Friday, August 8, 2025

Letters

Reader Suggests Meaford Military Base be Repurposed

Dear Editor, It has been just over a year since I wrote you a letter suggesting that the Meaford training base be repurposed into a drone training centre. A lot has changed since that time. The war in Ukraine and Gaza continues and has evolved into drone warfare, Donald Trump is looking for stronger border security, and our sovereignty in...

Concern About TCE Testing on Georgian Bay

To the Editor, A massive drilling rig has appeared off the shores of Meaford, and many residents are asking: What exactly is being tested beneath Georgian Bay? TC Energy says the drilling is part of “geotechnical investigations” for its proposed $7 billion Pumped Storage Project. But this vague explanation doesn’t address the real concern: the geological sensitivity of the site. The...

Reader: How Do We In Meaford Look At Sustainability

Editor, I frequently look over the view of South Georgian Bay from atop Grey Rd. 7 and I think: How do we in Meaford look at sustainability? Should it involve TCE and their PS project? The Niagara Escarpment has a solid history of being a protected geologic anomaly simply because by its very nature it was too difficult to develop. However, times...

Landlord and Tenant Board Overburdened

To the Editor, As a property manager in Grey-Bruce County, I’m sounding the alarm on an urgent and worsening crisis. Government programs like the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP), meant to help vulnerable people, are being grossly abused — and landlords and working taxpayers are paying the price. ODSP is funded by taxpayers — the hard-working class of this province —...

Reader: Why Is Ontario Giving Millions to a $67 Billion Company?

Editor, Why is Doug Ford’s Ontario government gifting $285 million of taxpayers’ money to TC Energy—a publicly traded company worth more than $67 billion—for pre-development work on a proposed pumped storage project in Meaford, Ontario? This enormous sum could be used to build hundreds of much-needed homes in the Grey-Bruce area. Instead, it’s being handed over to help a corporation with...

Reader Shares Thoughts on Batteries, Toxic Metals & Unexploded Munitions

Dear Editor, For someone who is always so critical of others' research work, Mr. Mike McTaggart’s letters never fail to amuse. Using Mr. McTaggart’s own research methodology, I proved that car accidents in Ontario were practically non-existent between 2015 and 2025. How? I only counted the ones that involved Teslas. How could someone hoping to convince Meaford that Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS)...

Popular this week

Reader Offers Thoughts on New Developments

Editor, The letter of July 17, 2025, in the Meaford Independent newspaper by Jim Molineux hit the nail on the head! After reviewing the Heritage Advisory Committee meetings held earlier it seems there is need for further clarification from the developer on the current site plan for this proposal - especially as discussion of this showed many details were not...

Reader Offers Thoughts on Recent Pumped Storage Letters

Dear Editor, In response to Roberta Docherty’s July 10 Letter to the Editor, I will try to eliminate Roberta’s confusion. Tesla Fire is an online site that tracks all Tesla fires from worldwide newspaper articles, including cars and Tesla Megapacks. Megapacks are used for electrical grid scale energy storage. Out of 232 Tesla fires documented since 2013, there were only 3...

Reader: How Soon We Forget

Editor, Is there no one around to remember Hurricane Hazel anymore? Here we are, about seventy years later, planning to build an entire apartment block on a flood plain. Although Meaford was not the hardest hit by Hazel, it was bad enough and there have been other events since with the potential to present a significant threat to life and...

Reader Shares Thoughts on Proposed Condo Development

Editor, The floodplain condominium development to be constructed directly behind the Meaford Library and alongside the Bighead River has been a hot topic in your newspaper. A recent letter to The Independent indicated that the original proposal was for a massive structure that would be almost 3 times larger than any other building in Meaford. It now appears that one...

Change in Nursing Home Attitude

Dear Editor, I used to be so set against nursing homes because what I saw was dreadful. However, the ministry seems to be more efficient and the homes are now better run. The "park em in the hall" mentality is gone and there is caring in the caring. Please let people know to check before you judge. Things have changed. Thank...

Batteries vs Pumped Storage

Dear Editor, After reading last week's paper I am really confused. Both letters to the editor espoused the value of batteries over pump storage, but they were incomplete: If batteries in cars blow up, why would a bigger battery not do so? Getting Lithium out of the ground is environmentally bad too. In fact I can think of every complaint used against...

Healthcare & Bridges

Dear Editor, I was just reading your excellent editorial about opening the bridges. They were closed because of people who did not understand their importance and reopened because it was the right thing to do. It occurs to me that you can say the same things about public health care. Politicians want to sell it out to American style private companies,...

The Elephant in the District

Editor, You can ask just about anybody who lives in Meaford what it is they appreciate most about it and the things everybody will agree on is the heritage character of Sykes Street, the adjacent streets, the Bighead Riverscape, and the Georgian Bay shoreline and harbour area. This was so important that the Council in 2014 passed a Heritage Conservation...

Reader Compares Pumped Storage to Battery Storage

Editor, If you want to get real comparative data about Grid storage options, do this web search. “Grid Storage Comparisons”. There is a lot of information available from well researched, reputable sources. Or, you could just read TMI letters from local "experts" with their “opinions”. The following is based on my research from many sources. Batteries. ( Li-Ion) Life expectancy/warranty 10-15 years Efficiency:...

Reader: When Tenacity is Unbecoming

Editor, I write in response to a letter you published on June 5, from Mr. Mikkelsen of TC Energy. He has been using your 'Opinion' section for the past 6 years to promote the virtues of TC Energy’s proposed Pumped Storage Project (PSP) to be built atop the Niagara Escarpment in Meaford. During this 6 year period, no “much needed” storage...