By Stephen C. Geneja, Chairman,
The Concerned
Citizens Group of Tyendinaga and Environs
Ecology is a big factor in our daily lives. The word is derived from the Greek word "oikos" meaning household or place to live. Ecology is simply about our homes and our neighbourhoods. Canadians today are a mixed bag we don't share a common culture, history, language, race or religion. What we do share is our commitment both to democracy and to our land. I believe that this study of nature is a civic and political duty. The picture we get from nature is most graphic and complete. Many industries today, including municipalities, appear to embrace intolerance, selfishness, pride, arrogance toward creation, and irresponsibility to the community and future generations.
One of the principal characteristics of stakeholders, Concerned Citizens Group, and the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte, is their willingness to use the courts as a tool to protect their God-given share in nature good water from protected aquifers.
Governments must address the crisis in North America of pollution as an environmental crime and those that are proven to be in the environmental violator category must be treated as criminals. The closing of certain beaches on Lake Ontario, Toronto, Presqu'ile Park, and the Sandbanks and environs is evidenced every summer and this is just the tip of the iceberg.
In French, nuisance means annoyance or harm. Blackstone expressed the Roman law maxim sic utere tuo ut alienum non laedas (use your own property but not to injure another), as the foundation of the Law of Nuisance in the late eighteenth century. Ancient British common law flatly forbade an owner from using his property in such a way. A defendant's use of his land that caused injuries to the community at large (air pollution, bad odours, health threats) was treated as a criminal offence known as public nuisance. The law was treated seriously indeed; in 1307, an English man was put to death for violating a clean air law prohibiting the burning of coal in furnaces.
Over the centuries, an entire body of public nuisance law accumulated as a compendium of behaviour forbidden by some legislatures and courts. Edward II signed the first known clean air act, a smoke pollution control law, as early as 1273. By 1525, London residents were successfully suing city officials to require private property owners to control their swine, whose stench they claimed caused a "dreadful terror".
Over the years, the laws have had to be made flexible in order to cope with changing threats to the social order. By 1960, North Americans found themselves with the highest standard of living of any people in history; concurrence of events exposed the planet's fragility and the waste of public resources. At that same period in time, North Americans were losing their health, many birds and fishes, and the purity of their waterways.
A Clean Water Act and other water protection laws would be a positive step in protecting public property and welfare, and improve our declining water quality by forcing dischargers to internalize the cost of pollution. However, the regulations by themselves will not accomplish any of these objectives. Only widespread compliance with the law will achieve these goals. While the environmental law gives government the authority to stop pollution, it cannot compel governments to exercise that authority.
This article was abridged from Environmental Science & Engineering magazine, which also contains many more articles not posted on our Web Site. See our home page on how to order your subscription. We regret we can only accept orders from Canada and the United States.