Environmentalist cries foul over land assembly in Wilmot
Growing opposition to property deal
The environmental consequences of the land assembly underway in Wilmot Township, no matter what is built on the 750 acres, are staggering and roll back decades of planning by the region, says Kevin Thomason, a leading environmental activist.
“To me this is absolutely absurd,” said Thomason. “There are folks across the community really worried about what’s going on in secret, behind closed doors.”
There are no water or sewage lines to the land now, and the sewage treatment plant needs major upgrades to handle a big, new development on the area bordered by Bleams, Nafziger, Highway 8 and Wilmot Town Centre, he said.
The sewage treatment plant there can handle 7,000 to 9,000 new residents, he said, but big factories use as much, and sometimes more water than residential developments.
Workers going to and from a new factory will put thousands of vehicles on the roads, snarling traffic and increasing greenhouse gas emissions causing the climate crisis, he said.
Special care will be needed around the well head protection areas near the site, which tap into the underground aquifers for the region’s water supply, he noted.
Thomason has long worked with environmental groups in this region and across the province to curb urban sprawl, protect wetlands, promote sustainable transportation and reduce the greenhouse gas emissions. The Sunfish Lake resident is among the environmental activists who helped shape the region’s last Official Plan.
“Literally thousands of people and hundreds of groups had input into the region’s Official Plan,” said
Thomason. “Why would something like this come and threaten so many aspects of it right out of the blue and on such a scope and scale?”
He was also among the organizers of the campaigns that forced Premier Doug Ford to reverse two controversial decisions — opening up the Green Belt to new development and forcing some cities in southern Ontario to open thousands of hectares of land for new suburbs.
Thomason said he not seen the Region of Waterloo act like this before — telling property owners they must sell or face expropriation.
“They were given 10 days notice,” said Thomason. “That is so incongruent with how the region has operated in the past.”
The property owners are upset, but their local and regional councillors say they can’t talk about it. So, Thomason thinks the provincial government is the driving force behind the land assembly.
The farmers and homeowners had until Wednesday to accept or reject the offers from Canacre, a consulting firm that specializes in large land assemblies for big infrastructure projects. The farmers were offered about $35,000 per acre. The offers listed the purchaser as the Region of Waterloo.
In December 2023, the region announced it could not afford to prepare a big, shovel-ready site for a large investment that will create many jobs. It is just too expensive, but a good idea, said the region at the time.
But less than two months after that, a representative of Canacre started visiting property owners in Wilmot Township with offers to buy and threats to expropriate.
“There’s got to be somebody driving this corporately right now,” said Thomason. “Something has pulled together the township, plus the region, plus the province, and is trying to drive this forward to one common destination.”