MONDAY MAY 4, 10:00 am. IN WOOLWICH COUNCIL CHAMBERS - AUDIT COMMITTEE - SCOTT HAHN

An audit committee comprimised of past and current regional politicians will be looking into the facts surrounding Woolwich Councillor Scott Hahn's lack of proper election expense reporting. There will be a public meeting this Monday morning at 10:00 am. in Woolwich Council Chambers. The issue appears to be Scott's brochures and election signs which he did not state any expenses for. Scott has since advised that the election signs were donated which is fine however he has not stated by whom they were donated. Similarily the brochures are an expensive question mark. When the smoke clears it absolutely could turn out to be no more than inattention and a failure to attend to the details.

On the other hand if for some reason Scott is embarassed to admit who was donating to his campaign and he intentionally tried to hide his donations, then he could be in serious trouble. This for me is the interesting question. Are the donations he received from friends or family and essentially no big deal or is it a big deal as to who donated to him? These are the questions that this audit committee absolutely must answer. Any attempt to give Scott no more than a slap on the wrist while not telling the public who donated to his campaign will reek of a coverup.

What if any are the environmental implications in all of this? At this point in time I do not know. Potentially worst case scenario Scott might have to step down as Ward One Councillor. If that occurred a proven friend of the environment, Dr. Dan Holt, is the next in line via last October's election. Scott's performance has been mixed on Council and his obvious support of Mayor Shantz in all things is worrisome.

Again until the audit committee have done their work it is idle speculation as to whether an enemy of the environment may have donated to Scott's campaign. That is what the big deal is all about. Idle speculation will occur until this audit committee do their important work and put idle speculation to rest.

STEWARDSHIP OF CANAGAGIGUE CREEK, ELMIRA PROJECT

Congratulations to CPAC and Graham Chevreau who headed up the application process to obtain funds from the Region of Waterloo's Community Environmental Fund. Graham Chevreau did the legwork in making a proposal for a project to sample soils and sediments around the Stroh Drain area, on Chemtura's east side. The purpose of the funds is to allow CPAC to hire a consultant to do this work. One concern I have of course is the Mayor's close relationship with Chemtura and the Ontario Ministry of the Environment. The two latter groups want nothing more than to defang public consultation. This includes so called "expert" meetings and technical meetings which intentionally exclude completely qualified and knowledgable citizens. This is the exact same nonsense that went on with CEAC being left out of technical meetings back in the late 80s. See where that got the public with the wells shut down in 1989. Similarily in the early 90s Uniroyal and the M.O.E. wanted the same thing but citizens through APTE said absolutely not. Bring your technical experts to public meetings and let the public listen and have their say.

There will also be an attempt to co-opt CPAC's consultant. As MTE are already working directly on behalf of Woolwich Township with the Breslau splashpad this is a problem. CPAC and the last Council worked together hand in hand. This Council has allowed Mayor Shantz free rein to smear CPAC in her attempt to please Chemtura and the M.O.E.. Now Chemtura want MTE to attend "technical" meetings. MTE can not and should not wear two hats. Either they represent Woolwich Township (Council) or they are under the direction of the current, honest CPAC. This is similar to Councillor Bauman attending the private, secret discussions of April 9/15. He attended as a representative of Council not representing CPAC. That said he has told CPAC that he spoke up on their behalf while they were being smeared by other attendees. Unfortunately exactly zero of his remarks appear to have been included in the biased "meeting notes" as Mayor Shantz calls them.

CHEMTURA PUBLIC ADVISORY COMMITTEE THIS THURSDAY 6 PM. IN WOOLWICH COUNCIL CHAMBERS

Apparently Woolwich Councillors will be attending this Thursday's public CPAC meeting in order to have a one on one public discussion with CPAC members. I think it is safe to suggest that this is not only a good idea but one that should have happened about two or three months ago. Better late than never however. Of course if Chemtura or the Ministry of Environment show up unexpectedly after hiding since last October, that will make the discussion more difficult simply from a time standpoint. Lest we forget The M.O.E. also did not attend the September CPAC meeting with very little notice as in a few hours.

Similar to last week's Council meeting I expect that CPAC will focus on the facts not on the behaviour of parties with either agendas or axes to grind or both. CPAC as indicated in my postings of the last four years, written the day after their public meetings, have always taken the high road. It is entertaining watching truth challenged parties attempts to scapegoat CPAC for the sins of others. Whether it be Chemtura's or the M.O.E.'s disrespect and obfuscation or even my strong ctiticism of guilty parties, CPAC have not participated. Yours truly has only been a CPAC member for a couple of months since April 2008. I haven't even been a member of their sub-committee SWAT since I resigned in early February of this year.

I even have high hopes that we might have more media than just the Elmira Independent at this Thursday's meeting. Hope to see you there.

REGION OF WATERLOO ANNUAL DRINKING WATER REPORTS - GLYPHOSATE

On Saturday April 18/15 I posted here that Woolwich Council had stepped up for West Montrose. This was in relation to the wholly inadequate Annual Reports allegedly describing this community's contaminated raw water. A whole spectrum of issues concerning these Reports were raised by myself at the Woolwich Council meeting held on the Tuesday prior to April 18. One issue I did not raise were inadequate Method Detection Limits (MDL). A multitude of sins can be hidden when authorities use MDLs that are high enough to nearly guarantee non-detects of various chemicals. For example a MDL of .4 part per billion for toluene will absolutely detect a concentration of 3 parts per billion (ppb) in groundwater. However if the lab involved is advised that a MDL of 5 ppb is satisfactory then the very same groundwater sample will report toluene as Non-Detect (ND).

The list of industrial/agricultural chemicals that are tested for have varying MDLs from .01 ppb up to 1.0 and 1.3 ppb. There has been however one particular herbicide with an incredibly high MDL for many years. Glyphosate is the active ingredient in Roundup a nearly ubiquitous herbicide used in agriculture as well as around the home. It has been of concern to me as I basically felt that the purpose for such an incredibly high MDL was simply to mask its' ubiquitous presence in groundwater.

This winter the public were advised that Glyposate has been recently designated as a probable carcinogen. This scientific determination will have a ripple effect both through the industry as well as through regulators. Monsanto will undoubtedly attempt to attack this designation and defend their very profitable business. The Region of Waterloo have even more explaining to do with their Annual Reports having a MDL of 25 ppb. for a probable carcinogen in our drinking water.

FEAR & LOATHING IN CHEMTURALAND

Hatchet job, smear campaign, bitchfest. These are some of the words describing Sandy Shantz's "Township of Woolwich Environmental Planning Discussion Meeting" of April 9, 2015 - 2:00 pm. Dodie Hummel Boardroom Township Administration Building 24 Church St W, Elmira. Other names for this meeting were Sandy's teaparty and or the "pretend" stakeholders meeting.

It's difficult to be certain but it seems likely that the powers that be at the Township would have at least gotten an opinion if they could be sucessfully sued for 1) writing filth 2) distributing filth . I wonder if their very careful distribution of this letter somewhat minimizes their legal liability. The other four Township Councillors finally received a copy days after it went to CPAC. As of this past Tuesday at Council they had not received it. Very strange. Similarily I still wonder if they distributed it not only to their allys at the meeting but also to everybody else. To the best of my knowledge nobody has sent it to the media. On the face of it this is strange unless Mayor Shantz has been advised that that would indeed open the door to legal liability. One can pretend that malicious, bitchy, false personal attacks are allegedly simply collecting information about a committee of Council but if distributed to persons other than those participants, perhaps it then becomes a legal matter.

Both Chemtura and the Ontario Ministry of Environment are terrified of real, honest public participation and consultation. Hence based upon the various proposals included in this five page "meeting notes" it becomes obvious as to what their game plan is. This game plan will be implemented via Mayor Shantz and Councillor Bauman carefully manipulating the other four Councillors via sweetalking these changes as to being beneficial while at the same time smearing CPAC & SWAT. I wonder exactly at what point Councillor Bauman will stick the knife into Sandy. His Mayoral chances in the next election depend upon Sandy's apparent self destruction. He needs to get her way out on a limb, depending on his support, before he cuts the limb off. Is CPAC the issue or will it be the next one?

Public CPAC meetings will be reduced to three or four per year. The Agenda will be controlled by Chemtura not CPAC. There will be private, by invitation only, "technical" meetings likely held at Chemtura. This is why the April 9/15 "meeting notes" ridiculously suggest that this CPAC are not technically competent or do not have access to that competence. In fact Chemtura want nothing more than toadies, incompetents and co-opted members of the public at these private meetings while two to four consultants run the show. Any psuedo expert representing either the Township or CPAC will be outnumbered, outgunned and carefully picked first for his deference, respect and very quiet civility in the face of bullshit.

Public transparency and accountability are desperately required. Mayor Shantz in conjunction with Chemtura and their corrupt regulator (M.O.E.) are removing both.

DOCTOR DAN HOLT KICKS BUTT (S)

Yesterday it was the Elmira Independent story titled "Critical report endorsed by Woolwich". Today it is the Woolwich Observer front page story titled "Keep focus on contaminants, says CPAC chair". Gail Martin's story in the Independent focuses on the most recent report from MTE Consulting which states "...that the results of the proposed (Conestoga Rovers) shallow soil sampling program will not accomplish the goal of the proposed work program ". Woolwich Council chose to endorse MTE's latest report which of course refers to the recently discovered and researched east side off-site flow of contaminants from Chemtura into the Canagagigue Creek via the Stroh Drain.

Steve Kannon's article in the Observer focuses exactly where it should. That is also where Dr. Dan Holt wishes to focus and that is on the facts of the ongoing off-site discharge of contaminants. This CPAC position is of course absolutely contrary to the fairy tale of containment that both Chemtura and the Ontario Ministry of Environment have been spinning for years.
Quoting Dr. Dan Holt "With this preponderance of evidence mounting, it is the firm belief of CPAC that the Chemtura site is an uncontained hazardous waste site."

Yours truly was also quoted from my Delegation to Council as I stated "New revelations regarding east-side leakage into the neighbour's propertry and then southwards into the Canagagigue Creek and the Grand River continue to unfold. These include ongoing fish consumption advisories for Dioxin contamination, found only in the Canagagigue and the Grand River below the mouth of the Canagagigue. Nowhere else in waterloo region are there Dioxin advisories".

Lastly I will quote Steve Kannon's views as to the behaviour of Mayor Shantz. It is my opinion that Steve is both understating and attempting to be non inflammatory with his comments. In other words I'm accusing Steve of being "nice" to Sandy. He stated that "He (me) obviously rubs Mayor Sandy Shantz the wrong way as she repeatedly interrupted the start of his presentation to insist Marshall remain "respectful" and attempted to rebut some of the points he raised."

NANCY DAVY, JOE FARWELL & JANE MITCHELL (G.R.C.A.) - DID THEY APPROVE THE APRIL 9/15 "Meeting Notes" ?

Mayor Sandy Shantz with considerable assistance from integrity challenged individuals orchestrated a meeting for the purpose of smearing Woolwich Township's appointed CPAC (Chemtura Public Advisory Committee) committee. The "hatchet" job truly was awesome although the heroes involved forgot to include their names along with their truth challenged comments. Originally Sandy inaccurately advised CPAC as well as the public that this was a meeting of "stakeholders". Myself and others succesfully pricked that balloon by pointing out that they've been missing in action for years if not decades. Some "stakeholders".

The question I have is to what extent have various participants agreed to this "hatchet" job done on Township letterhead. Did three representatives of the Grand River Conservation Authority (GRCA) expressly approve these "meeting notes"? Nancy Davy, Joe Farwell and Jane Mitchell are reasonably well known names in the community. Are they even aware that their names are on the front of this slanderous and scurrilous document or did two Woolwich Township employees write this up and only submit it to the Mayor for approval?

There are many other names embarassingly on the front page of this document. For example Inge Rinne of Woolwich Healthy Communities is named as a participant. I'm confident that she would have said nothing about CPAC as she has literally never attended a meeting in twenty-four years. Also while I have never met her formally I have seen her speak at Council and been quite suitably impressed. Is she aware that her good name is attached to this putrid document? Has she even received a copy of the Township's April 9/15 "meeting notes"?

Some decent people I believe were manipulated to attend this meeting not knowing its' true purpose. Their names and credibility are being used by Chemtura/M.O.E. and Mayor Shantz to bolster their smear campaign upon a dedicated group of Woolwich volunteers. Sandy you have no shame and no morals.