Last chance to comment on water plan

Rob Learn

August 10, 2012

NIPISSING – A journey of research, consultation, regulation and drafting policies comes to a close this month after more than six years.

The North Bay-Mattawa Source Water Protection Committee will submit its final draft of their source water protection plan on Aug. 20 and the public has its last chance to submit comments on Aug. 18 before it is sent off to the Ministry of Environment.

The document that numbers in the hundreds of pages addresses 21 potential threats to the drinking water in North Bay, Mattawa, Callander, the town of Powassan, the village of Trout Creek and the Village of South River.

For the most part residents in those areas will not notice imposition of the plan, with the exception of regulations already determining their properties will require a mandatory septic inspection every five years.

The majority of the proposed regulations set out changing or entrenching in provincial and municipal planning documents the ban of potential land uses, such as landfill sites and open salt storage, where they might affect drinking water quality. They also outline public education issues.

But, about 830 households have been deemed significant threats to drinking water because of the location of the septic systems. There are 242 households identified in Trout Creek, two in Powassan, 258 in the Municipality of Callander, 95 in East Ferris Township, 233 in Chisholm Township and one in the City of North Bay.

The septic systems are already under the mandatory inspection order after the provincial government adopted the Source Protection Committee’s assessment report in 2010, which identified them as significant threats. Under the Ontario Building Code, a septic system designated a significant threat must be inspected every five years.

North Bay-Mattawa Conservation Authority staff wrote the document based on technical reports and consultations that were started in 2005 in the months leading up to the passing of the Ontario Clean Water Act, which set up the source water protection program across the province.

This latest comment period on the source protection plan likely won’t change the mandatory inspections.

“The time to address (significant threat designations) was at the time before the assessment,” said Conservation Authority general manager Brian Tayler.

The assessment identified the Municipality of Callander and the Town of Mattawa as having the most significant threats to their water supplies, though both areas will be taking very different action.

The Municipality of Callander draws its public drinking water from Callander Bay in Lake Nipissing where high phosphorous levels have been found and the waterway has been plagued with blue green algae because of it for the past few years. Blue green algae can produce toxins that boiling and filtration will not remove.

“Phosphorous is a long-term persistent nutrient. The phosphorous issues in Callander Bay didn’t just happen yesterday,” said Tayler. Tayler says in particular that phosphorous naturally travels throughout a waterway so the entirety of the Wasi River watershed that drains into the bay has been identified as an area of concern. To address potential phosphorous contamination, any septic systems within 120 metres – about 400 feet – of the water in that zone are classed a significant threat. The watershed extends to the border of Algonquin Park.

“Where do you draw the line?” asked protection plan manager Sue Miller.”

In Mattawa, the town draws its water from a wellhead in the town proper. And while no issues were found with the water, the potential is there.

“You tend to have more threats from a wellhead because once it becomes contaminated it doesn’t flush out,” said Tayler. In Mattawa they also found the town is on gravelly soil with a greater potential for hazards to seep into the water table.

“You don’t want people doing things like changing their oil in their driveways,” said Tayler. To address it, the plan proposes an active education campaign that will include a special component for those using fuel oil to heat.

A town sewage system means no septics have been identified for mandatory inspections.

Mattawa is similar in protection planning with the town of Powassan, which also uses wellheads to supply the public system. However, the wellheads’ distance from town, the soil’s clay composition and the natural contours of the geography mean only two homes near the fairgrounds just off of Highway 534 require septic inspections.

The plan may surprise some, as it doesn’t address the town’s sewage lagoons located a few hundred yards uphill from the wellheads.

“We did do technical work on the lagoons,” said Miller, noting that between the clay and a creek running between the two sites, the lagoons were not deemed to be an issue.

In terms of impact on residents, Trout Creek is second only to Callander. There, 242 households are part of the mandatory inspection program. The village was included in the study as a cluster of wells as the village of 550 people relies on private wells and septic systems.

In Trout Creek any septic within 100 metres of a wellhead is considered a significant threat, though the Ontario Building Code specifies minimum setbacks as 15 metres for drilled wells and 30 metres for dug wells.

The significant threat designation has stirred controversy in Trout Creek and Municipality of Powassan council plans to raise it with the Minister of Environment at a provincial conference later this month.

The cost for a septic re-inspection is between $215 and $240 depending on whether the municipality administers the paperwork. All inspections must be done by the Conservation Authority under provincial legislation.

Last on the list of the inspection programs in terms of threats is the City of North Bay, which draws its drinking water from Trout Lake and the Village of South River, which draws its water from the South River.

North Bay is deemed to have the safest drinking water source because its intake is located deep in the lake and far from shore.

“Its vulnerability is considered very low,” said Taylor, noting the Conservation Authority and City have a long relationship working to protect the lake.

In South River, the village doesn’t benefit from a deep water source and Miller says slowly moving water there means its doesn’t have the same benefit of dilution capabilities as North Bay. However, the study also didn’t find any pre-existing issues and a mandatory septic program wasn’t deemed necessary.

The final comment period for the protection plan is the second one it has gone through. The Source Protection Committee hosted open houses in the spring to gather comments and change the plan as deemed necessary to reflect them. This final comment period will be used to gather public feedback to be handed to the Ministry of Environment with the final draft of the plan. Only the Ministry can make changes at this point.

Tayler says the Source Protection Committee has kept public consultation as a principle through out the six years of work.

“At each step we’ve had working group consultations throughout. We did multiple public meetings with the municipalities that didn’t have to happen but the committee wanted to happen,” said Tayler.

Once the Plan is approved the committee will turn to implementing. The plan is available for viewing at the North Bay Mattawa Conservation Authority’s offices at the ski hill in North Bay, affected local municipal offices and at actforcleanwater.ca.