Governments love windmills, people who live near them hate them. The result is a beautiful recipe for lawyers.
ulian Falconer, no stranger to public interest cases, represents families challenging the development of three wind farms near Lake Huron
Mr. Falconer is one of the country’s top constitutional and human rights lawyers. He represented the Smith family in a lawsuit into the death of Ashley Smith in custody. He worked on the Ipperwash Inquiry. He represented Maher Arar in a suit against the federal government over his rendition and torture in Syria. The list goes on. Point is, Mr. Falconer takes a special interest in holding government to account.
On Monday he’ll be taking on windmills. He wants Ontario’s Divisional Court to overturn the regulatory approvals of three projects, the St. Columban Wind and K2 Wind Energy project in Huron County, and the SP Armow Wind project near Kincardine, Ont.
His clients, who live near the projects, fear the noise and vibration of the wind turbines will trigger a host of serious health problems. Mr. Falconer will argue in court that Ontario’s process for approving wind farms violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Provincial legislation says anyone challenging a wind farm project before Ontario’s Environmental Review Tribunal must prove “serious harm” to human health. Mr. Falconer says that threshold is unfair because it is too high.
“The effects of wind turbines are felt in the most private and personal areas of residents’ lives, in their homes and beds, where the state has its lowest interest in intrusion,” Mr. Falconer submits in his written argument.
The Charter argument is a fairly new wrinkle in the fight against wind farms. But litigation itself isn’t. When the Divisional Court rules on the appeal, its decision will join the more than 30 Canadian reported court cases that have dealt with wind turbines — a number that shoots to nearly 100 when you include hearings before Canadian regulatory tribunals.
More than 70 anti-wind supporters show up at London courthouse for first constitutional appeal
A farm stands in the foreground as some of the 45 wind turbines at the Bornish Wind Energy Centre stand in the distance near Parkhill. (Free Press file photo)
Wind turbines are like the “nightmare neighbours” that are “constantly noisy, constantly in your face,” says a lawyer looking to change the rules that govern turbine approvals.
Julian Falconer told a divisional court of appeal that the nuisances might not be enough to burst eardrums, “but that neighbour slowly drives you crazy.”
Please come out and show your support for the Divisional Court Charter Challenge Appeal of the Ontario government’s wind power approval process. This appeal will be heard at the Courthouse, 80 Dundas Street, London (parking and entrance off Queens Ave.) on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, November 17, 18 and 19. Start time on Monday morning is 10:00 a.m. The court room number has not yet been determined but the location will be posted in the courthouse by Monday morning. Your attendance is vital. This is a test case and, if successful, has the potential to help all communities struggling with the industrial wind turbine issue. Come early (about an hour beforehand) and bring your signs for a peaceful protest outside the courthouse.
For more information on this legal action go to www.falconers.ca.
If you are unable to attend but would like to make a donation to the Charter Challenge, cheques can be made payable to “SWEAR” and sent to Dave Hemingway, R.R.#2, Bayfield, ON N0M 1G0. Donors can also go online to the SWEAR website at, www.swearontario.wix.com/swearontario, and hit the “DONATE” button.
Hope to see you there. Please feel free to forward this email along to your likeminded friends, neighbours and relatives.
Anita Frayne
On Behalf of SWEAR
For more information on this legal action go to www.falconers.ca.
If you are unable to attend but would like to make a donation to the Charter Challenge, cheques can be made payable to “SWEAR” and sent to Dave Hemingway, R.R.#2, Bayfield, ON N0M 1G0. Donors can also go online to the SWEAR website at, www.swearontario.wix.com/swearontario, and hit the “DONATE” button.
Hope to see you there. Please feel free to forward this email along to your likeminded friends, neighbours and relatives.
Mothers Against Wind Turbines looks to raise $100,000
Bryan Jongblood looks at a map to determine his receptor number. Mothers Against Wind Turbines held an information meeting last week as it prepares to launch a legal battle against the Niagara Region Wind Corp. project that is before the province.
Approval of a 77-turbine project from the province could come any day and a group of residents opposed to its existenceis doing anything but silently waiting.
Mothers Against Wind TurbinesInc (MAWT) is bracing for a fight, much like their comrades in the West Lincoln Glanbrook Wind Action Group have been. While the latter group is awaiting a decision from the Environmental Review Tribunal (ERT) the newer group is gathering information and raising funds to mount its own fight against a much larger project.
Niagara Region Wind Corporation (NRWC) submitted its renewable energy approval application 10 months ago and residents have been preparing for its approval ever since. Should it be approved, 77 turbines will rise on the rural landscape of West Lincoln, Wainfleet and Haldimand. Forty-four of them are slated for the community of West Lincoln, with the majority in the Wellandport and St. Anns areas.
Last week MAWT (Inc) invited members of the public to an information session at Covenant Christian School in Smithville where they provided an update on both the NRWC and IPC Energy projects and asked for support.
“A Charter challenge is going to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars,” said Deb Murphy, co-chair of WLGWAG and a new paralegal who represented Anne Fairfield at her ERT hearing last month. “The average person, the average group can’t even begin to think about that.”
The issue with taking wind proponents to court, said Murphy, is the process. While an environmental review tribunal can only rule on whether or not a project will impact health — human, animal or environmental — it is the first step in a lengthy process to fight the projects she said. This is the case with WLGWAG’s appeal which was launched by Fairfield after the project was approved and again when the province approved an amendment to the project after it was discovered that four of the five turbines were placed too close to neighbouring properties then regulations allow. The tribunal could not rule on the process, explained Murphy, only on whether or not the amended application would harm health.
“You can’t skip it. You have to go to the ERT and lose that then appeal,” said Murphy, noting it cost WLGWAG $4,000 in copying alone to prepare for the hearing. “It sucks. Thirty one of 32 ERTs lose.”
While the ERT was costly in paper, the next step, divisional court, will cost even more warned Murphy who noted paralegals can’t represent the group in the next stage meaning to have a fighting chance a lawyer is required. Murphy also warned that timelines will be tight as the group will have only 15 days from the time the project is approved to launch its appeal.
Luckily for both groups they have been granted intervenor status in a constitutional challenge launched by three groups fighting turbines in Goderich, St. Columbian and Kincardine. A total of 15 groups in Ontario similar to MAWT (Inc.) and WLGWAG are also included as intervenors on the case which will head to court in November.
It cost each group about $6,000 to participate, said Murphy, who expects wind proponents to challenge any victory granted to groups like MAWT (Inc).
“If we win, you know the wind companies will fight it,” she said. “It could take a long time.”
To raise funds for legal fees MAWT(Inc) is selling tree seedlings, T-shirts and lawn signs. The group also hosts garage sales and is always taking donations of gently used items. The group has a goal of raising $100,000 to cover legal costs each step of the way.
The group is also looking for volunteers to help with fundraising, research and writing and seeks the advice of experts in various fields from legal to technical.
“If we don’t have legal counsel it will be tough for us,” said Lois Johnson, MAWT (Inc) member. “The time to donate is now.
“MAWT(Inc.) will launch an ERT. MAWT (Inc.)will launch a judicial review and MAWT (Inc.) has joined the constitutional challenge,” Johnson added.
The group is also asking that anyone living within 2.5 kilometres of the NRWC project area determine their receptor number — which is based on the distance between the turbine and home.Those numbers will help the group prepare evidence in relation to noise disturbance from the turbines should they be erected.
“If you’re on the list, we need to talk to you,” Johnson said.
DOCUMENTARY
BIG WIND By Rico Michel http://www.dliproductions.ca/films/big-wind/ Margaret Welcome to the wacky world of green power, where misguided governments have sparked a massive corporate feeding frenzy (at taxpayers’ expense) to achieve little or nothing of any social benefit. — Margaret Wente, Globe & Mail
It has taken decades for us all to understand the pressing urgency of protecting the Earth’s environment by finding alternatives to fossil fuels. At last, the development of a green energy industry is presenting the opportunity to heal the environment… along with the opportunity to exploit it further. For politicians, going green provides a convincing election platform. For business, it offers the chance to make hundreds of billions of dollars. Green energy is the future and those who get in there first will benefit greatly. But not only honest players are championing this new industry. And nowhere is this more evident than in the massive development of industrial wind power.
Big Wind is a surprising and compelling documentary about the unprecedented rush to develop industrial wind turbines and how this is transforming the landscape in Canada and the world. The film investigates why governments are spending billions on wind power without first conducting health and environmental studies,why corporations are grabbing up precious farmland to put up hundreds of thousands of enormous industrial wind turbines, why people living near the turbines are falling ill, losing their animals and their farms,and whether these new “green” wind turbines are actually helping our environmental aims.
The rush to go green is pitting corporations against residents,government against citizens, neighbour against neighbour. Through the process the people are being stripped of their due democratic process.
Big Wind is a story of unethical political systems, corporate greed, and ordinary citizens who have had enough and are standing up to big government and big business. They are part of a growing revolution in rural communities in Southern Ontario and around the globe– people fighting to defend their homes, their way of life and the environment against Big Wind. It is a battle that will profoundly impact the green movement, as well as the well being of citizens in Canada and citizens worldwide for years to come.
Niagara Region Wind Corporation has proposed construction of 77 3 mw IWT’s, from just south of Smithville, all the way to Lake Erie.
This project includes part of Haldimand County, Wainfleet & West Lincoln. This project has 3500 Receptors. A receptor is located 2 kms from the centre of a building to the base of a turbine. (this number is not the number of people living in within 2 kms of the turbines) 44 of the turbines and the transmission lines are scheduled for installation in West Lincoln, 3 in Wainfleet and 30 in Haldimand.
Growing evidence indicated that 20% of the residents living in homes within the 2 km impact zone of IWTs will suffer moderate to severe negative health impacts, for which some may have to abandon their homes. (This has already occurred in other areas across Ontario.) Everyone will suffer from loss of property value, as is already evidenced by the inability of residents to sell their property simply because of the possibility of turbines being placed in their neighbourhood.
We need to preserve the spirit and values of our community from typical social disintegration and injustices as witnessed in communities worldwide where IWTs have been pitting neighbours against neighbours, and family against family. Our Health, Safety, Property Values, & Environment are priceless and worth fighting for. for this reason MAWT Inc. seeks funding from our community.
MAWT Inc. promises to do everything in our power to protest this project and to protect our community from the installation and the negative effects of the installation of IWTs.
Funds are needed for:
A. Retention of legal counsel for the Appeal of the NRWC project
B. to prepare and submit an injunction against IWT approvals and/or construction
C. to cover legal costs to assemble expert witness and evidence for Appeal hearings.
Just the preparation and gathering of documents and the subsequent costs of preparing the copies and mailing the hundreds of pages of documentation can add thousands of dollars of unanticipated expenses to an appeal. There are many unknowns, such how many times we will need to appeal, or if the wind proponent will appeal a MOE decision made in our favour.
************************************
We there fore ask for your support by donating to Mothers Against Wind Turbines Inc to assist with the legal challenges on behalf of residents who are opposed to NRWCs wind project. If funds collected are in excess of the need to support legal proceedings and related costs, funds will be returned to donors based on % donor contributions.
follow link for a print off of Where to Send Donations. Feel Free to make copies and hand out to your Family and Friends. We Must fight as a Community!!
A high-profile Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms challenge over the Ontario government’s wind farm approval process has received some significant local support.
Lambton County council has authorized staff to apply for intervenor status on behalf of the county in the Charter challenge spearheaded by three Huron County farm families.
This Charter challenge, to be heard in divisional court in London, is believed to be the first of its kind to be argued at this high of a level in the justice system, county solicitor David Cribbs told council Wednesday.
County staff have up to $60,000 to apply on behalf of the county to become an intervenor, and if successful, raise local landowners’ concerns over the provincial approval process as part of the Charter challenge.
“I believe this money is going to be well-invested for Lambton County taxpayers,” Deputy Warden Bev MacDougall told fellow councillors Wednesday.
The Huron families claim their Charter rights are being violated because the government doesn’t study the potential health impacts of proposed wind projects before it issues renewable energy approvals for them.
If families choose to appeal the granting of a provincial approval, they also claim they face the difficult task of proving a project can cause serious harm to human health.
However, the Ontario government is currently holding off on approving offshore wind projects until studies are done studying the potential impacts on both human health and the environment, noted Santo Giorno, of We’re Against Industrial Turbines Plympton-Wyoming.
“We don’t begrudge the fish having protection, but we should too,” he told council.
Health studies for on-land wind farms are “only a reasonable request,” noted St. Clair Township Mayor Steve Arnold, adding “every other industry when they’re expanding have to go through proper health studies.”
Cribbs cautioned council he may not be able to argue the case for the county because he is set to be representing them at an appeal over the Suncor’s Cedar Point wind farm.
“The two happen at the same time and I can’t clone myself, so that’s a problem,” he told council.
Council approved the $60,000 budget – including $20,000 of county funds already earmarked for local anti-wind activists – in the event outside legal counsel will have to argue the case.
MacDougall said she has seen the empty homes and the overall impact of wind turbines through her own drives across Huron County.
“This [Charter challenge] is the tip of the fight.”
The Charter challenge is expected to be heard in London court Nov. 17 to 19. A preliminary hearing for the Suncor appeal is slated for the Camlachie Community Centre Oct. 6. The hearing is expected to begin Nov. 6.
Prime Minister Harper, Rural CANADIAN Residents call on your Government to do what the Ontario Provincial Government will not do. Protect its citizens!!
It’s painfully obvious to Rural Ontario that our Provincial Government/Liberals are not listening and have no intention of listening to the concerns of it’s Rural Population.
The anti-wind movement has been patient. The anti-wind movement has been resilient. The anit-wind movement has not and will not go away, it has in fact grown in size and is more determined than ever to be heard!!
It is time for the FEDERAL Government to listen up!!Prime Minister Harper advocates for individual freedoms and accountable government. The Anti-wind movement calls on Prime Minister Harper and His Government to stop and take a close look at what is happening in Ontario!!
We lost the Provincial Election to the Liberals but if the PC’s want to stay in power on a Federal Level then they need to stop replying to calls for help by CANADIAN Rural Citizens with ” pass the buck responses.”
This from Jane Wilson of WCO…
One of our members got a quick response from her MP in answer to her email on the policy points regarding wind power in Ontario, and the 2015 election. Her MP told her that the federal government is doing a health study, and that is that: any other contact should be through the province of Ontario.
But we people at Wind Concerns Ontario do not give up!
Here’s what she wrote back:
Thank you for getting to us so quickly, but I beg to differ with your opinion that this problem is only a provincial problem. The federal government is also responsible for problems being initiated into rural Canada.
Yes, you have set up a Health Study, but the results will be too late for Canada. This study will not come out until sometime this year, (and the year is almost over) and then it will have to be studied and examined, etc.
It will take years for any positive change from this study, and from the correspondence we have had with Dr. Michaud, it seems he started with the premise that there is no problem because the onus of proving irreparable and irreversible harm is impossible to prove so anyone with concerns has “turbine hysteria”.
The Green Energy Act is structured in such a way that our municipality or its people will have no right in the matter.
And then, your government, who we support, is helping the Liberal & NDP view by washing your hands of responsibility.The PC’s must stand up for the rights of rural Ontario especially.
If you do not stand up for us, you will lose your majority to the Trudeau machine that is barreling down the road to the election by doing everything in their power to make our prime minister and the party look bad.
I am enclosing a letter which WCO has crafted to explain this situation to you. Please read it and study it. If you have questions, Wind Concerns Ontario (WCO) would be pleased to help you understand the situation.
IT’S TIME THAT YOU GET INVOLVED.
Such spirit! Also, respectful, with details, and emphasizing the need for action.
It’s astounding to read these days how pleased with themselves liberals are that the Wynne Ont gov’t is remaining steadfast in their refusal to amend the Green Energy Act in any meaningful way. It’s as easy as water off a ducks back for these progressives to delight in calling opponents to Industrial Wind Turbines as NIMBY’s and having democracy essentially waived to accomplish the policy goals backed by the GEA.
I only have this to say;
I want all these cheering Liberals to consider this;
Take your worst nightmare of a conservative leader. An amalgam of the very worst of Harper. Harris, throw in a little Ralph Klein and some Tea Party Timmy Hudak. I can sense your blood pressure rising as I write this. Oh the horror.
In the Legislature, a new bill is to be introduced called the “Nuclear Waste Recovery Act”
The voices of those from around the world who have spoke up are finally starting to be heard over the noise of the Industrial Wind Turbines. It truly is sad that a precautionary approach was not taken before exposing so many to Turbines. When will it be up to the Government to PROVE to US that IWT’s do not have a “Direct Casual Link to Adverse Health Effects on People” before being allowed to put up more in populated areas? Will it take another 10 years of suffering?
[Noise from modern wind turbines is not known to cause Hearing Loss, but the wind turbines may have adverse health effects on humans and my become an important community noise concern]
10 year Guinea Pig!!
[ Start with some “sleep deprivation” then add “cardiac arrhythmias, stress, hypertension and headaches, give that a stir and you have “Vibroacoustic Disease” or VAD. Which is occuring in persons who have been exposed to high level infra and low-frequency noise. (ILFN) for periods of “10 YEARS”!!! or MORE!
It is believed to be a systemic pathology characterized by DIRECT TISSUE DAMAGE to a variety of BODILY ORGANS and may involve ABNORMAL “Proliferation of Extracellular Matrices”]
[The energy generated by large wind turbines can be especially disturbing to the “vestibular systems” of some people, as well as cause other troubling sensations in the head chest or other parts of the body.]
[ Most relevant research has been conducted in Europe by “wind turbine manufacturers who typically don’t share with public.]
[…reports of the distressing effects on people living near utility scale wind turbines in various parts of the world are becoming common.]
e Hearing Loss, but the wind turbines may have adverse health effects on humans and my become an important community noise concern]
Mothers Against Wind Turbines Inc. 