Province may allow campground despite developer breaking Clean Water Act

Despite a developer pleading guilty to altering an environmentally sensitive wetland without a permit in 2005, work may soon be allowed to start on a campground on the section of the wetland that was altered near Parlee Beach Provincial Park.

It's the result of a 12-year-old compromise that a government spokesperson told CBC News would not be acceptable now.

Local residents fear it may add to an already dire water contamination problem at nearby Parlee Beach, one of the province's best-known tourism sites.

In December 2003, nearby residents protested when former MLA Azor LeBlanc and his sons Gilles and Michel LeBlanc started filling in part of the wetland in Cap Brulé.

That prompted the environment department to charge them under the Clean Water Act and order them to stop the work and undo the damage by June 2004.

The LeBlancs did not finish the remediation by the deadline. Instead, negotiations between the LeBlancs' lawyer and then minister of environment Brenda Fowlie allowed them to leave part of the wetland filled in.

Sheila Lagace, a spokesperson with the Department of Environment, said in an email on Friday that a similar agreement would not be acceptable settlement today.

The shrinking of the wetland has opened the door to a potential new owner being able to build a 220-site trailer park, Shediac Camping Resort, partly on the land the LeBlancs filled in 12 years ago.

The project is now going through an environmental impact assessment by the province.

Gilles LeBlanc said he's selling the property to the new owner who is spearheading the campground proposal.

'Secret deal'

In November 2004, Fowlie wrote to the family's lawyer, Ronald LeBlanc, in response to a proposal on "compensation."

Landowner Gilles LeBlanc said the compensation was for them not being able to build on part of their land.

In her letter, Fowlie told the LeBlancs the wetland would be redefined to make it smaller.

The result is that 15 metres of the former 30-metre buffer zone can now be developed, opening the door for the construction of a 220-site trailer park.

In exchange, the LeBlancs handed a piece of adjacent wetland they owned to the department of natural resources.

Gilles LeBlanc eventually pleaded guilty in 2005 to violating the Clean Water Act. The charges against Azor and Michel LeBlanc were dropped.

Dr. Andre Touchburn, an emergency room doctor at The Moncton Hospital who has a cottage in the area, said he is worried what he calls a ''secret deal'' sets a dangerous precedent by allowing development on a protected wetland.

"We know there was a series of meetings between the developer and the minister of the environment, in which a progressive weakening of the enforcement order came about,'' said Touchburn.

''The order to restore the wetland has been watered down considerably over the years."

Touchburn said the proposed campground would still be possible without the redefinition of the wetland, but it would be considerably smaller. He estimated the 2004 Fowlie letter allows 70 to 80 of the 220 campsites.

Parlee concerns

Touchburn and other residents fear the proposed campground, and the damage that's already been done to the wetland, threatens to add even more fecal bacteria to Shediac Bay.

The beach water was rated "poor" — a designation that would normally close a beach under Canadian guidelines — for several days in August this year.

Touchburn notes water tested at the outflow of the wetland near the proposed site, at the east end of Parlee beach, revealed some of the highest levels of fecal bacteria.

He thinks that is no coincidence.

• Parlee's pollution problem: 'Politicians are getting in the way' 
• Water monitoring at Parlee Beach failed to meet Canadian guidelines

"Wetlands are important filters of surface water and act as cleansers of the waterways that surround them," said Touchburn.

"The wetland in question has been partially infilled, the natural flow has been destroyed, or altered, a lot of the vegetation and forest around the buffer zone and wetland has been clearcut, so it's logical to assume there's a lot more runoff from groundwater heading into that wetland, and it's safe to assume it may be contributing to high levels of bacteria."

In a report made public last month by the Shediac Bay Watershed Association on fecal bacteria tests at several sites in the bay, the Cap Brulé site just east of Parlee Beach had one of the two highest counts.

The other was at the opposite end of Parlee.

Summer 2017 opening

Azor LeBlanc, who was the Liberal MLA for Shediac-Cap Pelé from 1974 to 1991, died in 2011.

His two sons Gilles and Michel are the owners of the land now.

They are in the midst of selling the land to developer Pierre Vautour.

Gilles LeBlanc feels the family has been the victim in all this.

"It was my father's dream [to develop the property], he worked for it all his life and he will never be able to see it," said LeBanc.

"Now I just want to sell the land and get out of there."

Vautour has started advertising lots at Shediac Camping Resort for the summer of 2017, despite not having approval yet from the environmental impact assessment.

Last spring, the Beaubassin East rural community council approved the rezoning from environmentally protected and coastal residential to commercial, despite residents writing letters and attending the council meeting to oppose the change.

LeBlanc said the developer was issued a watercourse and wetland alteration permit at the end of the summer, but the development is still conditional on the provincial EIA.