TREPA

The Nova Scotia government still hasn’t enacted a wetlands conservation policy almost a year after it was supposed to be in place.

And the Ecology Action Centre is displeased.

Jennifer Graham, the Halifax centre’s coastal co-ordinator, said Tuesday that the process had been running on time until a couple of stakeholder groups received a two-month extension to last November’s deadline for input into the draft document.

“Then there was no sign of it,” Graham said. “We ask and we ask. We hear that there has been some disagreement at the cabinet table and we wonder what the holdup is.”
The policy was to be in place last December as part of the Environmental Goals and Sustainable Prosperity Act.

Graham said she has heard from various sources that some agricultural groups and the provincial departments that support agriculture “aren’t liking the way this rolled out.”
She thinks some of the issues involve scrublands or areas with a mix of alder bushes and cattails normally not thought of as wetlands.

“A lot of the frustration I’m having is that there are concerns . . . (but) the industry interests that are concerned and the departments that are concerned should actually talk to the staff that are working on this and have participated in the process,” Graham said. “There was a lot of time to consult on this, and to try to stall it at the political level, that’s not cool.”

Environment Department spokeswoman Michelle Lucas said the policy is still at the department level and hasn’t reached the cabinet table.

“We certainly would like to have (the policy) done by now, but it is a complex piece of work,” she said. “It’s an important policy . . . and we want to make sure we get it right.”
The department is trying to balance opportunities for sustainable economic development with a commitment to prevent a net loss of wetlands in the province, Lucas said.
She said there were a lot of submissions and feedback on the draft policy.
“The input was quite large,” she said. “We wanted to make sure we considered all of that input.”

Lucas said Environment Minister Sterling Belliveau “has said he would prefer to have a missed target than a policy that doesn’t work for Nova Scotians.”

Graham said that up to 65 per cent of the province’s salt marshes have been lost to human activities such as diking and development.

“It seems like there’s a lot of pressure to fight back against some pretty basic legislation,” she said.

The draft policy’s goals include preventing further loss of salt marshes and ecologically significant wetlands, Graham said. Another goal is specifying that wetlands of more than 100 square metres could not be altered without a permit.

Graham said she’s worried that more wetlands may be filled in while the policy remains stalled.

Halifax, NS  –   The Ecology Action Centre wants to know what is hampering the announcement of the  province’s no-net-loss of wetland policy.  The provincial government promised to deliver a wetland conservation policy by December 2009, as a key goal within the Environmental Goals and Sustainable Prosperity Act (EGSPA).

The new wetland conservation policy will create a consistent science-based approach to prevent the net loss of wetland area and function in the province. Wetlands are critical for purifying drinking water, flood protection, erosion control, as well as providing habitat and nursery areas for many types of birds and fish.  Up to 65% of the province’s original salt marshes have been lost due to human activities such as dyking, road construction, and development.

“The wetland policy is now almost a year overdue. I can’t believe it’s not out yet”, says Jennifer Graham, Coastal Coordinator at the Ecology Action Centre, This delay is grossly unfair to the many stakeholders who participated in good faith in the policy development process.  We are wondering what is stalling approval of the wetland policy and who is benefiting from the delay?”

The draft Wetland Conservation Policy was circulated for public and stakeholder feedback in the fall of 2009.  The Policy features a number of goals, including preventing further loss of salt marshes and other ecologically significant wetlands, and specifying that wetlands over 100 square metres cannot be altered without an alteration permit.

“Let’s just get on with it” says Graham.  “The document we commented on in November 2009 was decent.  There were some things in it we liked and some we were not so fond of, but once implemented, it will get the job done in terms of preventing wetland loss. We want to see this move forward and we don’t want anyone to muck with the contents of the document we say almost a year ago”