►►►►►►       WHY THIS SITE?    ◄◄◄◄◄◄

Normally, Citizens go about their business, pay their taxes, and trust in their elected officials, and municipal staff, to work on their behalf: to build and maintain infrastructure, and services.

The peoples’ representatives take oaths of office to work for the public interest, with integrity, honour and a sense of service, befitting the high responsibilities of office that they hold.

Somewhere between City Hall, and the Community of “Munster” ….all that seems to have been lost.

In the early 1990s, residents had a growing sense of urgency, to get rid of the failing sewage lagoon system, which had long out-lived its “temporary” status, and had become a disgraceful example of mismanagement, an embarrassment to home owners, an impediment to re-sales, and a menace to the environment.

After several band-aid efforts, (in excess of $2.5 million), at “long term upgrading”, mixed with system failures, lagoon over-toppings, and a steady stream of staff blunders, and cries for removal of the lagoons, the Regional Municipality started a study, to look for a “permanent solution”. Amidst evidence of tremendous regional staff influence and pressure, what the first study (in 1996) recommended was every resident’s nightmare: bigger lagoons and bigger spray-fields ---in other words: more of the same, only worse.

Meanwhile, Ontario’s Planning Guidelines have stated that lagoons are no longer suitable for an urban setting, (such as Munster).

Area residents presented documentation which finally lead to the Region's obvious conclusion that the proposed expansion was technically doomed to fail, and that something better had to be found. Since on-site treatment technologies had significantly improved in the intervening years, a few proponents of these technologies came forward to the Region, stating that they had not been adequately assessed, and asked for a re-assessment of their advanced systems. Regional Council agreed, and on March 11, 1998, voted to have that occur. (To see Motion: CLICK HERE.)

In the previous, Half-Million-Dollar, consultant's assessment (in 1996), the pipeline option had been thoroughly looked at, and was dismissed as being unsuitable, and too expensive), so the new study (in 1998) was to evaluate only the newer “alternative technologies that had not yet been adequately studied or evaluated”,  that could produce higher quality water (than the output from the lagoons), that could be "discharged to 1.) Land Application, 2.) Subsurface disposal to groundwater (i.e., tile bed or equal), or 3.), Watercourse discharge (i.e., Jock River)".

A Request for Proposals (RFP), for on-site treatment technologies, was advertised in the Public and Trade Press. (View Advertisement)

Residents' hopes for a proper solution ---in a timely fashion--- were quickly dashed, due, apparently, to the extreme pressure and interference from the Region’s engineering staff, aided and abetted by manipulation from the Region's Chair, Bob Chiarelli (later Mayor of Ottawa) and Goulbourn's Mayor Janet Stavinga (later Councillor). (Numerous examples are on file.) As a result, non-eligible pipeline bids were solicited from favoured parties, and a two week extension was arranged to accommodate these selected contractors (CLICK HERE). The evaluation process, which followed right from bid-opening, was a farce. The non-eligible pipeline bids were accepted and assessed, together with the legitimate bids that were in response to the RFP call ... even though the RFP requirements (see above, or CLICK HERE), did not allow for the inclusion of any pipeline bids in this tendering process.

After many other ‘irregular occurrences’, (which have since become the subject of the pending litigation), the Region's final “preferred option" ---five times more costly--- was proclaimed to be a pipeline, (which, incidentally, included the backward step, of having continuously operating lagoons ...the very thing Munster residents wanted to avoid, with the newer technology).

One citizen who volunteered to serve on the Public Liaison Committee (PLC), accidentally got a little too close to the truth at a ROPEC meeting (August 5, 1998), and blew the whistle with his new evidence confirming suspicions of an apparent “pipeline fix”. He was served with a $4.2 million SLAPP Action Lawsuit, in a heavy-handed attempt to suppress the evidence.

A group of citizens then took the City to the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB), to challenge the veracity of the 1998 evaluation ...and won. The OMB Decision found that there were “…a number of specific instances where the data used by the evaluation team in assigning utility values were either incomplete or simply missing.” The OMB concluded that “the facts presented as part of the evaluation methodology are not perfected enough to make a judgement based upon them”, and ordered that an independent re-evaluation be obtained from an engineering-consultant to finally select the correct wastewater treatment system for Munster.

In an attempt to thwart this, the City challenged the OMB decision in Superior Court, asking for Leave to Appeal the Decision, and again, the City lost the Court Decision on the grounds that it did not have a case. (The Appellant was awarded costs for both the OMB Hearing legal expenses and the Superior Court legal expenses. The resulting overall costs to the taxpayers for such reckless resistance to serve the public interest and due process of the law, must be quite considerable at this point.)

Having exhausted all other avenues in its efforts to defeat the OMB Order, and failing at each, the City finally selected engineering-consultant, R.V. Anderson, to conduct the review. However, the City manipulated the OMB work order, and severely restricted the scope of the R.V. Anderson study plan, such that it left out evaluation (and disclosure) of many of the health risks and negative environmental impacts that would result from a pressurized sewage forcemain from Munster to Richmond ---through Richmond's shallow aquifer, and directly past approximately 140 shallow private wells. (View Richmond Village Association Document - pdf-file)

The City also disregarded the Ontario Municipal Board’s order not to conduct any further pipeline-related work while the OMB-ordered work was pending, and until the final option selection was known, (such as the City had done with the $1,120,000 Pipeline Oversight contract, it awarded to Doran/Taggart Construction, while the OMB Hearing was pending). While R.V. Anderson was conducting its research (through most of 2002), the City was quickly proceeding with more than $2,000,000 in additional pipeline-related projects in Richmond (under different guises) --- all subsequent to the OMB Hearing, and prior to the R.V. Anderson Report. The remaining costs associated with the pipeline option, if it were to go ahead, would still add up to $15,000,000 more, versus, less than $4,000,000 for the total cost of mechanical treatment option. Thus, from an economic viewpoint, alone, the numbers show that the pipeline would still be a much poorer investment ...in spite of the money already spent on it.

On December 16^th, 2003, R.V. Anderson released its Independent Report confirming that the pipeline option was the worst of the wastewater-treatment options ---a finding which supported the four OMB Appellants' positions from the very beginning. This is now the fourth study that has been conducted (by The Region of Ottawa-Carleton, Goulbourn Township, and the City of Ottawa), and THREE out of the FOUR engineering firms, hired by the municipality, have stated that the pipeline is an inferior option, in this case.  The only** study out of the four, to "advocate" the pipeline (i.e.: the evaluation conducted by Conistoga-Rovers & Associates) …was found to be deficient, (or "imperfect"), by the OMB Decision, a conclusion that was further backed by the Superior Court of Ontario, and now, by this fourth evaluation completed by R.V. Anderson.

**[Consider that, in February of 1998, the ostensible purpose for hiring Conestoga-Rovers & Associates (CRA), to complete its costly ($400,000-plus) second study, was to provide (once-and-for-all), a fair, open, transparent, and accurate assessment of the wastewater treatment systems of the interested proponents of advanced treatment technologies, (along with conducting a 'treatment technology-specific' Request for Proposals, leading to the installation of a high-performance wastewater treatment plant at Munster). That lofty purpose was quickly "sabotaged" by a hidden agenda for a Pipeline Fix. Even without the benefit of reviewing evidence relevant to the pending litigation issues, it was the conclusion of both the Ontario Municipal Board, and the Superior Court of Ontario, that a proper evaluation of the two subject communal treatment  technologies, still had not been fulfilled by CRA's evaluation process. And R.V. Anderson's limited (by City) review process also confirmed this by pointing to the existence of previously ignored evidence against the pipeline.]

As of August, 2003, the City is still trying to avoid the recommendations of these three costly engineering reviews recommendations against the pipeline, and the decisions of two legal bodies, (ie: the OMB and the Superior Court of Ontario). The City is in contempt of the OMB Order, on several points. How much longer does the City expect to be able to abandon due process: including its legal, fiduciary, and health/safety responsibilities to its ratepayers?  As the City pushes forward with its illegal "pipeline fix", we see ever-greater requirement for a full-scale, independent forensic audit ---perhaps leading to more beyond that.

All of the City's back room maneuvering and interference, along with misrepresentations by City officials in the local press, so far, merely continues to reinforce ---as a reminder to us all--- what little respect some City Staff, and our Mayor and Ward Councillor hold for these two judiciaries, as well as for the public interest.

That is where we are …and that is why this Website.

Sincerely Yours,
for accountable government,

Concerned Citizens of Ottawa
March 15, 2003.  (Up-dated: August 11,2003)

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