David Heurtel says he's made no decision on luxury housing plan for Saint-Bruno forest

Despite assurances from Environment Minister David Heurtel that no decision has been made, municipal leaders in Saint-Bruno are worried Heurtel may be poised to approve a controversial luxury housing development in a wooded area on the flank of Mont Saint-Bruno.

• Group fights to save Saint Bruno forest
• Saint-Bruno development faces opposition

The six-hectare forest, called Hirondelles Woods, was sold by the St-Bruno golf course to Liberal Senator Paul Massicotte and his development company, Sommet Prestige, in 2006.

The land is zoned residential, and Massicotte's plan to subdivide the forest  — about the size of nine football fields — to build 30 luxury homes was authorized in 2011 by the former administration of St-Bruno-de-Montarville, under Claude Benjamin.

'Rare and exceptional' old-growth forest

The current mayor of St-Bruno, Martin Murray, and his council are fiercely opposed to the plan. However, Sommet Prestige has all the permits it needs, except for one: approval from the Quebec Environment Ministry.

The ministry has classified the Hirondelles Woods as rare and exceptional.

The woods, made up of old-growth sugar maples, are also home to an endangered and protected plant: wild ginseng.

Only 50 viable wild ginseng populations remain in Quebec, and by the ministry's own analysis, wild ginseng can't survive in a residential development.

Bruno Bergeron, the urban planner who designed Massicotte's proposed housing project, said "it is absolutely not our intention to destroy or threaten" the wild ginseng.

So the developer worked with a ginseng specialist, to come up with a way to build on the site while preserving the species.

Plan to save wild ginseng

Sources have told Radio-Canada the Environment Ministry plans to approve the revised development plan under several conditions, including:

• That it preserve 60 per cent of the forest canopy.
• That it create buffer zones and fence off certain areas.
• That it transplant some of the wild ginseng elsewhere on Mont Saint-Bruno.

Bergeron would not confirm the conditions, citing confidentiality.

However, Andrée Nault, a researcher at Montreal Botanical Garden, said moving the ginseng would be a last resort — and a risky one.

"When we want to protect a plant, we protect not only the plant but also its habitat," Nault said.

'No decision,' says David Heurtel

For his part, the environment minister insists nothing has been decided yet. 

"The promoter submitted a modified project which we are currently evaluating," Heurtel said on Thursday afternoon.

"There's absolutely no decision that has been made on approval or non-approval of the project."

Saint-Bruno Councillor Marilou Alarie hopes that's true, saying she's in danger of losing faith in the Minister of Environment.

"I would think [he] should be called Minister of Development," she said.

Alarie helped launch the fight to protect the Hirondelles Woods a decade ago and was so determined to save the forest that she jumped into municipal politics in 2013.

If Massicotte's development is approved now, even with conditions, she said she'd be heartbroken.

"It would be the demonstration that here today in Quebec, the lobby of one real estate promoter – just one –  is stronger than eight million people who voted laws to protect their land and their biodiversity."