Waukesha water diversion proposal webinar encourages public comment →

The Manitoulin Expositor, February 17, 2016
Author: Alicia McCutcheon

ONTARIO—An information session webinar on the province’s role as part of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Basin Sustainable Water Resources Agreement in the Waukesha, Wisconsin water diversion proposal was held last week, bringing together 22 participants from across the Great Lakes, including three from Manitoulin Island.

“Ontario has a long history of working with the Great Lakes Regional Body (which works under the Agreement), but also a long history with this type of diversion proposal,” one of the provincial facilitators from the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (MNRF), stated, giving an overview of the Agreement, which was signed on December 13, 2005 by the Great Lakes premiers (Ontario and Quebec) and governors, explaining that the Agreement came into full force on March 8, 2015.

The public consultation meeting dealt with the proposed Waukesha diversion, which seeks to divert an annual average of 38.2 million litres/day from Lake Michigan (with a plan to return 100 percent of the volume of water diverted back to Lake Michigan, as set out in the Agreement standards).