Dear Editor:

I am responding to our MPP Carol Mitchell’s letter recently published asking for our Community input regarding the proposed amendments to the regulations for the Green Energy Act.

MPP Mitchell encourages us to send our comments to our government related to the proposed amendments to regulations of the Green Energy Act. Why? She does not appear to have reviewed and considered our Community input. No one in our government [who we employ and work for us] reviews and considers our Community input. Furthermore, I also don’t recall MPP Mitchell asking for our input when the Green Energy Act and Regulations were first proposed – I stand to be corrected – so why ask us to comment at this late stage. Even if she did encourage us to comment last year, she did not review and consider our comments. I will explain as follows:

I live in Saugeen Shores within the proposed Arran-Elderslie Wind Poject.

Saugeen Shores has the final say whether or not an industrial wind turbine project can come into the Community. The Green Energy Act says so in Section 2, set forth as follows:

“This [Green Energy] Act shall be administered in a manner that promotes community consultation." 

The language of Section 2 is clear and unambiguous. Community consultation has the final say. Section 2 is the first substantive provision of the Green Energy Act and is supreme to any other provision in the Act. Section 2 governs and controls the Act and the regulations. I rely on the very language that our government uses. I expect our government to follow the law it enacted. I now turn to how our government has violated its own law. I request our MPP Mitchell to respond to this letter. I further request our MPP Mitchell to meet with our Community pursuant to Section 2 of the Green Energy Act. I look forward to hearing from her and for our Community to meet with her. We must preserve our local Democracy and take control of what comes in and out of our Community.

Minister of Environment [MOE] Wilkinson disagrees with me and says "We [the Ministry of Environment] have final say." There is nothing in Section 2 that would even suggest this. Standard statutory construction requires that Section 2 be construed liberally in favour of the community and local democracy. Standard statutory construction requires that you cannot "read in" a negative as Minister Wilkinson is attempting to do. Pursuant to Section 2 of the Green Energy Act, if the Saugeen Shores Community tells the Ministry of Environment that we do not want an industrial wind turbine project in our Community that ends the proposal and the Ministry of Environment cannot approve the project. It would be against the law for the Ministry of Environment to approve the project. To hold otherwise would make Section 2 meaningless and useless. The Supreme Court of Canada when reviewing legislation presumes that the legislature would not enact legislation that was meaningless or useless. Community consultation is open ended in Section 2. There is no limiting language, no definition, and it controls the Act and the regulations and encompasses and controls every part of the Act and regulations. MPP Mitchell confuses the regulations and the Act. The regulations are born from the Act and are always controlled by the Act that is supreme. The regulations merely speak to minimum requirements that a proposed wind project must follow. The regulations require the wind project to conduct a minimum of 2 public meetings. Community consultation encompasses and controls this regulation. The wind project by regulation must also consult with the municipality and aboriginal community. Community consultation encompasses and controls these regulations.

Why would Minister Wilkinson interpret Section 2 in a negative and limiting way. We employ him. He works for us. He is not some sort of celebrity or VIP. He is our employee. Think for a moment if an employee at Bruce Power told his employer that he was not going to pay any attention to him. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Why would Minister Wilkinson, MPP Mitchell and all our elected and non-elected employees not want us to have the final say? Isn't it just natural and a good idea for the community to control major industrial projects that come into or do not come into our community.

"We" in the Minister's context means the approvals official, Doris Dumais, of the MOE, would have the final say. The approvals official is not elected, and not accountable to us. She is employed by us, however. I for one do not want the approvals official who is not accountable to anyone to disregard and overrule our community democracy. It would be unlawful, in violation of our government's own Green Energy Act.

MPP Mitchell does not appear to have reviewed and considered any of the community consultation set forth in Section 2. I have met with her personally and asked if she reviewed particularly the MOE community consultation provided at MOE's public meeting held in Port Elgin on June 22, 2009. She had not. She did not even attend that meeting that was only 1 of 6 meetings throughout all of Ontario held by the MOE related to the Green Energy Act and regulations. That is not acceptable. The MOE meeting proposed a 550 metre setback from a residence. Experts say the minimum setback should be at least 2 km to protect health of citizens living near the industrial wind farm.

Our Community consultation unanimously criticized the 550 metre setback proposal and demanded it to be longer and for health studies to come before a final regulation was promulgated. There was no representative from the proposed wind project in attendance and arguing in favour of the proposed 550 metre setback. Why? Because it was a done deal. The wind lobby knew our government would not review our Community comments, and the wind lobby knew the government was not going to change the 550 setback. Surprise: The final regulation: 550. The 550 metre setback was arbitrarily set. The wind project people even say so.

Furthermore, no one in our government has answered how they arrived at 550 metres, and why 549 metres in the eyes of our government harms people. All because of one metre. When health is on the line, don’t guess. It is easy to remedy this. Make the setback 2 km.

Nonetheless, our MPP Mitchell said the community consultation had to have been reviewed and she said she would find that documentation and get it to me. She then advised later that she could not get it and that I would have to go through the Freedom of Information Act.

Something is terribly wrong in our democracy if my MPP cannot find simple documentation related to a review of community public input. I asked the Freedom of Information director if he knew anything about the documentation wherein the community consultation was reviewed. He had no clue. He said he would check with MOE bureaucrats that I had already met with and who also had no clue. I have been asking for this review of community consultation under Section 2 for over 1 year now. No one knows anything about it.

Recently, I have met with Doris Dumais, the approvals official noted above, who wrote me and advised that the community consultation had been reviewed and considered by our government. When I met with her face to face she admitted that she had not personally reviewed and considered the community consultation. She indicated that MOE bureaucrats were compiling the documentation related to the reviews I asked for, and that I would meet with them once they compiled it. Ms. Dumais informed me that she had the final say on approval of an industrial wind turbine project. She said her interpretation of Section 2 was that the community did not have the final say, similar to what Minister Wilkinson's party line is above [that ironically became the party line after my meeting with Ms. Dumais]. I asked her how she could read in a negative that was not in the language of Section 2. It was odd she would even think to do that. She informed me she would ask her lawyers. This was almost 2 months ago. She tells me they are still working on an opinion letter re Section 2.

Heaven help us if we as citizens have to hire a lawyer to figure out what our government is saying in legislation presumably for our benefit. Again, read Section 2 ["This Act shall be administered in a manner that promotes community consultation"] and there is absolutely no reason to consult with a lawyer to interpret such clear and unambiguous language that must be interpreted liberally in favour of the community and local democracy, without limitation. If our government wanted to limit the community consultation they could have expressed it with clear limiting language. Our government did not limit community consultation in any way. Why? Because this is how democracy works. It would be unconstitutional and contrary to the Charter to limit community consultation in the way Minister Wilkinson, MPP Mitchell, and Doris Dumais, approvals director, would have you believe. The money, money, money of the special interests come to mind. I note that our MPP Mitchell has not attended any of the public meetings related to industrial wind turbines, but she did attend the grand opening of the industrial wind turbine project in Underwood that was by invitation only and citizens were left outside to try to get our MPP's attention. That is unacceptable. Our MPP also left the floor of the Parliament while her local constituents sat in the audience, having travelled to Toronto specially to participate in a moratorium motion related to the Green Energy Act.

Doris Dumais, approvals director, admitted to me that community consultation was very important, but that it must be balanced with the other approval requirements set forth in the Act and regulations. She said she had to review and balance the community input with the other approval requirements, and that the community input was very important. What is extremely troubling about this is that Ms. Dumais admitted to me that she had not reviewed the community input and is having people compile it only after we asked her about it. Had we not asked her, the approval would be made without any review of the community consultation, against the law, and in violation of the Green Energy Act, Section 2.

The government did not review our community consultation. We stood up at public meetings put on by the MOE and our government, and our government did not review it. MPP Mitchell encourages public input on the new amendments. Why? She doesn't review it. No one in government reviews it. It has become a dictatorship. The government does not consider our input. It is a violation of the Green Energy Act, the Constitution and Charter.

Note, the amendments that MPP Mitchell is talking about are related to making it easier for the wind companies to obtain approvals without any consideration to obvious adverse health effects while taking more property rights away from people. The amendments ignore the extensive evidence establishing that industrial wind turbines cause adverse health effects and citizens are suffering and some abandoning their homes.

I wish all companies to do well, and make as much money as possible. With a strong caveat: Do not place these things too close to people where they adversely affect health. My girlfriend's sister was bought out by a wind company because of the unbelievable sickness she was experiencing because of these huge industrial wind turbines invading and trespassing into her retirement home through stray voltage, vibration, low frequency, from the giant electrical cables and noise of the turbines.

Ontario is bigger than most countries with very small population. Put these things and make money away from people and not at the expense of their health.

I attended an International Wind Symposium on adverse health effects related to industrial wind turbines, in October, at Picton, Ontario. MPP Mitchell, Minister Wilkinson, and our government were invited. Not one person from our government attended. That is unacceptable.

The symposium highlighted that there are extremely serious adverse health effects related to these huge giant electrical industrial wind turbines. Dr. King, who our government relies on, did not investigate in any way the 106 known adverse health victims of the 690 wind turbines currently in Ontario. It is willful blindness, bad faith and probably intentional now, for our government not to check out these problems, and not even attend to find out anything about it. I understand that the government would not attend the symposium because it was not “congruent with government policy.” Unbelievable!

Our government puts its head in the sand and ignores obvious health problems to its citizens and does not do anything about it. Note that Dr. King is an infectious disease doctor and has no expertise related to wind turbines other than presenting a book report on them related to studies done by the wind companies. A study is only as good as the money paying for it.

The bottom line:  the Community of Saugeen Shores controls and has the final say on whether or not an industrial wind turbine project invades our community. I am sending a copy of this letter to our MPP Mitchell. I ask her to respond. I ask her to meet with our Community pursuant to Section 2 of the Green Energy Act. I look forward to hearing from her and for our Community to meet with her.

Most Respectfully,

John Mann

Saugeen Shores