Shortly after posting last week’s column, the following comment appeared on the City Scope Facebook page.

“That and they are unmeasured, anti-democratic, and fail in their original mandates. 63 subnational jurisdictions in North America, every one of them, save Ontario, get by without conservation authorities.

“And several have far better conservation outcomes that are actually measured, monitored, and reported upon.”

The comment was posted by Leith Coghlin, a St. Thomas resident who is Managing Director of EnPointe Public Affairs, a London-based advocacy and public policy analysis firm.

Coghlin released a response to Conservation Ontario’s comments in November, 2020 regarding proposed changes to conservation authorities.

Last week, we spoke with Morgaine Griffin, chair of the Catfish Creek Conservation Authority, on the province’s plan to consolidate the existing 36 conservation authorities into 9 regional bodies. You can read that item here.

The Eastern Lake Erie Regional Conservation Authority (ELERCA) will include the Kettle Creek, Catfish Creek, Grand River, and Long Point Region conservation authorities.

We sought elaboration on Coghlin’s comments and spoke with him at the beginning of the week.

“It has the potential of doing that,” advised Coghlin. “It has the potential of creating a standard across the province, particularly with respect to hazard lands, development in what I would call Section 28 protected lands; that’s where you need a permit from a conservation authority to develop in a space. It will cause greater uniformity and fairness across the province.”

However, asserted Coghlin, “I still wish that they would be abolished (all conservation authorities in the province). We don’t need them.

“I will maintain that position until I take my last breath. We do not require conservation authorities to protect, preserve, and conserve what we need to environmentally in the province. We can completely achieve it through other medium.

“But I think the government’s point of view is that, for example, Catfish Creek doesn’t have a professional engineer on staff. Doesn’t have a professional geotechnician on staff.

“So the way that it works right now is that if you submit a fairly complex and environmentally rigorous submission to Catfish Creek or Kettle Creek, as part of your approval and applications process, you actually have to pay for these conservation authorities to retain the outside expertise, even to be able to review your file.

“And then what is even more aggravating in it all of this is that even when you pay for this outside expertise to review, because they don’t even bother with the budget that they’re given to have this type of expertise on staff, the unqualified staff that work there ultimately are the ones that make the recommendations, not the outside retained experts.

“The outside retained experts write recommendations that then the unqualified staff go ahead and editorialize and decide to do a policy comparison to what Section 28 of the Conservation Authorities Act or any of their own special policies or guidelines say.”

Section 28 of the Ontario Conservation Authorities Act empowers local conservation authorities to regulate development in and adjacent to natural hazards like floodplains, wetlands, and watercourses. It requires property owners to obtain specific permits for construction, site grading, or altering shorelines to prevent property damage and protect public safety.

Coghlin continued, “So if you are an applicant trying to do Project X in a place like Halton, where Conservation Halton has a rather large staff, including engineers and so on and so forth, chances are your application is going to be treated in a markedly different manner than it would be here in Elgin County, even if you are effectively proposing to do exactly the same thing.”

We asked Coghlin to elaborate on his comment regarding the number of jurisdictions that do not rely on conservation authorities.

“We’re the only ones that do in Ontario. And there’s no jurisdiction in the Western world that is looking at the Ontario model of conservation authorities and saying, ‘Yeah, we want to do that.’ Not a single solitary one.”

Coghlin insists the conservation authorities are another level of bureaucracy.

“But it has a halo over it. And it has this halo when people hear the word conservation or green, or environment. And you say, well, I’m going to get rid of that. Then everybody gets nervous.

“Because if they’re about conservation and trees and protection and conservation, then they must be inherently good. Right. But what if I were to tell you that over the past decade, we have spent over $10 billion through conservation authorities and the programming that they maintain.

“And there has not been one single solitary performance audit on whether or not they are actually achieving what their mission and mandate at law is. None, not even within the ministry itself. I know assistant deputy ministers over the past 20 years of the Ministry of Natural Resources that had begged and pleaded with multiple governments to say, can we actually get some resources to do some program audits?

“Because an awful lot of money is being spent in these organizations to determine whether or not they’re actually achieving what they ought to be doing. And they were routinely turned down.

“So would we do this with hospitals if we spent 10 billion? Absolutely not. In our own backyard, David Musyj is in as the administrator of London Health Sciences.

“We have eight school boards, nine, actually, I believe, in the province of Ontario right now that are under supervision by the Ministry of Education. That’s right, and almost entirely on the basis of vast sums of money where the expectation was that it was going to fund X to deliver Y, and there’s no or scant evidence that that was done.

“And in fact, in many cases, the money was diverted to non-priority, non-mandated activities, and so the province sent in nine different administrators, and then we also have them in the healthcare sector. That has never happened with conservation authorities.”

What about parks like Springwater Conservation Area?

Coghlin responded, “We have Ontario parks. Why do municipalities or conservation authorities need to be landlords owning these conservation areas? It’s not in their mandate.

“So if you look at Springwater or something like Dan Patterson and then Dalewood, which is just across the reservoir from me, do you know where those revenues go that they generate from those conservation areas?

“You would think that they go to help offset the conservation authority levies. But they don’t. The overwhelming majority of the revenues that they take that originate from those conservation areas fund their lobby group, Conservation Ontario, which has no statutory basis at law to exist.

“Why does a government local-level agency or board require a provincial advocacy organization? So the money that could be used to help offset these expensive local levies is not being used in that manner. Instead, they’re being given to a political advocacy organization to lobby and influence the province, not to the public’s advantage, but to the advantage of saving this particular bureaucracy. It’s madness.”

Coghlin’s response to the 2020 Conservation Ontario report can be found here: https://ontariolandowners.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/EnPointe-Public-Affairs-Response-1-Dec-20-to-CO-Comments-from-Nov-27-20.pdf.

Can’t say we are surprised at this one as Kohler hinted at a mayoral run a couple of weeks ago when we spoke at the Arthur Voaden open house.

He has served on city council for 22 years, but in a fascinating turn of events, Kohler was not initially elected to office, nor was he elected for his first term as mayor.

We wrote about this eventful start to Kohler’s political career in this corner in June, 2022, and here is an excerpt.

He first threw his hat into the ring in 1997 and finished as third runner-up in that year’s municipal vote.
Referencing Eric Bunnell’s People column from April of 2000, Ald. Helen Cole had announced her resignation, and council met behind closed doors to unanimously agree that Kohler should fill the vacant seat.
The top vote-getter in 1997, Terry Shackelton, had already moved on to council and the next hopeful in line, former alderman Hugh Shields, declined the appointment to council.

In September of 2003, Peter Ostojic chose to vacate the mayor’s office to pursue a position elsewhere in city hall, and Kohler was then appointed head of council.
Later that year, he campaigned for the mayor’s position in the municipal election and was successful.
He fell short in his bid for re-election in 2006, losing to Cliff Barwick in a bitter battle.
Kohler returned to council in 2010 as an alderman.

And he has remained there ever since.

In a media release announcing that he is joining the mayoral race, Kohler observed, “I’ve seen St. Thomas in boom times, recessions and transitions. We now have the chance to foster the longest sustained period of growth and stability in our city’s history, regardless of national or provincial climates.

“Residents expect our city to get it right.”

Kohler stressed the need for balance.

“For those who may be concerned that the grand projects and commercial growth will dominate council’s attention, may I give every St. Thomas resident reassurance.

“This city only works when the people living within it feel heard, seen, and reflected. Living here my entire life has allowed me to know what each neighbourhood regularly feels  are our city’s priorities.”

Kohler is running under the banner of “Capable, Local, Proven” leadership.

The only other candidate in the mayor’s race is Aidan Frederick, a junior staff accountant at Graham Scott Enns in St. Thomas. We will profile both candidates in the coming weeks.

Two more members of city council in St. Thomas have declared their intention in the Oct. 26 municipal election.

Lori Baldwin-Sands is seeking re-election to serve a fifth term on council.

And Joan Rymal filed her nomination papers this week. Rymal did not run in the 2022 municipal vote but was appointed to council last October when Steve Peters resigned his post to spend more time as chair of the Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers. Rymal was first elected in 2014 and re-elected in 2018.

The two join Jim Herbert, Earl Tayler, Gary Clarke, Rose Gibson and Joan Rymal in an increasingly crowded race for a councillor’s seat, with 13 now in the running.

Also joining the list this week is Mike Brisson, the former manager of Maxwel’s Foto Source and life member of the St. Thomas Minor Hockey Association.

David Goodwin advised this week that he has submitted his nomination package to run as the Liberal candidate in Elgin-St. Thomas-London South in the next federal election.

He was born and raised in Elgin and graduated from Wilfred Laurier University. He also holds a diploma in Data Analytics from the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management.
His family operated Goodwin Furniture in St. Thomas for 100 years until 1970.
He is a director for a financial investment company based in Toronto, but lives in St. Thomas, working remotely.

He also serves on the St. Thomas Heritage Committee and is a former member of the Old St. Thomas Church Restoration Board.

In the 2025 federal election, Goodwin lost to the Conservative Party of Canada candidate, Andrew Lawton, who garnered 32,565 votes. Goodwin trailed by less than 5,000 votes.

The city has established a new Affordable Housing Grant Program 2026-2028. The objectives of the program are to:

 Increase the supply of safe, quality, and well-maintained rental affordable housing.

 Support inclusive, accessible, and sustainable housing developments.

 Address the housing needs of vulnerable and marginalized groups.

 Prioritize support services, complementary uses and activities with the provision of new housing.

 Achieve dwelling units with deeper affordability for an extended period.

 Foster innovative approaches and partnerships in housing delivery.

At Monday’s (July 14) meeting , council members will be asked to approve the three recipients of funding from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation Housing Accelerator Fund (HAF) through the grant program.

The YWCA St. Thomas – Elgin would receive $725,000 toward the pre-construction and capital costs for the Hiawatha Affordable Homes project (at 53 Hiawatha Street).

This will be a four-story apartment building with 50 units, plus program space for residents to gather and participate in YWCA programs and services.

The project will prioritize inclusive and supportive living by allocating approximately 50 per cent of units to women and seniors aged 55 and over, as well as dedicating five units specifically for youth under the age of 30 who are experiencing or at risk of housing instability.

To ensure accessibility and long-term livability, 10 units will be fully accessible and barrier-free, supporting individuals with mobility challenges and promoting aging in place.

The building will be designed to meet net-zero energy standards, significantly reducing environmental impact and operating costs. Sustainable features will include energy-efficient building systems, high-performance insulation, and renewable energy generation.

The total allocation for 2026-2028 towards the YWCA Hiawatha project from the federal HAF, including the Affordable Housing Grant Program, new funding and additional HAF investments in housing-related infrastructure and affordable housing, would total $2.7 million, comprised of $925,000 allocated from the 2026 HAF amount, $1.175M from the 2027 amount and $600,000 from the 2028 amount.

The second recommended recipient is Eastwood Housing Corporation, which is requesting $75,000 toward the pre-construction and capital costs for the Old Office Renovation project at 1-200 Burwell Road, which would include conversion into two new rental units.

And the third funding recipient is The Trustees of the Central Congregation of the United Church of Canada with $25,000 for pre-construction and capital costs for two options of a new, seven-storey apartment building at 135 Wellington Street with 69 units.

This proposal will also include upgrades to the current community centre adjacent to the new build. The project will require the acquisition of properties for both building and parking requirements.

In response to our item last week on the consolidation of conservation authorities in Ontario, Lisa (Eleanor) Heard submitted the following observation.

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And a reminder, I can be heard weekday afternoons as news anchor and reporter on 94.1 myFM in St. Thomas. As always, your comments and input are appreciated.