The Niagara-Orleans Regional Alliance (NORA) continues its fight against Plan 2014 for regulating Lake Ontario Water levels – fearing the lake would see more extremes in water levels and leading to an eroded shoreline during high water and parched marinas during low levels.
On September 25, NORA co-chairs Orleans County Legislator Lynne Johnson and Niagara County Legislator David Godfrey met with International Joint Commission (IJC) officials from the U.S. and Canada to again state their strong opposition to the proposal.
Also in September, the IJC submitted its conclusions to the governments of Canada and the U.S. regarding Plan 2014, asking both governments for views and concurrence on revising the IJC’s approval for regulating water levels and flows in Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River.
The meeting attended by Johnson and Godfrey on September 25, was arranged by Congressman Chris Collins and was attended by Collins, Gordon Walker, acting chairman, Canadian section; Dereth Glance, commissioner of the U.S. section; and Frank Bevacqua, public information officer, U.S. section.
“The IJC was not very happy with the outcome because the Congressman told them in no uncertain terms – ‘This thing was wrong from the beginning and it’s going nowhere. You did your job and now we will do ours, we are going to kill this in Washington once and for all,’ ” Johnson said.
Johnson and Godfrey traveled to Washington D.C. in August to meet with federal officials and state their opposition to the plan. At that time, Godfrey told officials, “Our fear is hundreds of millions of dollars of valuable property will be lost from erosion, and sales tax revenues from our fishing and recreational boating industry will literally be swept away. The unendurable result is every taxpayer across our counties will pay the price with high taxes.”
In a continuing effort to bring facts to the decision makers in Washington as well as the people, Johnson and Godfrey say they have sent leaders numerous documents detailing objections from such sources as the U.S. Department of Transportation and the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation.
In its letter to the IJC, the U.S. Department of Transportation states, “The DOT cannot support the proposed Plan. As a threshold matter, we question the IJC’s authority to change the current plan without reference to other communications from the U.S. and Canadian governments … the proposed adaptive management process raises concerns that the IJC may make changes to the regulation plan without interested users having an opportunity to participate in the process established by the Treaty for public comments.”
The St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation states in its letter, “The Plan 2014, in its present proposed form, will have significant negative impact on commercial navigation during periods of low water, which are expected to be more frequent in the future …The Plan … in an attempt to improve the wetlands ecosystem could bring about unintended consequences that affect other areas of the environment, such that the total negative impacts outweigh the benefits conferred to the wetlands.”
Legislators Godfrey and Johnson say they applaud Congressman Collins for his assistance in helping to set up meetings with the IJC. “He has been a strong supporter of NORA and our efforts to stop this absurdity,” Johnson said.
The IJC has stated that the ecosystem of Lake Ontario and the Upper St. Lawrence River has been unnaturally compressed and harmed by the current plan which has been in place for more than 50 years.
“Plan 2014 helps restore plant diversity and habitat for fish and wildlife by allowing more natural variability in water levels while continuing to moderate extreme high and low levels,” the IJC said in its Summary of Benefits and Impacts of Plan 2014.
