This is such a short sighted…

This is such a short sighted and selfish approach, selling out tomorrow to profit today. What you should have learned from First Nations, Inuit and Metis people [and the duty to consult should always be an ethical priority as well given all the harm they have endured at the hands of the Canadian state] is that decisions today should consider how they will impact 7 generations down the line. Pushing development while failing to prioritize the protections needed for species at risk, many of them keystone species, will wreak irreversible damage on precious remaining green spaces and wetlands.

I volunteer with an indigenous led Turtle Protection group and the turtle populations in Ontario are all threatened and declining due to human activities. The prospect of dissecting and destroying their remaining habitat could quickly put them over the edge. Without turtles the waters will quickly become unhealthy and unsafe. They generally need 10 to 20 years before they can even begin to reproduce, and so many when they finally reach maturity are killed on roads already. We need better safer more protections for them, not less. They have so much to teach us and we owe it to them, and to the coming generations to ensure they will be here, as they have always been, since the times of the dinosaurs. They have survived devastating meteor strikes and ice ages, but... in hust over a couple centuries of industrialization we have nearly wiped them out. That should give us all pause. We must question the premise of business as usual with profit at the centre and advancing technology at all costs. The losses that will occur if this goes ahead are not worth it. We need more humility not more hubris. I want us to be leaving a world that regards Turtles with respect and continues to protect and defend everything that is life giving about biodiversity, not leaving a path of destruction that the future will have to grieve.