Science and Research Committee on Feb. 7th, 2023

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

You're 20 seconds over already, Mr. Cannings, unfortunately.

We're moving on to the five-minute round with MP Soroka.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll start off with Ms. Hull.

I think the work you're doing is quite interesting. I'm just curious, though, about the accuracy of your data. You speak about regional weather stations and those are much more scientific than what you're doing with the citizen scientists. I'm just curious. I'm not saying it does happen, but if you did have somebody trying to prove that the climate crisis was really hitting them hard so it was very dry and very hot, then what would you do with that type of information? Would you accept that or would you consider it invalid and just not use that person's information anymore?

[Juliet Hull]

That's actually a great question.

CoCoRaHS in general has a very robust QA/QC process. Every single report is put through that process to make sure it is accurate. We have had to close some stations because people were using it to push a narrative. We don't do that immediately. We try to discuss what they should be doing and how to report properly. We definitely do sometimes get people using it to push an agenda.

Most of the time when there are errors in reporting, they're either typos or people have forgotten to make a multi-day report and they put a week's worth of precipitation into a single day. That all does go through a rigorous QA/QC process.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you, for that, Ms. Hull.

That's one of my big questions. Citizen scientists are great. They help out a lot, but as you said, if they have their own agenda.... I'm glad there are safeguards put in place so the information is accurate in the end. That's what we actually need—accurate information. That's great work on that.

I'll go to Ms. Reinsborough.

I love the fact that you're looking at salt. I just cannot believe how much salt they use here in Ottawa. Is your data proving that it's having an impact? If so, are you having any success in trying to get the cities to use less salt or not?

[Laura Reinsborough]

This is now our fourth winter doing road salt testing in local creeks in urban areas of both Ottawa and Gatineau. What we are finding is that 80% of the tests we have done are showing that they are beyond the threshold limits of what an aquatic ecosystem can endure. The data will tell us where the most urgently affected areas are that have the highest concentration. They sometimes have close to ocean levels of salt.

That allows us to look at the land use around those creeks and to do education on awareness. In fact, last week was our road salt reduction week. We do awareness campaigns about lessening salt use but also some training. One intervention we did last year was to bring in some key operators who would be applying road salt for private companies and have them do “Smart About Salt” training, which was developed in Ontario. That's one intervention.

We know where those high urgency creeks are only by doing the regular testing.

You were just asking about the validity of the data, and there's an opportunity there. We can test for the conductivity in a creek. That's a proxy for understanding how high the chloride levels are. If we're seeing very high levels, then we will do a test for chloride directly. We'll take that same water sample to a lab and test it for chloride, not just for conductivity. That will allow us to compare and see that we can confirm the results.

Overall, yes, it is the municipalities that apply road salt, but it is individuals and it is businesses. We really need that broader education effort to ensure we all know what the appropriate use of salt is.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Actually, that's a very good point, but I just didn't know how you'd be determining municipal road salt versus public road salt. The reason I bring this up is that when summertime comes and people start applying fertilizers, a farmer would put on, maybe, 150 to 200 pounds an acre of nitrogen and so forth, where for someone in the city here it's probably around 1,000 to 1,500 pounds an acre, the same equivalence. They are just superseding the nutritional requirements of grass and don't even realize it. They think, that whole bag lasted me the whole summer and it only was $34, so big deal. Do they know how many thousands of pounds an acre they're actually applying?

That's where I think it is, that really, people don't realize in their own personal use how excessive they're becoming. That's why I was wondering. I didn't think you could determine between the two. Could you?

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

MP Soroka, you're over time. You are worth your weight in salt. I'm very appreciative of the question because I, too, have concerns about how much salt Ottawa is putting in our environment, but I digress.

The last five-minute round will go to MP Collins.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to our witnesses for appearing today.

My questions are going to centre around the pandemic and its impact on, maybe, your volunteer base. As a long-time city councillor and as a 20-year member of our conservation authority, as an example, I know that when the pandemic arrived so many people had no opportunity to travel at home or, really, abroad. Thus, so many people “refound” the outdoors, so to speak. Our campsites filled up immediately. There were so many people using our trails. In numbers, for our waterfront trails and our local parks, the usage was off the charts in terms of what we were accustomed to experiencing over the years. From a conservation perspective, it was a welcome change in terms of the numbers.

I know that if I switch gears, then, to the food bank I started and opened with my constituents, the volunteer numbers there fell during the pandemic. It was tough to get people to come out. There was a lot of hesitancy about being indoors, obviously, and close to people with all that went on in the first couple of years.

I've watched recently and I've read recently some reports that talk about volunteerism affecting the non-profit sector. Numbers are down in the range of between 55% and 65% in some areas, in terms of trying to encourage people to volunteer or donate their time to certain causes.

I'd like to understand, from all the witnesses here today, how the pandemic might have impacted your operation, with volunteers or otherwise, and what role the government might play to assist in maybe kick-starting and providing support with either infrastructure, outreach or other operational issues that you may still find to be a challenge.

Ms. Reinsborough, with that, I'll ask you to answer it first.

[Laura Reinsborough]

Thank you. Yes, it's a great question.

When the pandemic first started I was working with a food security organization at the time. The impacts on volunteerism were absolutely hard.

The type of volunteering that Ottawa Riverkeeper does with citizen scientists is quite different. Often an individual will gather data on their own in a single point and then mail or transfer the results back. In this actually, though we as an organization needed to pivot in how we supported volunteers—more virtual training, preparing packages, ensuring that contents were safe for all parties involved—we could still ensure that it was done safely.

There were some volunteers who decided not to continue and we paused on some programs, but most were able to continue. That access to blue spaces and the more qualitative impacts of being able to volunteer—a sense of belonging, a sense of purpose, being part of something bigger than yourself—all of this continued and was even more needed, I would say, during the pandemic.

Our volunteering has been able to continue. In fact, we've had very high demand. Last year we had over 225 people respond to a single request for volunteers. We're now trying to make sure that we have opportunities for all of them to be supported. It does take staff capacity. I would say that's where the long-term stable funding for the third sector, the community sector, can really make a difference.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thank you very much for that answer.

Mr. Lawrie, can I ask you the same question?

[David Lawrie]

Yes. We're similar in that a lot of our work can be done individually. We have had a lot training programs in the past to help train volunteers, but we had to shut that down for the last two and a half years. We're just getting started up again this year with some of our work. We were pretty much shut down for the last two or three years, except for a couple of volunteers who were willing to work on their own doing acoustic bat surveys and salamander monitoring. Other than that, we are just getting back up to speed now.

Similarly, having access to some kind of stable funding would help tremendously, because we have none for our operational work. We do a lot of project-based work, and that's all grant-based. That's money in the door and out the door. We don't have any operational funding to do long-term training or operational activities. It's all project-based.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. Chair, I think I'm out of time. I don't know whether Ms. Hull can provide some written correspondence as it relates to what her answer might be.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

Thanks so much for all the questions and answers today from our witnesses. We are done for that portion of the meeting.

We do have a quick matter to discuss and to approve. The clerk shared a draft budget in the amount of $17,950 for our study on citizen scientists. Is there a motion to adopt that budget?

(Motion agreed to)

Our next meeting is scheduled for Thursday, February 9. The chair will have the clerk publish the notice soon.

Colleagues, with that, is there agreement to adjourn that meeting?

Seeing that there is, we are adjourned until Thursday.