Frogs vs. developers in environment battle
Housing project in La Prairie must do more to protect habitat, groups say
The noise it makes is often likened to the sound of a finger running along a comb, and it is so small it can comfortably rest on a quarter.
It’s Quebec’s smallest and most endangered frog — and environmental groups have been fighting for years to protect its population in La Prairie, where a residential development is underway.
Despite a recent court judgment that environmentalists hoped would lead to a halt to construction, the Symbiocité La Prairie project is going ahead on a territory inhabited by one of the nine remaining Western Chorus frog metapopulations along Montreal’s South Shore.
The five-phase project calls for nearly 1,400 condos, multiplexes, townhouses, and single homes in La Prairie’s Bois de la Commune. The first phase is almost finished, with the second phase set to begin in August or September.
The promoters and the city have set aside 50 per cent of the land, 87.7 acres, to serve as a conservation area, which will include four artificial “reproduction ponds” for the frogs, who will be displaced from their breeding grounds by the construction.
In 2013, two environmental groups sought an emergency order from Environment Canadatoputan end to the residential project. Nature Québec and le Centre québécois du droit de l’environnement (CQDE) group argued it posed an imminent threat to the recovery of the Western Chorus frog population on the development site.
Nearly a year later, the federal department rejected the request on the grounds that there were other individuals of the species elsewhere in the country, and therefore the species could not be endangered, said Karine Péloffy, a lawyer and director of the CQDE.
“To be able to say that there is a threat to all the individuals of a species across Canada, I mean, short of a nuclear blast… there will never be such a threat,” said Péloffy.
Both environmental groups challenged Environment Canada’s decision in federal court, arguing it contravened the Species at Risk Act.
On June 22 — over a year later — Federal Court Judge Luc Martineau ruled that Environment Canada should go back to the drawing board and, over the next six months, re-evaluate the case.
The federal government’s reason for rejecting the order was illogical, absurd, and went against the law, Martineau wrote in his decision. He also suggested the government had ignored its own internal advice on the subject. An Environment Canada document from 2012 had recommended issuing an emergency order to protect the habitat in La Prairie, and stated that the conservation area would only protect 15 per cent of the Western Chorus frog population currently on the site.
The environmental groups heralded the ruling as a step forward for protecting species at risk in Canada.
In the wake of the ruling, the environmental groups sent cease and desist orders to the city of La Prairie and to the project promoter, Quintcap, asking that construction be put on hold until Environment Canada makes its final decision.
But the city and promoter say construction will proceed.
Since the court judgment did not order construction to cease, it will continue, the city of La Prairie said in a statement to the Montreal Gazette.
Chantal Charron, a spokesperson for the city, who declined an interview request, also said in an email that the city had obtained all the necessary permits for the development and conservation park.
Both Simard and Péloffy learned that construction would continue when contacted by the Montreal Gazette. Simard called La Prairie’s decision “deplorable.”
Quintcap president, Ted Quint, and chief financial officer, John Waxlax, also told the Montreal Ga- zette this week that construction would continue.
“We have no basis to change what we’re doing,” said Waxlax. “We’ve followed every single recommendation, every single requirement of Quebec’s Environmental Department regarding the frogs.”
In this case, it was Quebec’s environment ministry, and not Environment Canada, that decided whether or not this project would go forward. The province imposed many requirements, like putting aside 50 per cent of the lot and building reproduction ponds, said Quint.
The only way Environment Canada can put an end to the project is by issuing an emergency order, something that can only be done at the federal level. Environment Canada could issue an emergency order because the frog is an at-risk species in Quebec, and the federal department can act to protect atrisk species.
It was Environment Canada’s refusal to issue such an emergency order that led to the legal action and Martineau’s judgment in June.
Three of the four new reproduction ponds have already been built, according to Waxlax, as well as a tunnel under the road for the frogs, and a stream was moved, at the request of Quebec’s Environment Department. Waxlax said the five-phase project is being completed one step at a time in order to allow the frogs to move to the conservation area, and that construction didn’t take place during their reproduction season — between March 15 and July 1 — unless the land had been completely flattened. That way, no water would accumulate and attract the frogs.
“There’s been an extremely elaborate, detailed compliance plan that we have followed to the letter,” Waxlax said, adding that Environment Quebec has been inspecting the site.
Quebec’s environmental department has not responded to requests to confirm or deny this information.
Quint maintains the conservation area will enhance the frogs’ chances of survival.