TWO UPCOMING ENVIRONMENTAL DELEGATIONS TO COUNCIL

The first upcoming Delegation will be this Tuesday evening at Woolwich Council by Dr. Dan Holt. As Chairman of the Chemtura Public Advisory Committee (CPAC), he will be giving an update to Woolwich Council in regards to all the latest news. His Delegation to Council was announced at the last CPAC public meeting namely November 29/12. While Chemtura and their fellow travellors are thus aware of Dan's delegation, I would be surprised to see them there as one they are chicken and two they like to be frontrunners. In other words if they aren't in charge and control they usually make themselves scarce. We will see this Tuesday.

The following week yours truly has booked himself as a Delegation through Woolwich Township. I will be recommending changes to the CPAC Terms of Reference so that individual members of CPAC will need to vet their membership in other industrial or environmental bodies with both the township and CPAC. There have been CPAC members involved in dealings with industrial bodies and even with consultants to Chemtura at the same time as their duty and loyalty were ostensibly to CPAC. Keep in mind there are some excellent groups and choices out there but as well there are many problematic, essentially political bodies as well. Transparency is the issue and at a minimum, membership in other groups with either actual or perceived conflicts of interest; needs to be made clear to all parties involved. All means all of Council and ALL of CPAC.

It would not surprise me if Chemtura are offended enough by Dr. Dan and CPAC speaking the truth publicly this Tuesday that they turn around in the New Year and take a kick at the can, themselves. My expectation would be a typical CRA presentation of jibber jabber focusing on dynamic this and dynamic that interelated with the magic of three dimensional computer hydrogeologic models. In other words they will use their talents to bafflegab the audience into submission. Please keep in mind that computer models are just that, models. You figure out the answer you want and then you plug in various variables to get there. As the person in charge of the model you can weight it any way you want. In particular without telling others you can weight cost if you wish as the biggest concern. Or you can weight pump and treat technology as being inherently superior to source removal, which it isn't. The opportunities for deception are endless. No one but Chemtura's consultants will have 100% access and understanding of their model and most importantly the correct or otherwise assumptions they put into it. The most obvious source of error will be their incorrect and ridiculous insistence that there are no off-site sources of contamination. Similarily they will probably program into their model that there are no on-site sources of free phase DNAPL, which again is both incorrect and ridiculous. The expression is GIGO or garbage in, garbage out. Their models are garbage based at least partially on their inputs.

BROWNFIELD INCENTIVES CONSIDERED IN WATERLOO

Kitchener, Cambridge and the Region of Waterloo all have brownfield incentives plans; unfortunately. These plans reward anti social behaviour. They enable irresponsible property owners to cut their costs of production by passing on waste disposal and treatment costs to the public. This "externalizing" of costs is common and is simply a method for private industry to steal from the public purse. These cleanup costs to the public occur when either municipalities, the Region or the Ontario Ministry of the Environment become involved in cleaning up either ongoing businesses or abandoned ones. The other way they accrue to the public is when these government bodies don't take the initiative but simply sit back and wait for a private developer to come along. Then they offer him "incentives" as in tax reductions for him to do the cleanup.

There will be a public open house on December 13/12 from 3:30 to 6:30 pm. at the Waterloo Memorial Recreation Complex. It's purpose will be to discuss brownfield incentive plans for the City of Waterloo. Today's waterloo region record has the following story "Lack of brownfield program could be liability, city hears".

CPAC TERMS OF REFERENCE REQUIRE UPDATING

I have sent out feelers to various interested and possibly uninterested parties in regards to changing Woolwich Townships Terms of Reference for the Chemtura Public Advisory Committee (CPAC) specifically; with the proviso that maybe all their committees Terms of Reference may require updating. As currently written CPAC's Terms of Reference are illogical, inconsistent and essentially ignored anyways. This time round their update should include serious consultation and input from all of the current CPAC and SWAT membership.

The problem no longer is one of speculation or mere say so. Recently at a public meeting CPAC were treated to the spectacle of a former long time CPAC member admitting that they had been working with Conestoga Rovers, consultants to Chemtura, on the side. This work whether directly related to CPAC issues or not (it was) should have been made transparent to all CPAC members at the time because there was the possibilty of a conflict of interest between their private interests and their public duty as CPAC members.

This is not the first time a CPAC member, appointed by Woolwich Council, has been in a conflict of interest position. We've had two others who were members of the National Advisory Panel of the then CCPA and the now CIAC (Chemistry Institute Association of Canada). They were members at the exact same time as Chemtura were attempting to receive Verification from CIAC. This Chemtura Verification which was just denied again this week was done so with current CPAC members being consulted and advising against Verification. It would be totally inappropriate for any of those current members to be also members of the CIAC.

It is conceivable that a CPAC member could be a member of a related body or even collaborating on a project with another CPAC party such as Conestoga Rovers without a conflict of interest. The icing on the cake however is the blatant lack of transparency. This information was kept secret from the CPAC members at the time, including myself. It was relevant in the extreme and the individuals had a duty to advise both Woolwich Council and their fellow CPAC members of any possible or apparent conflict of interest. Clearly these requirements need to be enshrined in the Terms of Reference for upcoming CPAC members.

CHEMTURA"S *RESPONSIBLE CARE VERIFICATION SHOT DOWN AGAIN

I'm not even going to bother with crocodile tears. It would be an affront to companies who have seriously made efforts to engage their communities in honest dialogue if Chemtura had been verified yesterday. They were not and again I suggest that their failure is of their own making and actually increases the credibility of the Chemical Industry Association of Canada (CIAC). I do not remotely endorse the CIAC because I don't know enough about them. I do endorse this their latest decision regarding Chemtura in Elmira.

One reason why I am still wary of them is of course their membership. They are comprised of a who's who of chemical polluters in Canada. That being said if their mandate is sincerely to promote more responsible and safe handling of chemicals then who can criticize that? My other concern is the reason they've given currently and in the past for Chemtura's ongoing failures to achieve verification. It is stated as being a lack of community involvement. I'm sorry but perhaps there is a lot that can be read into that simple reason but I wish they'd be a whole lot more specific. It would give me confidence that future attempts by Chemtura, without substantive change in their honest communications, will continue to be rebuffed. Two days ago here in the Advocate I stated that Chemtura's basic dishonesty with the Elmira public needed to be drastically changed.

Phony long term DNAPL investigations and never ending junk science surrounding issues such as petroleum hydrocarbons and DNAPL in the off-site Elmira aquifer must end. Honest admissions of Chemtura off-site chemical sources must be made along with the ramifications of their presence to the overall Elmira cleanup. Bait and switch documents involving the M.O.E. must be acknowledged. An Indemnity was given Uniroyal for known on-site contamination on October 7, 1991 and then a public Control Order was issued on November 4, 1991 which was significantly different than the private sweetheart deal/Indemnity.

This is the heart of the matter. Any company that feels that long term deception and misrepresentation of facts to the public is O.K., does not deserve the *Responsible Care designation.

ST. JACOBS COMMUNITY CENTRE 5-7 pm TONITE

O.K. I just got off the telephone where I was confirming tonite's meeting at the St. Jacobs Community Centre. A fellow from XCG Consultants indeed confirmed that the exciting and sexy topic of sewage will be on the Agenda. This is an important topic however. Recently I posted here in the Advocate the fact that the Elmira WWTP (STP) was the third worst offender in the Grand River watershed for either intentional or accidental by-passes of partially treated sewage.

While the Region of Waterloo are currently underway with both planning and actual construction improvements at a number of sewage plants in the region; obviously it's not a moment too soon and indeed probably should have been down five years ago. We are still slowly learning of varieties of chemicals which are not broken down or removed by our treatment plants. Among others these include pharmaceuticals which are harmful to both human and natural life in the watershed.

Apparently there are choices as to the preferred wastewater treatment plans. It would be helpful if more citizens made it clear to our politicians that more treatment is better. Yes more treatment costs more money but it is money well spent not only for all of us now but for future generations.

CHEMTURA AGAIN SEEKING *RESPONSIBLE CARE INDUSTRY DESIGNATION

*Responsible Care covers quite a large area of matters and issues and I will admit that it is by no means a rubber stamp or done deal for Chemtura (Uniroyal) in Elmira, Ontario. They have been unsucessful in achieving it; many, many times and they have however received it on occasion as well. Although I am extremely skeptical and rightly so of all in house, internal, self policing bodies whether professional or industrial nevertheless the biggest boost to the Chemical Industry Association of Canada's (CIAC) credibility for me has been their repeated past refusals to verify Chemtura.

Partly what concerns me is the CIAC's (former CCPA) stated reasons for denying Chemtura verification under *Responsible Care in the past. A big part of it has been Chemtura's alleged failure to engage the local community. This lack of communications if you will has been perplexing to both myself and I'm sure to Chemtura. Indeed their hiring of a Public Relations company last summer (Susex Group) presumably is to address this shortcoming.

The problem for me in a nutshell is a very simple one. Honesty. They don't have it in their dealings with the public. In over twenty years of dealing with them either as a formal member of the Chemtura Public Advisory Committee (CPAC) or as simply a member of the community I have long lost count of the misrepresentations, deceptions, obfuscations and or simple refusal to respond to relevant questions regarding their environmental operations and impact here in Elmira. I am sorry but by any defintion you want, a company that is inherently dishonest with the public, especially after that company has permanently shut down the public water supply does not deserve a *Responsible Care designation.

Tomorrow is a meeting with the CIAC verification team. It includes a representative from Chemtura's West Hill facility as well as two from Elmira. One is the current Chair of CPAC, namely Dr. Dan Holt. Three more are assigned by the CIAC. Dr. Dan has been soliciting opinions of CPAC members on this matter and will appropriately represent them and Elmira citizens. I wish I had the same confidence with all the other verification team members but I do not. It would be grossly irresponsible to reward this rogue company for their decades long misrepresentaion of the truth to the public.

INCREDIBLE ANGER OVER JIGS HOLLOW PIT GO AHEAD

I'm not sure what is worse namely consistent bad decisions or inconsistent ones. If you know ahead of time your Council is beyond hope then you ride out the storm and don't waste your time and energy appealing to their better sides. Also if citizens are convinced that their Councils are there only to protect and serve the interests of the priveleged few then they can go to Council and basically publicly confront them for their sins. In the case of our current Council we definitely have problems. That being said both individuals on Council as well as the entire Council have made some good decisions along the way. Woolwich Bio-En and Jigs Hollow Pit are not in that category.

Today's Woolwich Observer is filled with stories, Letters to the Editor and an excellent Editorial by Steve Kannon. The story is titled "Jigs Hollow gravel pit cleared to proceed". Steve makes it clear that 70 residents in Council chambers were not buying what the gravel pit lawyer and the OMB Chair Mary-Anne Sills were selling. Jan Huisson, one of the Participants, afterwards stated that allowing four of them to speak last Monday "...amounted to so much window dressing.". That's what most of this hearing was. It is outrageous and disgusting for the OMB Chair to suggest that the only evidence of value came from the proponent's bought and paid for experts. Over the last couple of years as well as last Monday the Participants representing the Friends of the Winterbourne Valley outlined numerous holes in the so called "evidence" produced by the proponent. They also correctly pointed out that the onus is on the proponent to prove his case.

Clearly both the law and its' interpretation are biased. Once again citizens in an allegedly free democratic country are seeing the truth. You buy your justice and truth in this country. Our politicians have sold out long ago to vested, wealthy interests and democracy and individual citizen rights have gone as well. Environmentally, constructing gravel pits along the Grand River is prima facie, gross stupidity. The gravel is merely more accesible and hence cheaper to remove from the ground. That's what this is all about. Meanwhile our lying politicians pretend that they are following allegedly honest process and procedure but they are really nothing but window dressing. Shame on the OMB, shame on the provincial Ministry of Natural Resources and shame on any of the three on Woolwich Council who knowingly sold out their own residents and taxpayers for the financial benefit of a few.