This is our home watershed, so we can speak to it directly. Conservation Sudbury, formerly the Nickel District Conservation Authority, works in the Vermilion, Wanapitei and Whitefish River watersheds, and the City of Greater Sudbury describes its board this way: Conservation Sudbury is governed by a General Board consisting of seven members appointed by City Council. Of these, at least five must be elected members of Council while the remaining two seats may be held by appointed citizens.
Seven seats. Under the proposed formula, Greater Sudbury appoints four members to a 22-member Northeastern Ontario Regional Conservation Authority, alongside Sault Ste. Marie and North Bay with three each, Timmins with two, and ten smaller municipalities with one each.
Two of those seven seats may be filled by people who do not sit on council. On a board of that size, that is where knowledge of fisheries, hydrology, flood hazard or drinking water source protection can sit. When seven seats become four, and councillors are competing for the same four, those are the seats that go. Nothing in the law protects them.