Ontario’s Plan to Consolidate Conservation Authorities: What’s at Stake | ERO #025-1257 | #LocalConservationMatters
Before continuing, readers may wish to review this background research brief:
Doug Ford Is Dismantling Ontario’s 70-Year Watershed System
👉 https://gaiaorganics.ca/doug-ford-is-dismantling-ontarios-70-year-watershed-system/
The Ontario government is proposing major changes to how Conservation Authorities operate.
Right now, Ontario has 36 local Conservation Authorities, each governed by a board representing 10–15 nearby municipalities. This structure ensures conservation decisions are informed by local knowledge and local accountability.
Under the proposed changes, these 36 authorities would be merged into just 7 large regional bodies, overseen by a new provincially controlled agency. Each regional board would represent 50–100 municipalities, significantly distancing decision-making from local communities.
Local watersheds require local governance
The Ottawa and Eastern Ontario region is shaped by distinct watersheds, including the Rideau, Mississippi, South Nation, and Ottawa River systems. These watersheds are not interchangeable. They differ in soil composition, hydrology, land use, agricultural activity, and climate risk.
Effective watershed stewardship depends on local expertise, long-standing relationships, and accountability to place.
For decades, Conservation Authorities have provided this place-based leadership. Their boards, staff, and partnerships are grounded in the landscapes and communities they serve. This locally governed model has supported:
- Flood protection and risk management
- Water quality protection
- Ecological restoration
- Agricultural best practices
- Public education and access to nature
- Long-term watershed resilience
Regional consolidation risks weakening environmental protection
The proposed shift to large, regionalized Conservation Authorities would move decision-making further away from municipalities, farmers, land stewards, and residents who are directly affected by watershed outcomes.
This consolidation risks:
- Concentrating authority in larger urban centres
- Diluting rural and agricultural voices
- Reducing transparency and accountability
- Weakening place-based environmental safeguards
Watershed-scale decisions directly affect soil health, water retention, biodiversity, flood risk, and climate resilience. These impacts are local by nature and require governance structures that reflect that reality.
Conservation is relational, not administrative
Water flows through landscapes, not political boundaries. Stewardship is built over time through trust, collaboration, and accumulated local knowledge.
Centralizing Conservation Authorities undermines the very strengths that have allowed them to function effectively for decades. Conservation works best when decisions are made close to the land and the people who depend on it.
What the Province should do instead
The Province of Ontario should pursue policies that strengthen, rather than weaken, local conservation capacity by:
- Maintaining locally governed Conservation Authority boards
- Ensuring municipal funds remain invested in their local watersheds
- Protecting and strengthening environmental safeguards
- Retaining Conservation Authority lands and assets within the local authorities that steward them
- Working collaboratively with Conservation Authorities to support locally driven climate adaptation and watershed restoration
- Increasing stable provincial funding so Conservation Authorities can meet mandated responsibilities without eroding local services
Why this matters
Healthy watersheds are foundational to community safety, food security, climate resilience, biodiversity, and quality of life. Protecting them requires governance that is local, accountable, and grounded in place.
Local conservation matters. Take Action NOW!
Use the Letter Template below to:
Contact your MPP
https://www.ola.org/en/get-involved/contact-mpp
Contact your local Municipal Council & Committees
https://www.ecologyottawa.ca/committees_council_contact
Comment on the Environmental Registry
https://ero.ontario.ca/notice/025-1257
Letter Template (Please Personalize)
Customized Submission – Ottawa Region
ERO #025-1257
Re: Proposed boundaries for the regional consolidation of Ontario’s Conservation Authorities
I am opposed to the scope and scale of the proposed boundary changes for Conservation Authorities in the Ottawa and Eastern Ontario region, including those responsible for the Rideau, Mississippi, South Nation, and Ottawa River watersheds.
I live and work in the Ottawa region and am directly connected to the health of local watersheds through land stewardship, community involvement, and daily reliance on clean water and healthy ecosystems. Access to local environmental expertise — particularly expertise grounded in watershed-scale planning, soil health, and land-use realities — is essential to the resilience of this region.
Local Conservation Authorities play a critical role in protecting water quality, managing flood risk, stewarding land, and supporting ecological resilience in a region facing increasing pressure from development, infrastructure expansion, and climate-driven extreme weather.
They also provide vital public benefits through parks, trails, education, and flood-control infrastructure that protect communities downstream, including the City of Ottawa. These services rely on deep local knowledge, long-standing relationships, and accountability to the communities they serve.
A regionalized Conservation Authority model would weaken these relationships by distancing decision-making from local municipalities and residents, concentrating authority in larger urban centres, and reducing transparency and accountability for watershed-specific outcomes. I am concerned that municipal contributions raised locally would no longer be reliably reinvested in local watershed protection.
I am seeking local solutions to local water and environmental challenges. The strength of Conservation Authorities lies in their local governance, accumulated expertise, and long-term investment in community assets.
I respectfully urge the Province to maintain local decision-making boards, protect environmental safeguards, ensure municipal funds remain dedicated to their local watersheds, retain Conservation Authority assets locally, work collaboratively with Conservation Authorities on climate adaptation, and provide stable provincial funding to support their mandated work.
Thank you for the opportunity to provide comments on this important matter.
Sincerely,
[Your Name]
Ottawa, Ontario