Municipality Matters
The North Grenville Times
A tar sands pipeline in North Grenville?
Municipality and Fetherston proceed with interim agreement The Municipality of North Grenville and the Fetherston Park Residents’ Association have entered into an interim agreement which will initiate the transition of water and wastewater system management and monitoring from the Municipality to the Association and their contractors. “We are looking at a win-win situation for Park residents and all North Grenville taxpayers” remarked Mayor David Gordon. “With this agreement, Park residents now become the owners of the park and have their own destiny in their hands. I would like to thank all parties involved in these negotiations; the Park residents, who have truly pulled together to find a solution, and Municipal staff members Brian Carré, Forbes Symon and Karen
Dunlop for their dedication and expertise which has guided us throughout this process.” Maurice Dumoulin, President of the Fetherston Resident Association, is eager to take the next step in the process. “The Association has worked very hard these past months to position itself in a professional and cooperative manner. The Park is our home, and our intention is to take full responsibility of our property, as any homeowners would. We have lived in a state of limbo since the former owner declared bankruptcy years ago, and this process has motivated us to find a long-term solution.” “The Municipality recognizes the goodwill and hard work that Mr. Dumoulin and the Park Residents’ Association have put forth these past few
months. We are pleased to have come so far, working together in the pursuit of a solution that will best serve residents of the Park and all North Grenville taxpayers” stated Brian Carré, North Grenville’s Chief Administrative Officer. “This continues to be our focus as we proceed in the development of a final agreement between all parties.” In the coming weeks, North Grenville staff and the Park Residents’ Association will continue to collaborate until a final agreement is executed.
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By Maude Barlow and Ian Angus Maude Barlow is National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians, and former Senior Advisor on Water to the President of the United Nations General Assembly. Ian Angus is a member of Sustainable North Grenville. Both will be speaking at a community meeting at the North Grenville Municipal Centre on Tuesday April 15, at 7 pm. Every day in North Grenville, 1.1 million barrels of oil will flow past our homes, farms, under and over our drinking water supplies. It will be piped through a converted 40-year-old existing natural gas pipeline. That will be our new reality if TransCanada’s Energy East pipeline is approved. It would be the largest oil pipeline in North America, carrying diluted bitumen from Alberta’s tar sands. Diluted bitumen is not your grandfather’s oil. It’s created by diluting the thick bitumen with various toxic chemicals to make it just thin enough to squeeze through a pipeline. Shipping diluted bitumen is a relatively new process, with new risks that are only starting to be understood. The most obvious is the risk of a massive pipeline rupture, like the ones in Mayflower, Arkansas in 2012 and Kalamazoo, Michigan in 2010. Both spills confirm what a recent Canadian federal report found – diluted bitumen sinks in water. Sinking oil makes it harder to clean up spills. After five years and a billion dollars, the Kalamazoo River is still polluted.
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Heather’s Healthy Harvest Heather’s Healthy Harvest is thrilled to be the exclusive retailer for Marie Louise Soapery’s entire line of products. Her soaps are hand made in small batches from pure oils of the finest quality. They do not contain any artificial colour or dyes and no animal fats are used. The soaps and packaging are biodegradable for a greener tomorrow. She has an organic garden and grows many herbs, including the organic lavender used in her products. She has a selection of creams, soaps and sprays for many skin problems such as Eczema, Psoriasis, and allergic or dry/irritated skin. She also has an Organic Insect Repellent spray which not only works very well, it smells great and is good for the skin. Once you try her soaps, you may never want the synthetic ones from other stores. Heather believes it’s important to know where your food comes from and how it is raised or grown, to ensure you are purchasing quality and safe products. Her store offers meats that are free from antibiotics and growth hormones. Free-range meats come from animals that have been pasture-raised in cruelty-free, ethical farms, allowed to graze on grass and hay in open air, and have not been force-fed or forced to live their entire lives in over-crowded, dirty environments. By choosing to sell local products, in season, they are supporting nearby farmers and our local economy. Heather always takes customer requests into consideration when placing her orders. She tries to find any products that customers have said they would like to see in the store. Generally, when one customer would like to see specific products, other customers are happy with the new items too. Heather’s Healthy Harvest strives to give customers a relaxed and friendly atmosphere in which to shop. The store has many products that do not have any of the major food allergens, for those customers who have a variety of allergic responses to food. The major food allergens are: wheat, gluten, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, mustard, sulfites, egg, soy, fish, crustaceans, shellfish, and sesame. There are also several sweets that contain little or no sugar, or low glycemic sugars, for diabetic customers. For the products that are made in the store, they are constantly searching for new and exciting gluten free recipes that taste as though they are not gluten free. This requires a lot of taste-testing and asking for customer feedback in order to perfect the recipes. The idea is to come up with recipes that everybody would like, not only those customers who are gluten intolerant. With customer requests for products baked here, they ask the customer which food sensitivities are present and we use recipes that address their concerns.
In North Grenville, more than 70 per cent of homes draw their drinking water from the Oxford aquifer, which has been rated “highly vulnerable” because the soil and rock above it is very porous. The pipeline would pass directly though an area where rainwater enters the aquifer – a spill there could poison wells throughout our community and beyond. The pipeline would also carry diluted bitumen through the Baxter Conservation Area and under the Rideau River. A spill in either would have catastrophic effects on our natural environment and our tourism industry. Energy East is all risk with little reward for communities like North Grenville. Our health is also in jeopardy. In the case of the Michigan spill, the toxic diluents separated from the bitumen and began off-gassing fumes. Close to 60 per cent of the local population reported headaches, nausea and respiratory symptoms.
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CORRECTION
Diana Scanlan (not Sealan) is the pre-sale captain for the Kemptville area Multiple Sclerosis Carnation Campaign. If you are part of a work group in a place of business, consider getting a pre-order to assist Diana. She can be reached at 2585728.
15 Reuben Cres. Kemptville, HeathersHealthyHarvest.com 613-215-0353 April 9, 2014
The Voice of North Grenville
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