NEWS RELEASE—For Immediate Release—Thursday, May 27, 2009

Meditation Lake info kept from public

Freedom of Information Act requests still unanswered after 49 days, now no chance to inform public before government closes public consultations on Sunday.

The Wilderness Committee is again drawing attention to the fiasco that is the Meditation Lake development. For a year, the government has been in secret negotiations with Tim Horton Children's Foundation to build a massive youth camp at a remote-access lake in Whiteshell Park. Road building work in March tipped off the public to the secret development, and the Wilderness Committee has been asking for explanations on the project ever since.

Freedom of Information requests were filed on April 9, just days after the development was announced. The Wilderness Committee asked Premier Doer, Conservation Minister Struthers, and the Conservation department that public open houses be delayed until the information requests were answered, but to no avail. The public consultation window opened on April 30. On May 6, the government sent a letter saying they could not answer the information request in the required 30-day period, and extended the time period for another 30 days. Now, mere days before the public consultations on this project are closing on May 31, the information requests have not been answered.

Information of particular concern is who authorized a roadway to be bulldozed into an area of the park that has been managed as a remote-access destination for decades. Meditation Lake is also confirmed to have deadly toxins in it, but the water quality tests have not been made public. Finally, a Whiteshell Park management plan has been continually referred to by Conservation staff, but that document has not been made public.

"Outside of the obvious mismanagement by the Conservation department, with the contempt shown for the public by the development ahead of any public announcement and the refusal to release information in a timely manner, this whole discussion is really about our parks," said Eric Reder, Campaign Director for he Wilderness Committee. "The people of Manitoba value their parks, and value the undeveloped areas of parks. This project can't proceed at Meditation Lake. Meditation Lake and Horseshoe Lake are personally too valuable to give away to some private development."

"Further, people are offended to here the Conservation Minister there is nothing wrong with this development, and that this type of development without public announcement or consent is allowed. Someone needs to be held accountable for this fiasco, and I suggest looking to the elected official at the top of the department."

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