Sir: I was alarmed but not at all surprised to read Pete Hensel’s letter to the editor in the Sept. 12 edition of The Chatham Voice.
Mr. Hensel expressed great frustration that the experts handpicked by the Ford government to investigate the sediments containing Kettle Point Black Shale polluting many of Chatham-Kent’s water wells have not made any efforts to visit, consult with, nor have yet made a single phone call to any well owner in the municipality.
Shouldn’t the investigators be meeting with the people? Shouldn’t the investigators be on-site, on the actual contamination sites?
Don’t ask where Waldo is, ask instead where Ford’s experts are.
There’s been no effort that I’m aware of made by these experts to get into the field, talk with families, understand their problems, collect the discharging sediments and investigate the adverse effects these families are experiencing with their water supply before heading back to their laboratories to do their analysis, then write up their reports.
None of this surprises me in the least.
In fact, it’s just par for the course for how I’ve seen MPP Rick Nicholls and MPP Monte McNaughton handle this file over the years.
Both Conservative politicians knew this pollutant was releasing into their constituent’s water source as early as 2012. Both their press records are evidence of that acknowledgement.
Both of our area MPPs could have stood up in Queens Park years ago and demanded the Liberal government, then in charge, conduct a proper Health Hazard Investigation. That never happened, and in my opinion, it’s still not happening today.
In fact, from the beginning, the press release Minister McNaughton made announcing the selection of the experts and the tasking of the investigation panel to look only at pre-construction baseline testing that the North Kent Wind’s consultant AECOM conducted revealed how incredibly obvious this Ford government was intent on short changing our community from a properly conducted Health Hazard Investigation.
How does looking at baseline testing that was done months before the construction began for North Kent Wind pass as a comprehensive investigation for what’s happening now?
The baseline testing is a reference point in time, a snapshot of what things looked like before construction of the wind farm began.
Did the Ford government really think our community is that dumb and uneducated that we wouldn’t catch on to this? We can read a calendar.
Tactical error on that one, Premier Ford.
If the experts Ford has hand-picked only focus on and write up a report on what happened before construction and try to pass that off as a Health Hazard Investigation Report for what’s happening today, then that looks like a bait-and-switch attempt to me.
Minister McNaughton is quick to say in the press “Promise made, promise kept” when he speaks of the Health Hazard Investigation into the water wells. But if the promise kept is a bait-and-switch report, what help and what investigation results were really delivered? Isn’t that a huge waste of our taxpayer’s money?
I read the actual protocol – the actual work, the actual steps needed to perform a Health Hazard Investigation. The steps are written out and established under the Ontario Ministry of Health’s Health Promotion and Prevention Act legislation.
Public consultation meetings are a requirement of the Health Hazard Investigation Protocol. Ford’s experts are to meet with the affected families. Period. No political spin, no matter what MPP Rick Nicholls and MPP Monte McNaughton say, can get them out of that one.
To go back and address Mr. Hensel’s prior comment, “How long do we have to wait for this investigation?” I would say to Mr. Hensel, stop waiting by the telephone for a phone call that won’t come. Find something else to do with your time. You’re waiting for a report that has zero value to you and your neighbours’ water predicament.
And to MPP Nicholls and Minister McNaughton, I would say, never underestimate a community gentleman who can read and comprehend the English language.
All of us can read the Health Hazard Investigation Protocol and we know your government is already trying to rip us off.
Kevin Jakubec
Chatham Township
