MEDIA RELEASE
For Immediate Release
July 20, 2009

OPP Commissioner Fantino notified that Site 41 is Illegal, urged to ‘resume a neutral stance’

In a letter sent this morning to Ontario Provincial Police Commissioner Julian Fantino, the legal counsel for the Council of Canadians’ states that “there has been no proper approval of [Site 41] by the municipal council for the County of Simcoe.  In the absence of a by-law authorizing the project, it is illegal.”

There is a widespread movement to stop Site 41, a proposed waste dump situated on the Alliston aquifer in Simcoe County. The Council of Canadians and other organizations, most recently joined by the Federation of Tiny Township Shoreline Associations, have been drawing attention to the danger Site 41 poses to water so pure that a recent scientific study considered it to be “reference water”. The letter from Sack Goldblatt Mitchell LLP points out that the ongoing protest is a result of the objections of protesters to “the County’s attempts to build the waste disposal facility” at Site 41.

The letter notes that “members of the Ontario Provincial Police have interposed themselves in this civil dispute as advocates for the County of Simcoe, and most recently, have given notice of their intention to arrest and charge the picketers if they do not afford the County’s contractors immediate and unimpeded access to the site. The construction activity which your officers seek to assist the County of Simcoe in carrying out is unlawful.”

“The protesters are doing nothing more than peacefully objecting to unauthorized government conduct,” states the letter.

“It is incumbent on the County to seek an injunction from a civil court if it believes that the protestors are interfering with its lawful use of property,” concludes Sack Goldblatt Mitchell LLP in the letter. “In the meantime, the OPP should resume a neutral stance and preserve the peace, but otherwise not interpose itself in this on-going civil dispute.”

Maude Barlow, National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians adds that, “this new development shows that the county must take immediate steps to halt the construction at Site 41.”  

The full letter is available upon request.

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For More Information:

Dylan Penner, Council of Canadians, 613-795-8685, dpenner@canadians.org   

www.canadians.org/Site41