Woolwich Township, Region of Waterloo, GRCA, TAG Chair, one or two rotating TAG members, Ontario Ministry of Environment (MECP) and Lanxess. ........................................................................................................................... It is possible with the sham of public consultation that is both TAG and RAC that Lanxess have at some point in time either privately or very quietly advised some stakeholders that they have thrown in the towel as to ever getting their off-site pumping rates even close to what Chemtura and Conestoga Rovers publicly advised CPAC (Chemtura Public Advisory Committee) was necessary in November 2012. Maybe between private "technical experts" meetings and occasional virtual meetings only of RAC and TAG, it has slipped through the cracks. If so that "slippage" was intentional. .................................................................................................................... The March 2021 Progress Report is more of the same. More excuses and less pumping. Pumping well W9 is still at zero. On-site pumping well PW5 continues to pump below it's Target Average to contain on-site contaminants from leaving the site. Many years ago, Jeff Merriman of Crompton/Lanxess promised CPAC members that the on-site Municipal Aquifers pumping rate would be 6.0 litres per second. Last month's on-site pumping rate was 4.6 l/sec. And so it goes month after month and year after year without anybody seriously calling them on it. No charges, no ultimatums, no shaming, no press conferences...just silence and everybody pretending that it's all O.K. ...................................................................................................................... The total off-site pumping in March was 57.17 litres/second. In 2012 it averaged around 53 l/sec and we were advised that it needed to be tripled along with some source removal via In Situ Chemical Oxidation (ISCO). Later they informally suggested that a mere doubling plus ISCO would achieve the 2028 deadline. Well guess what? With a few months here and there at 62 l/sec the vast majority of pumping has slightly increased to about where it is right now. There has been no use of ISCO in the Elmira Aquifers. How the hell can they even pretend that they were ever going to achieve full cleanup when they have failed so miserably to achieve their own goals and targets? It is obvious. Quietly and privately all the co-opted, politically controlled "stakeholders" have sold out the public. They must have agreed privately not to raise a stink or ever publicly demand action. Newer citizen TAG members are trying but all the authority rests with RAC. This "system" of public consultation was designed to succeed for the politicians and to utterly fail the environment and the public which is exactly what has happened. It's all window dressing, hot air, smoke and mirrors, lies and deception.

RAC POSTPONED AGAIN

The scheduled, virtual RAC (Remediation Advisory Committee) meeting of April 29/21 has been postponed by our very own pretend Mayor (see my April 15/21 posting), Sandy Shantz. Apparently she doesn't think that there are any significant items worthy of discussion to be put on the Agenda. Good God! I think the first four words of the previous sentence may be all too true. Perhaps adding "or care" to the end of those four words might be even more accurate. Postponements like this when there are so many disputed elements ongoing that need to be pushed hard by TAG and RAC, simply undermine any momentum or agreement by citizens demanding improvements to the creek investigation and cleanup as well as to the cleanup of the Elmira Aquifers. Some of these issues, disputed by Lanxess/GHD include improper sampling techniques in the creek (shovel sampling), minimizing the significance of the magnitude of chemical exceedances in the creek, high Detection Limits (MDL). ........................................................................................................................... Other areas of dispute that need to be resolved include the failure of GHD/Lanxess to fully delineate groundwater under the ENTIRE Stroh farm. Both horizontal and vertical flow and even the existence of some deeper aquifers has not been determined as promised. Then of course is the huge issue of the southern half or third of the Stroh farm including the Stroh Drain, Ditch & Berm (SDDB). There has been zero monitoring wells installed and sampled and other than allegedly a couple of sediment samples out of the bottom of the Drain, there have been zero soil samples in and around (particularly to the immediate east) the SDDB. .................................................................................................................................. The failure of the planned major puming well W9, literally for years, is way beyond ridiculous. Instead of getting the off-site pumping going it has been static mostly since 2012 unless of course when it has dropped below even those inadequate pumping rates by Chemtura/Lanxess's own calculations. Also instead of getting the pumping rates where they need to be, instead the Ministry of Environment and Lanxess are negotiating new goals and new timelines for the cleanup of the Elmira Aquifers. This despite twenty-five years of promises that all was well and on track. The filthy liars! ................................................................................................................. Meanwhile Sandy says that we don't have enough for a RAC Agenda. More colourful and odourous Bulls.it .

YET ANOTHER POSSIBLE SCENARIO?

Yesterday I speculated as to various reasons, rationales, excuses etc. as to why the Crown Prosecuter made the decision to go ahead, charge, convict and agree with the defence (female victim) on a total $2,600 worth of fines not to mention the criminal record. Today I am adding one more possible scenario as to what the heck is going on. Keep in mind that this is speculation; that is an attempt to find a theory or series of facts that might explain the Crown's, on the surface, bizarre behaviour. ............................................................................................................................... What if after the conviction and sentencing of the accused (victim's ex-husband), new evidence came to light indicating that the alleged victim had been untruthful regarding events. For whatever reason she had decided that her ex-husband needed a serious comeuppance. Perhaps after an episode of intimacy she decided to gild the lily somewhat. Maybe she had given consent only for certain sexual behaviour and he in the heat of the moment added to the agenda somewhat, without agreement or permission. I repeat this speculation is simply trying to understand what appears to be ridiculous and asinine behaviour on the part of the Crown in going after the victim of a sexual assault. ............................................................................................................................. So perhaps the Crown heard (hypothetically) from a second hand witness that the victim had confessed after the fact that she had consented to sexual activity but after the event was unhappy or changed her mind or whatever. Also what if that witness was not available to give her statement/evidence at trial. THis could be due to an unexpected death or travel outside the country (destination unknown) or perhaps the witness merely disappeared locally. So, and I grant you this is really giving the Crown the benefit of the doubt, if the Crown were positive that a miscarriage of justice had occurred and the ex-husband was not guilty but they or the defence couldn't prove it, they then decided to teach the ex-wife a lesson. In other words to ensure that she did not get off scot free. For example they couldn't charge her with perjury without the second hand witness's legal testimony and the only thing they had was the charge of breaking the publication ban. Meanwhile perhaps the Crown advised the defence lawyer of the ex-husband that they were certain that an appeal would exonerate the former husband. This theory is convoluted I agree but that is what occurs when our authorities decide not to be transparent and honest with the public. Perhaps the Crown bluffed/intimidated the woman who they rightly or wrongly believe misled them and was thus able to get her consent to the negotiated fine. ................................................................................................................................ I want to be very clear here. I do NOT have any private information or knowledge regarding this recent case as written about in the Waterloo Region Record. At the same time I am wondering outloud exactly what kind of issues/facts/circumstantial evidence/unconfirmed but credible testimony etc. could possibly induce the Crown to legally go after the apparent victim of a criminal assault. If there isn't some honest and appropriate reason for the Crown's behaviour then my God have they ever publicly made asses out of themselves and out of the administration of justice.

SOMETHING VERY WEIRD IS GOING ON AT KITCHENER SUPERIOR COURT

Basically we are currently being led to believe that our Crown Prosecuters are very stupid. Well let me say this much: they certainly are not totally independent of politics. I've seen that for myself in the cases of Sandy Shantz and Scott Hahn, Woolwich Township councillors who ran afoul of the election laws. Whether there was sheer stupidity involved at the start, nevertheless there was cunning involved in both cases as they manipulated the rules and process in order to avoid the consequences of their behaviours. Now allegedly we have Crown prosecuters who think that it is just dandy to charge and help convict a woman who alleged that she had been sexually assaulted by her ex-husband. The fact that the now convicted perpetrator was her ex-husband I just learned from today's newspaper. ................................................................................................................. Now I would hope that all people understand that ex-husband or not, consent for sexual activity is required by all parties, on each and every occasion. Part of the problem legally has long been that most sexual activity takes place in private hence many cases of alleged assault end up being "he said, she said" with little or no actual evidence being available. Under those circumstances I understand the difficulty facing prosecutors and police especially if there are no significant injuries or if there is some sort of intimate prior history between them. "Credibility" becomes important which is unfortunate because despite judges sometimes believing that they have built in lie detectors, in actual fact these cases can end up being decided not on facts or evidence but on who is the better liar. I have long stated that the criteria of "guilty beyond a reasonable doubt" has long been subverted in our judicial system. ............................................................................................................ What could possibly induce a Crown Prosecuter to initiate charges against a woman after she has been sucessful in getting her alleged attacker, convicted? The choices seem very stark here. Either they are complete and utter fools or..........someone has decided that the alternative of letting the conviction of the attacker stand and the woman's allegations be substantiated is an even worse alternative. Keep in mind that the now convicted male (ex-husband) has appealed his conviction and that the woman's lawyer apparently negotiated the $2,000 fine and $600 victim surcharge with the Prosecuter after her client pled guilty to breaking the Court's publication ban. What the hell is going on!!!!! ............................................................................................................................... I think that it is clear that we, the public, are not being levelled with. For whatever reason the Crown are really behaving oddly. Yes I know that absolutely zero of the parties involved in our judicial system always make the right decisions. I also know that the courts go miles out of their way to avoid bringing "...the administration of justice into disrepute" and yet that is publicly what is happening here. I'm worried that this case which has become a "cause celebre" will disappear from sight and we the public will never know what the hell really happened. Is this some sort of vigilante justice by the Crown to even up the score? Is this some form of grotesque male "circle the wagons" to protect an abuser? Was the conviction of the ex-husband based upon the criteria of "guilty beyond a reasonable doubt" or was it primarily her testimony versus his? Something is really wrong here and this is why both our police and our Courts inherent fairness and credibility are being questioned.

PUBLIC NOTICE TO ANY & ALL THOSE DISAPPOINTED/ANGRY/DISGUSTED WITH ANY WOOLWICH COUNCIL DECISIONS SINCE POSSIBLY AS EARLY AS DECEMBER 2014

Here is the bottom line: If you seriously want to challenge any decisions of Council (Woolwich) that you feel were illogical, inconsistent, perverse or even possibly corrupt then there is a way. I believe a fairly certain path in fact. Heck if you even feel that council simply made the wrong decision on an issue without any particular spite, malice or favourtism involved, then have at it. I am basing my opinion on the following. It is my belief that Mayor Sandy Shantz has been sitting as Mayor of Woolwich Township in direct contradiction to a ruling by Superior Court (Kitchener) Justice David Broad since at least July 2015. I stated in the title that decisions possibly as early as December 2014 may be vulnerable to reversal. Of course I am not a lawyer and perhaps if the courts were stimulated to do their judicial duty they might only reverse all council decisions prior to say late March 2015 when Sandy Shantz filed inaccurate, deceptive Financial Statements under the Municipal Elections Act (MEA). ......................................................................................................................... Both MECAC (Municipal Elections Compliance Audit Committee) and Ms. Shantz did admit errors in her Financial Statements which understated the extent of her legitimate election costs. On it's own those errors were significant enough to cause MECAC to ask for corrections. However there was a more significant problem and that was the undisputed fact that Ms. Shantz's multiple "errors" resulted in her total claimed expenses to be below the $10,000 threshold at which she was legally mandated (MEA) to provide an audit of her Financial Statements which she did not do by the March 2015 deadline. There are only a few serious enough miscues, omissions, failures to comply with the MEA that result in the very serious sanction of the sucessful candidate immediately having their councillor or in Ms. Shantz's case, mayoral seat, removed from her. .............................................................................................................................. This sanction by law (MEA) was the duty of the Municipal Clerk of the municipality to undertake. She unfortunately utterly failed to do so both at the March deadline for submission of the Financial Statements and after Ms. Shantz's failures became public knowledge. I believe that the Clerk was uninformed and incapable of properly understanding and following the mandates and requirements of the MEA as I, a citizen with very little training in accounting or the law was able to do. That may explain her first failure although her failure after the facts became known is less understandable. .................................................................................................................. Ms. Shantz embarked on a rather creative strategy in order to keep her new job as Mayor of Woolwich Township. At the first public MECAC meeting in Woolwich Council Chambers on a Monday morning she appeared with allegedly unreleased new Financial Statements plus an Audit written by her personal, albeit qualified accountant. She provided these allegedly less than ten minutes before the start of the meeting including to me and the other parties to the hearing. Rather awkwardly she then a couple of months later in a notarized document advised Justice David Broad that she had provided these documents to the parties on the Friday prior to the Monday morning MECAC meeting. I absolutely did not receive them prior to attending that meeting and all the other parties made it clear that they too had just received them after Ms. Shantz handed them out. I do not rule out the possibility of collusion regarding the provision of these incredibly late documents. .................................................................................................................... Even worse MECAC had absolutely zero legal grounds to accept the Audit now months after the deadline and pretend that all was made whole. It was not. The March deadline was a hard deadline with no either furtive or otherwise actions and behaviour of the candidate possible to negate the failure to so provide the Audit by the legally mandated deadline. MECAC's behaviour and excuses for the Mayor were both pathetic and outrageous. ....................................................................................................................... In July 2015, at what I view as a tawdry court hearing, in which I as the initial complainant, was refused party status and in fact barely allowed to speak until the last moment, Justice David Broad heard the case, such as it was. His eventual decision stated that Ms. Sandy Shantz was reinstated CONDITIONALLY to the Woolwich Mayor's seat. The CONDITIONS INCLUDED that she must file a new Financial Statement with ALL her proper and legitimate (under the MEA) expenses included. That should have been a fairly simple fix for the Mayor. Unfortunately I had kept finding new errors and expenses that the Mayor (Ms. Shantz) had not included in her various reincarnations of her Financial Statement right up until her court appearance. Lo and behold after her CONDITIONAL reinstatement I found yet another significant expense via newspaper photo which she inexplicably failed to include in her last Financial Statement ordered by Justice David Broad. This information I took to both a local Crown Prosecuter (Kitchener) as well finally to a special, out-of-town Prosecuter, Frasier Kelly who was brought in to give the appearance of nuetrality. These Prosecuters "investigated" my private citizen charges, appropriately filed via a Justice of the Peace. Mr. Kelly was a piece of work who at a private interview used himself and a Regional Police Officer in an attempt to intimidate me from continuing to press for charges. The intimidation involved suggesting that I had committed an offense in regards to taping a public MECAC meeting held in Woolwich Council Chambers. What a piece of shit. ................................................................................................................................. So the bottom line is that our authorities with full knowledge that Ms. Sandy Shantz after being given multiple opportunities to file ALL her election expenses, never has done so, nevertheless have not dealt with her according to law. It is possible/likely that Justice David Broad was not advised by the Prosecuters that his Decision was not complied with. This I do not know. It is also possible that yet again, the good mayor privately filed another in a series of late Financial Statements, to the courts and election authorities without providing the initial complainant (me) with either a copy or even a statement that she had included the final, quite clear and obvious election expense in her penultimate Financial Statement. This folks is what I would expect to happen in a third world judicial system, not in Canada.

MURDER, MANSLAUGHTER, CRIMINAL NEGLIGENCE, INCOMPETENCE - WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED?

A twenty year old black man is dead. Again. His "crime" may have included an expired license plate and ornaments dangling from the back window in his car. Possibly his "crime" may include immaturity and or stupidity by fleeing police. None of those offenses are punishable by death yet there he lies. O.K. he wasn't shot five to seven times by the police officer like the kid (white) in Kitchener, Ontario was several years ago. We are still awaiting the inquest about that death. O.K. an incredibly stupid police officer (Chauvin) did not kneel on this young man's neck for nine minutes plus and slowly kill him. But...he is still dead and without any remote legal or moral justification if any are even possible. ............................................................................................................................ The female officer did not immediately cry self-defence or she felt threatened or any of that much too often bullshit. "Oh I was afraid for my life" crap that police officers have relied on for far too long and for far too many killings. She claims that she grabbed for her Taser as the young man was driving away and mistakenly shot him with her duty handgun. Wow I've got a real problem with that claim. I've never shot a Taser thus am unaware of the maual of arms such as a safety, single or double action trigger etc. I have however legally fired handguns and am competent and confident with them. Taser's I have seen don't really remotely look like any handgun I've ever seen. They look different and I expect they feel extremely different due to size, weight and grip/handle configuration. O.K. I'm skeptical about her claim of "oops I grabbed the wrong weapon and fired it (gun) accidentally". .................................................................................................... I am also concerned to hear that she was not a rookie. Far from it in fact as she has been described as a "veteran" police officer. Good Lord has her weapons training really been that bad? Does that police force require regular practice and familiarity training with both Tasers and handguns? Lastly I will say this. If I was on the jury I would expect to see, feel and handle both weapons in order to judge for myself how likely/possible it could be to grab the wrong one in a hurry and then use it. Lastly I would also want to know if the police officers even have the legal right to shoot a fleeing suspect with a Taser. They stopped him on a minor traffic charge and then found that there was an outstanding warrant for non-violent misdemeanors. Is that even O.K. to use violent but normally non-lethal force (Taser) in that case? Even if it is legal, should it be? ........................................................................................................................... Another young black man is dead by police hands. Yes police are human and make mistakes just as citizens and suspects do. The difference is supposed to be that police are professionals, well trained in the use of force and well trained when not to use it.

SUPPRESSION OF TRUTH BIG BUSINESS IN WOOLICH TOWNSHIP

Wriggling and squirming are harder to notice during virtual meetings than live ones, unfortunately. Certainly embarassment can be better hidden as participants either briefly shut off their cameras or even as they step away from them for a few minutes. Certainly TAG and Ministry of Environment (MOE/MECP) discussions about the inappropriateness of using "upstream" creek monitoring beside Bolender Park would fit into this category. Yours truly has publicly taken Uniroyal, Crompton, Chemtura and now Lanxess to task for this bulls.it for decades. Bolender Park may be geographically "upstream" from Uniroyal/Lanxess as they are located south of Church St. (Hwy #86) whereas Bolender Park (aka Bolender Park Landfill) is fully located north of Hwy #86. The problem of course is that the former landfill (1962-1970 approx.) is home to both municipal and industrial wastes including those from Uniroyal Chemical, Varnicolor Chemical and many other local industries. It certainly was "helpful" , convenient and self-serving having the General Manager of Uniroyal Chemical as the Chairman of the Sanitation Committee which supervised industrial discharges into the landfill. Gad and yet idiots like pretend mayor Shantz and other Woolwich councillors and senior staff all denied and minimized the problem. They all get to wear this one folks. By the way the neverending excuses that the M2 landfill on the Uniroyal/Lanxess site as well as the First St. Landfill (immediately south of the site) being hydraulically contained by pumping wells does not cover the Bolender Park Landfill. All the pumping wells whether shallow or deep are far too far south and are intended to stop contaminant flow leaving the site not stop contaminant flow from leaving upstream contaminated sites. Hence the Cangagigue Creek is negatively affected by not only the upstream uncontained, unremediated properties but also from further downstream illegal waste sites such as Varnicolor's Lot 91 which was never properly or fully remediated. It was intended to continue to discharge into Landfill Creek which then drains into the Canagagigue well below the Uniroyal/Lanxess property.

UNIROYAL CHEMICAL ISSUES NEVER GET RESOLVED: EVEN THIRTY YEARS LATER

Public consultation in Elmira is like a merry-go-round. The participants are constantly changing whereas the direction (and issues) are not. How could they be. All the guilty parties are in charge of the Agenda, the cleanup, the makeup of the public advisory committee, and all the rest. Every now and then a new Documentary comes out that at least briefly opens people's eyes as to the failures and frustrations of dealing with a multi national, multi billion dollar rogue polluter protected by the municipality (Woolwich), the Region and the province (Via Ministry of Environment). ....................................................................................................................... Currently we are talking about the Canagagigue Creek exactly as we were in 1996, 2012-14 and 2018-present. We have talked about DNAPLS from 1992-94, 2006-2008, again in 2012 etc. Hydraulic containment battles went on from 1992-97 and even recently the MOE/MECP are advising that 500,000 litres of contaminated Upper aquifer groundwater are being discharged to the creek every day. Why is this? Well it's simple. The guilty, self-serving and lying parties are in charge of the cleanup and their goal is to constantly downplay the damage done and constantly minimize the costs to both the polluter and the public's purse to clean up the mess. In this they are somewhat and sometimes opposed by honest, intelligent citizens looking out for the public interest. That interest includes aquatic life in and around the creek, it includes restoring Elmira's formerly excellent groundwater resources and finally it includes human health considerations of fouled air, ground and surface waters. The guilty parties merely give lip service to the public interest. The politicians goal is to get themselves re-elected so that they can continue to have all the perks with the minimun effort required. ..................................................................................................................................... Failure to resolve difficult and thorny issues is also the goal of most politicians. Never solve a problem that will eventually solve itself, regardless of the negative consequences of letting the problem fester for decades. Generally speaking politicians are masters of "managing" problems, not of solving them. Too many social problems are a direct result of the wealthy abusing the system for their benefit usually at the expense of many others. Whether we are talking gender, racial or religious inequality; there are parties who directly benefit from such behaviours. Our economic system is based as much as possible on cheap labour allowing private individuals to make money off the backs of their employees. Having an "underclass" who are willing to work for peanuts in order to survive is how most wealth was accumulated in the first place. Anti-unionism is as much about cheap labour and the legal right to get rid of those who stand up for themselves as it is about being forced to listen to your inferiors (i.e. employees). On one hand we are advised by our governments that immigrants bring skills (and money) into the country. On the other hand we know that desperate people will work under horrific conditions with little money and if they quit our government will assist employers in bringing in more low wage workers. Think of our agricultural sector in Ontario. ............................................................................................................................................ With our current democratic deficit in Ontario/Canada there was never any hope that Uniroyal Chemical or it's followup owners would ever do the cleanup job promised the public between 1989 and 1993. Uniroyal made far too much money by dumping their wastes on, in and around their property rather than properly treating them as much as possible. They externalized their costs on to the public, the environment and all the other downstream life forms. Local residents who sufferred and died from cancers and other diseases caused by toxic contamination were never remotely considered stakeholders by Uniroyal or our authorities. They were considered expendable assets until the environmental and human damage became too obvious. Then it was and always has been about our political authorities "managing" the cleanup so as not to offend the wealthy and powerful who keep them in power.

O.K. SO MAYBE AS BAD & CORRUPT AS THE MOE/MECP INHERENTLY ARE AT THE TOP; INDIVIDUAL EMPLOYEES CAN STILL HELP THE PUBLIC

It's sometimes difficult not to paint the entire Ontario Ministry of Environment (MOE/MECP) as corrupt from top to bottom. That they are grossly comprimised and corrupt at the top has to be obvious when one examines the decades old environmental degradation in Ontario, from air, land to ground and surface water. This includes loss of animal habitat, loss of wetlands, nutrient growth in rivers and streams and algal blooms in Lake Erie. Also we humans reflect the state of our environment via our health. Over 40% of us will suffer from one kind of cancer or another in our lifetimes. Climate change is also a direct result of human activity on the planet. Overpopulation only contributes to all the other problems. No, Canada unfortunately is not alone on this planet as each and every other country in the world contribute to these environmental problems. Burning of rain forests to clear ground for more single crop agriculture and burning of coal in China and elsewhere for energy continues on despite knowing the damage it does. .............................................................................................................................. Why do I think that our despised and disrespected MOE/MECP has some lower level redeeming features? There are a couple of things. Occasionally speaking difficult or unpleasant truths to the public is a start. While I have indicated here in the past that the MOE/MECP do criticize in writing much of the Lanxess and their consultants GHD plans and reports, usually at the end of the day Lanxess Canada and their client driven consultants (GHD) carry the day. The MOE/MECP decide, presumably at the top, to back down and avoid either issuing Control Orders or in taking the company to court to enforce the Environment Ministry's position. I have written here my admiration for the critiques of MOE/MECP hydrogeologist, Cynthia Doughty. Similarly in the past I have on occasion admired the work of MOE/MECP employees Jaimie Connolly and Bob Hillier, also hydrogeologists. ..................................................................................................................................... Another huge issue that of course advanced the money and face saving agendas of Lanxess Canada was the use of shovel sampling versus core sampling in the Canagagigue Creek for the last major sediment sampling. Core samples involve a manual hollow rod that is pushed downwards into the bottom of the creek and that can then extract soils/sediments from various depths below the top of the creekbed. With this method detailed and depth specific samples can be taken to determine both the composition and location of contaminants such as pesticides, DDT, dioxins/furans/PCBs and so much more. The shovel method is brutally inexact and inaccurate as it literally involves an attempt to dig out soils/sediments from below both the watersurface and the surface of the creek bed and then bring them through the water column (through the creek water) and to the surface with some sort of ridiculous attempt to claim that you have sampled 10, 15 or 20 centimetres below the creekbed surface and here is what we've found. In reality the creek water washes all the fines and soils off the shovel as you raise it upwards through the water leaving behind stones and coarse gravel. This of course exactly serves the purpose of the owner/polluter as many compounds such as PCBs, DDT and dioxins/furans adhere (adsorb?) to the fines not to the stones and coarse gravel. To the MOE/MECP's credit they too also jumped on this blatant and successful attempt to minimize the "sampled" contamination in the creek. .................................................................................................................... In my opinion, immense credit goes to former TAG member Joe Kelly. He spoke eloquently (& often humourously) to TAG members about this travesty. Not to discredit Lanxess/GHD's never ending and often successful "reasons/rationale/explanations/bulls.it" they claimed that the shovel sample method was absolutely necessary because parts of the bottom of Canagagigue Creek are "armoured". Well! Now I don't believe that there are large areas of the creek with either concrete or steel armor along the bottom. I'm even pretty skeptical about large boulders in the creekbed of the creek. Yes certainly boulders can be found at depth in the overburden on the way down to the bedrock. Yes I'm sure there's even the odd boulder at surface in Waterloo Region. As far as the bottom of the Canagagigue Creek, the onus is on the proponent of the report to prove that very convenient theory. They have not done so nor even tried. They as always pretend that nothing but truth and majesty dribble from their lips. I however have more often found it to be lies and spittle. Other options for using nothing but proper and appropriate core samplers (versus a shovel) include moving your goddamn sample locations to locations where the bottom of the creek is not allegedly "armoured". Anyhow back to the main point. Joe Kelly jumped all over Lanxess/GHD for this crap and to their credit the MOE/MECP have as well.

STROH COVERUP BECOMING CLEARER TO TAG: LANXESS/MECP CONTINUE THE DELAY GAME

Three TAG members in particular spoke truth to power last evening. They were Sebastian Seibel-Achenbach, Dustin Martin and finally Susan Bryant who set Ramin Ansari (Lanxess) straight as to how many decades the environment, Woolwich citizens and downstream residents have been waiting for a cleanup of the downstream Canagagigue Creek. Lanxess is in no hurry as each day, week, month and year that goes by means more Uniroyal Chemical contaminants have left their property and while some become entrenched and entrained en route, others flow far enough downstream during high water flows especially that they can no longer be attributed to Uniroyal/Lanxess. The delays of the last thirty years have likely saved the corporate owners of the former Uniroyal Chemical, hundreds of millions of dollars in cleanup costs all under the lacklustre watch of the Ontario Ministry of Environment (MOE/MECP). ........................................................................................................... Last night's TAG meeting was far better than the previous one. First of all both Lanxess (Ramin) and the MECP (Jason Rice) were present to both listen and learn as well as to add information. Their repeated absences have helped make a joke out of public consultation which is exactly what Woolwich Township, the Region (likely) and the province (Ontario) want. A number of issues from the MECP responses to Lanxess were raised such as the limited sediment data supposedly particularly in Reaches three and four (nearest the Lanxess site). Some of this undoubtedly is due to the ridiculously high Method Detection Limits (MDL) which can show concentrations of DDT and dioxins/furans at above the provincial or federal criteria as being Non-Detect (ND) which is outrageous. So called Background readings from Bolender Park Landfill were publicly stated by TAG members to be inappropriate due to Uniroyal Chemical waste and others being deposited there in the 1960s. I was smiling sweetly at pretend mayor Sandy Shantz during those exchanges as she and her council have publicly lied and minimized problems about that in-town landfill. Two other issues include the MECP's insistence that the Magnitude of contaminant Exceedances must be seriously considered as part of the criteria for designating Contaminants of Potential Concern (COPC). The other is a phony reference to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regarding a supposed 5% frequency rule which Lanxess now admit was in error. This "error" again, as always, favoured consultant GHD's client, Lanxess Canada. ................................................................................................................................... There was one other issue. I and others have known that Uniroyal/Lanxess's vaunted on-site hydraulic containment has never complied with the 1991 MOE Control Order which demanded 100% hydraulic containment in ALL ALL ALL aquifers. That stated I was surprised to hear the following statement go unchallenged namely that 500,000 litres of uncontained (but contaminated) Upper Aquifer water flow into the Canagagigue Creek every day. WOW! TAG by the way supports the numerous comments and criticms regarding the COPC and Conceptual Site Model (CSM) reports done by Lanxess Canada ........................................................................................................................... The next report discussed concerned the East Side Off-site Groundwater Evaluation. This was supposed to be a comprehensive study of groundwater, both shallow and deep, on the Stroh farm to the immediate east of the Lanxess property. Fundamentally it was no such thing and both Sebastian and Dustin Martin made that very clear. Sebastian asked why the report gave exactly zero answers as to why and how NDMA for example was found 240 metres east of Uniroyal/Lanxess even in one instance above the Ontario Drinking Water Standards (ODWS). There was no response or answer from Lanxess or the MECP. Keep in mind that the Stroh farm is allegedly cross-gradient if not up-gradient from the groundwater flow direction at Lanxess. Sebastian also pointedly indicated that just like the past soil samples, there is a huge gap in groundwater monitoring wells and hence results in the southern 300 metres of the Stroh property being uninvestigated and unknown. In other words: "YOU WILL NEVER FIND WHAT YOU REFUSE TO TEST FOR". Ramin made an interesting comment to the fact that normally they do soil sampling first to see if there is an issue prior to installing monitoring wells and then sampling them. Well soil samples are exactly what I and CPAC (and Sebastian) have been asking/yelling for for the last SEVEN YEARS. Dustin Martin made it clear that the Lanxess/GHD report only half accomplished it's goal. It did not answer the important questions nor did it fully delineate the groundwater either shallow or deep. He also interestingly advised that aquitards (i.e. less permeable clay & silt) usually have higher vertical flow than horizontal flow of groundwater. There is high contamination levels in some aquitards and he referenced well OW7-29 in the north and OW8 much further south which intersected the Municipal Aquifer (MU) yet the MU was shown as not continuing further north. Dustin actually used the word "deceiving" to decribe that on the map provided by GHD. .............................................................................................................................. Tiffany Svensson (TAG Chair) advised that a couple of results (soil/sediments) from somewhere along the Stroh Drain were not yet available. HA! She also suggested some kind of a further "Technical Meeting" to discuss these problems with GHD & Lanxess. Those discussions need to be public but forget that as much as Lanxess and the MECP are concerned. TAG haven't learned yet about the ability to abuse private meetings via numerous methods including keeping some results/conclusions "confidential". .................................................................................................................................. Be still my heart but Ramin is claiming that this Risk Assessment (RA) of the Canagagigue Creek is voluntary. PLEASE! Such utter bulls.it which thankfully Jason Rice later clarified. The MECP asked Lanxess to do this RA a while back and if they did not do it the MECP would issue a Control Order demanding they do so or if they abort it prior to doing necessary cleanup, the MECP will do the same. Ramin also publicly promised that if intrusive action such as excavation, dredging or armoring (creek banks?) is necessary that Lanxess will do so. Unfortunately there are a thousand weasel words and weasel steps between here and there. Allegedly "conservative values are used regarding toxicity values. Bulls.it again! There are no scientifically defensible values for simultaneous multiple exposures to toxins. It's all about one value per toxic compound regardless of how many there are. Secondly it's all about "acceptable" risks. This is a mathematical calculation in which one wealthy and informed party tells another one living in and around the risk that it's an acceptable risk by pretending that an individual only has a one in a hundred thousand or one in a million risk of coming down with cancer. Beyond supreme bulls.it. .............................................................................................................. Katharina Richter reported well on the 2020 Annual Monitoring Report (AMR). Covid excuses abound as to why I and presumably others who have received hard copies of this report for decades did not get one this year. Katarina expounded upon pumping wells both on and off site that are currently not working properly and why. Regardless it just pushes the final cleanup of the Elmira Aquifers further and further down the road. I believe that Dr. Richard Jackson suggested that 2050 or 2060 might finish the job. Linda Dickson also spoke to the February Progress Report. Linda also advised as to the ongoing problems with pumping wells both on and off the Lanxess site. ......................................................................................................................... My memory from last night's meeting is nagging at me about some comments regarding "redefining" the goals of the cleanup of the Elmira Aquifers. This is par for the course when after decades of promises otherwise, the guilty parties can't/won't fulfill their promises. Hence as they are in charge of the "cleanup", they simply redefine the goal or endpoint. Talk about unaccountable. Talk about shameless.

WELL IT APPEARS AS IF AT LEAST SOME OF OUR COURTS ARE LEGITIMATE

The following article appeared in the Waterloo Region Record eight days ago titled "Inmates $30M segregation lawsuit will stand, court rules". It was written by Colin Perkel. What I also find interesting is that it was the Ontario Court of Appeal upholding a decision by Superior Court Justice Paul Perell. I believe that this was Superior Court in Toronto, not in Kitchener. I am wondering if there is a pattern here. To date my experience both first and second hand has been extremely bad with our local (Kitchener) Superior Court. Ridiculous decisions seem to be no problem for them on occasion. .................................................................................................................................... In this case a former inmate was incarcerated for two years at the Toronto South Detention Centre. He was charged with bank-robbery but acquitted at trial. During his incarceration he was placed in isolation on two occasions for refusing to take medication he said had nasty side-effects. His mental health worsened to the point that he had suicidal thoughts and auditory hallucinations. Superior Court agreed that Ontario had mistreated its inmates with their solitary confinement protocols and ordered a $30 million class-action award. The province of Ontario appealed to the Ontario Court of Appeal who upheld the class-action award. ................................................................................................................................... Imagine that! The Rule of Law extends to the Ontario government. Superior Court Justice Paul Perell found that "...segregation violated principles of fundamental justice" and "The province had been "systemically and routinely" negligent in running the solitary confinement regieme, he ruled." Well it's about time that the provincial (& hopefully federal) correctional service got smacked for their cruel and unnecessary solitary confinement procedures. Cruel and unnecessary and condoned by our idiot politicians and governments.

ELMIRA ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTER A METAPHOR & A MICROCOSM OF THE FAILURE OF DEMOCRACY

Bluntly put our authorities have way too much (authority). You've heard the jokes about the most important job in the world coming with no qualifications i.e. parenthood. Well guess what, the second most important (politicians) comes with even less. Good looks and money are just about it. Yes there are the exceptions to the rule. Yes there are some very smart people in politics. Yes there are complete idiots (Hmm Doug Ford-former silver spoon druggie & Mike Harris the third, current local M.P.P.). And yet they succeed and we the public pay the price. ............................................................................................................... Our authorities literally lie to us day in and day out. Is it any wonder that currently in the start of the third Covid wave that people are demonstrating against masks in Kitchener? How do we know when these same idjits in charge are telling the truth and when they are lying? Our judicial systems are also retarded (oops not politically correct- how about "hopeless"). At one time justice systems around the world jailed, whipped and chemically castrated homosexuals. Marijuana use started the "War on Drugs" in the United States which led to criminal records and the largest percentage of citizens incarcerated in the world. Pharmaceutical companies-the very same who currently may be saving us all now with vaccinations have been found responsible for overprescribing and promoting opoids and powerful painkillers for their own profit enhancement with full knowledge that they were extremely addictive. This they denied as they promoted opiod use to citizens via their family doctors. ........................................................................................................................ Our environmental laws currently are under attack from that bastian of mediocrity and non-intellectual ability: Doug Ford. Hell in the U.S. they elected Donald Trump whose stupidity included misogony, sexual assault and he even bragged publicly about grabbing womens' privates. Oh and Mr. Trump was also a racist. Yet he got elected to the highest, most powerful position in the world. Is it any wonder that the coverup of the facts, the human health implications and the culpability of the Ontaio government via the Ministry of Environment has been so sucessful? The environmental implications are also horrific and equally ignored by our authorities with impunity. The United States sprayed dioxins (Agent Orange) on civilian populations, crops and roadways. U.S. troops and the next two generations of their children/grandchildren have also paid the price. As have Canadians exposed to Agent Orange produced both in Canada (Elmira-Uniroyal Chemical) and the U.S.

SOME ITEMS OF CONCERN IN THE TAG MINUTES OF FEBRUARY 25/21

The Minutes start off with my report/Delegation to TAG being "discussed". Ha! It stated "...all members received and reviewed the written submission from Alan Marshall." This was followed by "There were no questions or discussion." Hunh! My report referenced details in TAG member Sebastian Seibel-Achenbach's November 26/20 "Appeal to the Technical Advisory Committee". My report was in support of Sebastian's strong difference in opinion regarding the Stroh property and contamination on it from the former Uniroyal Chemical. This is a potentially major stumbling block to proper cleanup of both Uniroyal's off-site pollution as well as of the Canagagigue Creek and it's current Risk Assessment to determine what and how much cleanup are required. ......................................................................................................... DNAPLS were somewhat discussed on page 3 by Ramin Ansari of Lanxess Canada. DNAPLS are one other of the main coverups that have occurred post 1989 on this site. Among other omissions or errors by Mr. Ansari was his claim that (free phase) DNAPL had not been found on the east side of the former Uniroyal site. Or according to the Minutes allegedly Lanxess have not found DNAPL in the groundwater. This is nonsense. DNAPL compounds (eg. chlorinated solvents) are found in the groundwater of all aquifers throughout the site, north, south, east and west. If Ramin actually stated that free phase DNAPL has not been found on the east side he is also wrong because it was found at RPE-3 in 2009. .......................................................................................................................................... We are supposed to be flattered that Lanxess chose to "voluntarily" advise TAG about a proposed amended Environmental Compliance Approval (ECA) that they didn't have to. Excuse me but the last "voluntary" action that Uniroyal/Chemtura undertook was the $3.5 million cleanup of GP-1 and GP-2. That was bulls.it then (i.e. voluntary) just as it's bulls.it now. That was far more likely a closed doors, private agreement with the Ontario Ministry of Environment (MECP) along the lines of throwing Chemtura a bone after demanding a cleanup of GP-1 & 2 rather than they do a proper Investigation of the Stroh property. .......................................................................................................................... Lastly I have to comment on the following statement namely: "...focus the monitoring program on those parameters consistently found through decades of monitoring." With the majority of the monitoring for decades being NDMA, chlorobenzene and ammonia is it any wonder that those three are always found and everything else not tested is not? It's a self-fulfilling phrophecy.

MOE/MECP HAVE LOTS OF SERIOUS CRITICISMS OF LANXESS/GHD COPC & CSM BUT NO WHERE ENOUGH BACKBONE TO TELL THEM THEY'RE DONE AND IT'S OVER

CSM - Conceptual Site Model. COPC - Contaminants of Poterntial Concern. ...................................................................................................................... The 24 page report of back and forth Comments and Responses while highly illuminating is not however confidence building. Clearly all the errors, omissions and lack of clarity by GHD as expressed in this report indicates a consulting company and client who are going throught the motions and are expecting little to no pushback. In fact there are a couple of responses by GHD/Lanxess that indicate some frustration with the MOE/MECP trying to hold them accountable for their work. Poor babies. ........................................................................................................ Criticisms include using the shovel method versus a proper core sampler to collect sediment samples, insufficient background data sets to determine COPCs as well as suspect background locations such as Bolender Park Landfill being used. This landfill accepted Uniroyal Chemical as well as other local industrial/chemical wastes during the 1960s and should not be used as an alleged upstream background sampling point. Also one of my biggest complaints was the elevated Method Detection Limits (MDL) used in analysing sediment samples. When the MDL exceeds health criteria then far too many samples are listed as Non-Detect (ND) when in fact they may very likely exceed the health criteria for either aquatic organisms or human health exposure. The MOE/MECP also repeatedly emphasized and argued with Lanxess etc. that the Magnitude of Exceedance of a sampled compund needs to be considered as part of the frequency of exceeding a standard. In other words the criteria for accepting a compound as a Contaminant of Potential Concern should not rely on solely the frequency of detection but also on high high the magnitude of the exceedance is. Lanxess/GHD did not appear terribly happy with that idea or frankly any ideas/opinions that might increase their scoping/reducing of the eventual cleanup of the creek. ...................................................................................................................... The MECP also took Lanxess to task for their "typographical" error in claiming attribution to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for a 5% frequency of detection as a screening limit to eliminate toxic compounds for further investigation. In my opinion Lanxess and their predecessors have never made "typographical" or other "errors" to their detriment only to their advantage over the decades. Also using part of the Shirt Factory Creek where it exists on the Uniroyal/Lanxess property as a Background reading was appropriately criticized. Real typos existed regarding GHD inaccurately quoting Table C.3 repeatedly rather than Tables C.1 and C.2. Polyaromatic Hydrocarbon (PAH) results appear not to have been properly considered by Lanxess/GHD. ............................................................................................................................ One huge discussion etc. revolved around on-site failures of hydraulic containment allowing toxic discharge into the Canagagigue Creek. Lanxess and friends have proposed what I view to be as a ridiculous and outrageous claim namely that Toluene for example needs to be at a concentration of 100,000 parts per million or higher in order to work as a co-solvent for other organic compounds (DDT, dioxins, PCBs etc.). While I'd like to see some scientific literature to back that up, it also likely is a phony argument in the first place. Toluene has been floating as a free phase LNAPL on top of the water table for decades at Uniroyal. The LNAPL stands for Light Non Aqueous Phase Liquid and certainly exceeds 100,00 ppm. THis LNAPL 9Toluene) was discharged for decades directly into the creek via groundwater prior to any on-site containment (1997). ...................................................................................................................... These comments go on and on yet there seems to be no final straw, no conclusion that this report is fatally flawed. This is the problem with all these reports, "investigations" etc. They presuppose being accepted no matter what errors, falsehoods or omissions they contain. Everyone involved assumes the bulls.it the reports contain will never result in it being refused acceptance. And they never are. What a pathetic joke.

MORE ABOUT THE GHD REPORT DISCUSSED HERE TWO DAYS AGO

Well first of all in order to fully appreciate the volume of last minute data/reports dumped on TAG members plus myself the following has been added since I received the 93 page "2021 Comprehensive East Side Groundwater Report": namely 24 pages of a MOE/MECP Response and Comments to Lanxess regarding Contaminants of Potential Concern in the Canagagigue Creek as well as the Conceptual Site Model and 15 pages of Agenda (April 7/21) plus Minutes of the February TAG meeting. To further complicate getting this all read by next Thursday let me add that the 24 page MECP Report literally are MOE/MECP comments on prior Lanxess comments about MECP comments regarding an original Lanxess document from a year ago. I sh.t you not. That's what this so called "cleanup" is all about. Talk, talk, more talk and then the owner of the polluted site yet again privately throws down the blackmail gauntlet of sweetheart deals and MOE culpability for the Elmira disaster. The MOE/MECP long ago should have been removed as the alleged representative of the people. Their dirty hands have comprimised any flimsy chance of their ever being able to enforce the environmental laws of the province of Ontario. ...................................................................................................................... To date I have read the text of the 93 page "...Groundwater Report". Just more of the same bulls.it we've been treated to for the last thirty-two years while the company and their consultants hide behind the political shield provided by Woolwich Council and the Ontario Ministry of Environment, Conservation blah, blah, blah. A manure pile by any other name smells just as foul. First off groundwater is not the MAJOR issue anymore on the east, somewhat cross gradient, somewhat up gradient and even partially downgradient property known as 6770 Line #86 (Stroh farm). The odd groundwater flow is partially due to radial flow caused by the very high ground (topography) in the extreme north-east corner of Uniroyal/Lanxess. If you have for example a mountain being rained upon, both the surface flow as well as groundwater flow will likely be from all sides of the mountain (or hill). The raw liquid wastes stopped being deposited into Uniroyal Chemical's east side waste pits approximately fifty-one years ago. Most (not all) of the highly contaminated groundwater has long ago flowed off-site onto neighbours' properties as well as into the Cangagigue Creek. .................................................................................................................. The current, real problem is Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) which are hydrophobic and which readily drop out of solvent contaminated waters and attach to soil particles. These hydrophobic compounds include DDT, dioxins/furans, PCBs and certain pesticides and herbicides. Unfortunately these soil particles can be and are mobilized via flooding, heavy rains etc. and in this case leave the low lying areas immediately east of the Stroh Drain, Ditch & Berm (SDDB) and are flushed via the Stroh Drain into the Canagagigue Creek where to this day they continue to be shared with wildlife (and humans) both in and out of the creek. Lanxess Canada and the MOE/MECP know this perfectly well which is EXACTLY why they have refused to do serious (any) soil sampling where I and others have requested. This groundwater report does not address the problem which is a metaphor for the entire Elmira "cleanup". It's all about money, face saving and political power and influence.

THE LATEST GHD REPORT ON CONTAMINATED (by UNIROYAL) GROUNDWATER ON THE EAST SIDE STROH FARM

Page 1... Let's see now: "...on the property located at 6770 Line 86, Township of Woolwich, Ontario, henceforth referred to as the Property." And that folks is typical consultant doublespeak, garbage and misdirection intended to assure that future researchers, locals, honest citizens or authorities have no idea of where exactly these dishonest, slippery smooth consultants (GHD), their client (Lanxess Canada) and the allegedly responsible authorities (MOE/MECP) are referring to. For everyone living in or around Elmira over the last seventy-five or eighty years, they are referring to the Stroh farm (originally Earl & Eileen? Stroh now Ron Stroh). That's right, an active farm producing crops (corn, soybean etc.) on the lands immediately bordering some of the very worst toxic waste pits in North America. Oops that is so politically incorrect. It might upset people who eat local food produced either for direct human consumption or via cattle consumption. ..................................................................................................... 93 pages in length consisting of 32 pages of text plus cover pages and Table of Contents, 19 pages of Figures and 42 pages of Tables. No problem for someone like myself to read in a timely manner GHD's "2021 Comprehensive East Side Groundwater Report" dated March 21, 2021, received this morning by electronic transmission (e-mail). Hence of course as always at my expense to download and print off. (Thank you Dr. Henry Regier for your assistance). Oh did I mention that this report was promised to be on the TAG Agenda one week from today (April 8/21)? For someone with my background knowledge plus thirty years of reading literally hundreds of reports about Uniroyal Chemical, Crompton, Chemtura and now Lanxess Canada this is possible albeit laborious and difficult. For the more technically experienced and trained TAG members it will be very difficult. For the rest on TAG it simply isn't remotely possible for them to read, think, analyse and understand this much data all within a week. Not if they have full time jobs, families and other commitments than this part time volunteer work. ...................................................................................................................... These procedural battles (i.e. timeliness of reports for meetings) were fought and won decades ago here in Elmira. Over and over again they were fought and won only to have each new iteration of a disgusting chemical company continue to pretend to be interested in public consultation while doing everything possible to remove, replace, eliminate, marginalize and frustrate the honest citizens initially involved (since 1989). This means constantly fighting the same battles and lies over and over again. The TAG meeting on April 8/21 can only be attended virtually via lschafer@woolwich.ca or by phoning 519 6691647 (Woolwich Twn.).