Restoration work at a sandpit in Mercier, on Montreal’s south shore, continues to upset the sector, while illegal activities are allegedly taking place despite an order.
• Read also: The municipality of Mercier orders the cessation of restoration work in a sand pit
The peace and tranquility among the residents of St Margaret’s Street has been disrupted for months.
The comings and goings of trucks, the noise, the dirt and dust caused by the six-day-a-week work, bother them.
The latest results of soil analyzes sent to the city by the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change Control, Wildlife and Parks also showed that “the standards of some standards were exceeded, especially for some metals and some polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.”
In addition to the notice of non-compliance, a termination order issued Wednesday by the Commission for the Protection of Agricultural Lands (CPTAQ) could not be honored.
A Mercier native interviewed by TVA Nouvelles details how the activities disrupt her daily life.
“It’s continuous, it doesn’t stop. It starts at 6 in the morning. We, with our room in front of us, forget that when we sleep in it,” says Sonia Charbonneau.
The work, which aims to fill a sand pit to return the land to agriculture, raises great concern within the municipal administration.
“At that time, we started submitting complaints to the Ministry of Environment and the Agricultural Lands Protection Authority. Our inspectors are gone. A stop-work order was issued. Our inspectors are prohibited from entering the site to conduct inspections. “It is not livable,” says Mercier Mayor Lise Michaud.
The latter refers to a shareholder of one of the companies operating on the site, Stephane Laberge, who sent an official notice to the city.
The manager defends himself
The director returns the matter to the governorate level to intervene in the matter.
Ms. Laberge’s lawyer, Mr. Roger Paiment, was reached by phone on Saturday and told TVA Nouvelles that he would appeal the CPTAQ order, which is an administrative order only. He claims that the commission has no jurisdiction over the site’s restoration activities, which arise from rights acquired over the 10.1 hectares targeted by the work.
Me Paiement also confirms that the soil received on site complies with the requirements of the regulations regarding quarries and sand pits.
*Watch the report in the video above*
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