WEBVTT

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[Music]

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Q: Tell me about

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how everything started? A: Everything to do

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with the mega quarry was rather

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fascinating.

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So this tremendous stretch of land,

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just an hour and a bit north of the city,

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is home to about

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15-16,000 acres of soil that can really

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grow

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every kind of crop humans want to grow

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and eat.

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So it's really special in many ways and

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in 2006 and 2007 a US hedge fund

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bought a lot of land and

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the short and the long of the story is

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that they wanted to build Ontario's,

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Canada's second largest open pit mine

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under that soil

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and people took objection to that.

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Q: Okay so what did, what did your community

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do?

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A: Well like every other community was

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faced with really life-altering

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proposals of any kind,

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we got together elected the board they

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did the research.

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We learned more about the land and the

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limestone underneath it. We learned that

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it's home to

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water that feeds you know a million

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people south of us

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and in the end,

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got the discussion started that society

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has to make a choice.

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And the choice being, do you want to

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preserve your options of growing your

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own food or will you just let a hedge

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fund

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raid those sort of perpetual resources?

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And in the end

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the drive was to stop the application

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and

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part two of that two pronged approach

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was to change policies so that these

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crazy strictly vulture type

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applications just can't happen again. Q: So

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tell me about end act

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and what you guys did specifically to

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stop the mega quarry?

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A: Well first thing is, we knew that the

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mega quarry might get grandfathered

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under any policy change

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but the point is there needed to be a

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better decision-making process on how to

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approve those kind of things.

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Most of the policy you live with today

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you know was written 30, 40, 50 years ago

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and was never designed to handle a hedge

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fund proposal from out of the country.

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And part two of that was to preserve the

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land.

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So to get part one done, public awareness

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was just a huge thing.

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We're so grateful to student bodies at a

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number of universities in in this

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province. From Waterloo to

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Osgoode Law School,  Ryerson, OCAD, who put

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just tremendous talent into research and

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helping to build the awareness

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on how important this really all was, how

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important of a discussion it was, and in

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the end

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you know they take the credit and they

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should take the credit for defeating

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this crazy thing.

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Big thanks goes to David Suzuki

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Foundation. Big thanks goes to the

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Canadian Chefs Congress.

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They all helped with food stock. If you

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know, Google it and see it and how a

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community of

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two and a half thousand people had 28

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000 people for dinner.

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Was just a once in Canadian history

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deal and we're very proud to have hosted

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it, participated in it,

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and the year after it was soup stock

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here in the beaches put on by the

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Canadian Chefs Congress and the David

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Suzuki Foundation and

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you know drew 40 000 people unbelievable.

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Q: So now,

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when the highlands company withdrew

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their application,

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what happened then? A: Well generally when

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groups get going and they

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win they quit, and a big part for act was

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right from the very get-go

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to say unless policy has changed we

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haven't really

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done a lot because two years down the

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road someone else can pick up the ball

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and do the whole thing again.

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So policy change was a big deal and we

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had a great little celebration in

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Honeywood in the February after the

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Highlands Company withdrew their

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application

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and launched the food and water first

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campaign which is supported by thousands

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and thousands of people.

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Part of the reason that I'm going to ask

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you when we're done here is, to log on to

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food and water first dot com

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and take the pledge. Numbers at Queen's

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Park matter

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absolutely in any decision-making

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process and the more pledges we can

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collect to push

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farmland preservation issues forward is

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is a great thing.

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Timing is opportune right now because

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the greenbelt is under review, the

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Niagara scorpion plan is under

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review, and we have learned so much in

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this whole process that

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the numbers now back up what a lot of

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people have been saying.

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We don't need to push more urban sprawl.

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The province already has a fairly

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celebrated growth plan.

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There is some 800 000 available lots

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within

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the greater golden horseshoe area to

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be developed, so let's develop that first

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or a good percentage of it and then

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drive on and see where

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society is 25 or 30 years from now.  Q: Thank

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you very much.

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carl