Ontario’s environment minister was in the Kingston region Tuesday to announce funding aimed at preserving the Great Lakes.
“Since 2018, the Ontario government has invested $62.7 million in 550 new projects to save the Great Lakes,” David Piccini said, adding another $6 million to that total at a farm in Hay Bay on Monday morning.
The money is meant to support 30 multi-year projects that will help protect, conserve and restore the Great Lakes for future generations to come, he said.
Included in that is almost $163,000 going to Quinte Conservation for work in the Bay of Quinte.
“For our office, that includes work on some of our important coastal wetlands, long-term monitoring for algae and phosphorous in the Bay of Quinte,” said Brad McNevin, chief administrative officer of Quinte Conservation.
The funding will help efforts to get the Bay of Quinte stricken from the International Joint Commission’s areas of concern list.
McNevin said one of the major factors that keeps the Bay of Quinte on that list is fish consumption. He also listed eutrophication, an increase of phosphorous and nitrogen in the water, as well as phytoplankton and zooplankton, as issues that are currently being looked at to help with de-listing the bay.
Ric Bresee, MPP for the Hastings—Lennox and Addington, said working with stakeholders like farmers to reduce phosphorous run-off into waterways is a big part of helping preserve the Great Lakes. But, to him, the solution won’t come without a team effort.
“The environmentalists, the conservation authorities, all the various groups working together, our First Nations partners just up the water here, all of us have to work together to continue to make sure that we get the water quality, and we keep the soil in the best quality as possible,” Bresee said Monday.
Other funding promises included more than $400,000 pledged to the St. Lawrence River Institute of Environmental Sciences to measure mercury levels in fish and industrial sediment in the river, and more than $600,000 to the Governing Council of the University of Toronto to assess water quality in the Great Lakes.
Monday’s $6-million announcement is in addition to the $14 million the provincial government spends on Great Lakes remediation efforts annually.
— with files from Global News’ Alexandra Mazur