Judicial review launched on Thane smelter property

YorkRegion.com
Oct. 1, 2015
Heidi Riedner

A judicial review of the Environment Ministry will be a “game-changer” regarding an abandoned polluted industrial site in Georgina, according to the woman who filed the suit.

And she is hoping the community will help with the financial cost of getting it done.

Debbie Gordon filed for a judicial review in January after discovering the ministry removed a long-standing cleanup order against the former Thane aluminum smelter property on Warden Avenue in Keswick.

“I believe that as Canadians we, the citizens in Georgina, have the right to have a healthy environment to live in,” Gordon said.

The environmental activist and former Thane public liaison committee member feels the provincial government should be held accountable “for the pollution it allowed to go unabated for decades” after the smelter on Warden Avenue went out of business and left a polluted wasteland in its wake.

For years, Gordon has researched and met with political leaders, eventually asking the MOE to conduct an investigation.

That was after meeting fellow resident Roland Peacock in 2003, who told Gordon about the pollution caused by the Thane smelter.

“I could not believe this contaminated site had been sitting there for decades so near a provincially significant wetland,” she said.

Gordon made a Freedom of Information request to the MOE and discovered that in 2000, Thane had been ordered to clean up the aluminum waste that was stored on the site.

“In fact, as far back as 1985, the MOE had issued a control order to forbid the stockpiling of this waste material, but, under their watch, Thane managed to amass enough that it will now cost over $3 million to remove. Thane claimed they had no money and there was no pollution despite MOE’s own studies saying pollution was moving toward the wetland,” Gordon said.

Spending three years on the Thane public liaison committee, which was formed to solve the pollution problems of the smelter, and another year on the public input and notification committee, which replaced the public liaison committee, was an exercise in futility, Gordon said.

“It was clear that the MOE was standing in the way of a cleanup by refusing to cause one to be done. As it became clearer that the public expected the ministry to clean up the smelter, the ministry gave us less and less information and the committees met less and less frequently.”

The final straw, however, was when Gordon learned in January that the ministry had removed the cleanup order from the property in July 2014.

That was on the heels of dissolving the public liaison committee in December 2013, without telling the citizens, agencies or town until months after the fact.

When the town questioned the lifting of the cleanup order, the MOE stated in an email it was under no obligation to post its decision for comment or review and that “this order is administrative in nature as it revokes the requirements of a Nov. 23, 2000 Provincial Officer Order.”

“There had been no new studies or justification why after all these years the site did not have to be cleaned up,” Gordon said, adding in the many studies she saw during the past 15 years, not one recommended doing nothing or said the smelter was safe for the environment.

“The ministry’s own studies show there is harm to the organisms in the Maskinonge River wetland complex,” she said.

Gordon is being backed by Ecojustice, Canada’s only national environmental law charity, which is  paying for Gordon’s lawyers and relying on donors to cover the cost.

“We believe we have a strong case to hold the ministry to its own scientific studies and to procedural fairness for the public,” she said.

While roughly $60,000 in legal fees are being covered, Gordon is still required to pay what most likely will amount to a few thousand dollars in disbursement costs.

“I have taken this bill on myself because I believe that this case will make a difference. I cannot, however, fund the printing and filing costs of the court case without the financial support of the community.”

It is Gordon’s hope that anyone who is interested in getting the site cleaned up would consider contributing toward the disbursement costs.

The ministry faces either taking acceptable action on the Thane Smelter to protect the environment or a potential environmental law precedent requiring them to consult the community and have scientific evidence to support their decision-making, Gordon said.

“Such a precedent would prevent them from revoking environmental cleanup orders in secret and without sufficient evidence that it is safe for the public or the environment — something that has become far too common.”

To help with disbursement costs, Gordon is selling Thanksgiving pumpkin arrangements— $25 each or three for $60. As of this week, Gordon had sold 40 of the arrangements. You can pre-order and pick them up in Keswick, Oct. 8 to 10.

If you are not interested in a floral arrangement, but would like to support the cause, email debbierawngordon@gmail.com.

Any surplus funds will be donated to Ecojustice to support the legal work it has done on the case, Gordon added.