Timmins Local Citizens Committee

Minutes of February 23, 2011

February 23, 2011

LCC hours:  52 hours

Year to Date: 174

Total: 6013.4

Date:   February 23, 2011

Location: Ontario Government Complex, Fire Boardroom                                                             

Present: Robert Calhoun, Bill Russell, Barry Edwards, Ron Johnson, Kees Stryland, Rusty Fink, Jenny Millson, Marc Lapalme, Lino Morandin, Mark Joron, Kees Pols

Regrets: Scott Tam, James Naveau, Gail Krawchuk, Bob Bielek, Stefanie Thibeault, Allan Moyle

Absent:  George Sackenay, Rodney Wincikaby

MNR: Glen McFarlane, Derrick Romain, Nikki Wood

Guests: Bree Andrews, Forester, First Resources Management Group, Intern, Laurie Nuhn, First Resources Management Group

Call to Order:

Bill Russell called the meeting to order at 6:45 p.m.

Summary of Action Items for This Meeting:

Action Item 02-11-01: Glen will provide a copy of the Regional Director’s issue resolution letter regarding the issue between Perry lake cottagers/lodge owner and Temiskaming Forest Alliance.

Action Item 02-11-02: MNR will ask for a representative from FRMG to present a discussion on their silviculture program at the next LCC meeting scheduled for March 30, 2011.

Action Item 02-11-03: MNR will ask someone to come and discuss the issue of Renewal rates required for each forest, possibly for the next meeting in March.

Action Item 02-11-04: The LCC Meeting Schedule Discussion will be tabled at the next meeting in March.

Review and Approval of January 26, 2010 Minutes:

• Motion to accept- Marc Lapalme
• Seconded by- Kees Pols
• Carried

Review and Approval of tonight’s agenda:

§ Motion to accept- Kees Stryland

• Seconded by- Marc Lapalme
• Carried

Letters/Correspondence

• The Chairmen from all the District LCCs throughout the region met by teleconference to discuss the feasibility of having a regional forum meeting, venue to be held in Timmins. Louis Corbeil from MNR Hearst district led the discussion to organize the meeting. They discussed the need to network with each LCC and discussed the use of the internet websites/network and the possibility of using video conferencing as possible mediums. The next meeting with the LCC chairmen is scheduled for March 9, 2011.

District Manager Update- Glen McFarlane (for Randy Pickering)

Glen provided the Timmins LCC members with the following update:

• As follow up to the November meeting action item regarding issue resolution on the Temiskaming forest regarding forest operations in the vicinity of Perry Lake, the issue had been resolved between the cottage association, Perry Lake lodge and the Temiskaming Forest Alliance. Glen will provide a copy of the Regional Director’s proposed issue resolution letter to the Timmins LCC; the letter describes the mitigation efforts of harvest operations subject to the party(s) approval.

Action Item 02-11-01: Glen will provide a copy of the Regional Director’s issue resolution letter regarding the issue between Perry lake cottagers/lodge owner and Temiskaming Forest Alliance.

• The Timmins office is presently working with the forest industry on Annual Work Schedule follow-ups for re-submission to be approved by the District Manager by March 15^th, followed by public notice of inspection for 15 days. The Companies would then be able to resume forest operations for April 1^st pending these approval guidelines.

Tribute to Don Buck- All

• Nikki Wood provided a tribute to Don Buck, an MNR employee with 32 years of experience and worked in Timmins District since 1988; he passed away on February 17, 2011. He worked as an Area Technician in Timmins and had a very strong background in forest management. He will be sadly missed as a fellow worker, as a family man and as a friend. The LCC members provided a moment of silence in memory of Don.

Stick Nest Values Flights- Derrick Romain

Derrick provided the LCC members with a quick insight into wildlife values helicopter flights conducted by MNR staff to maintain, verify existing nests and search out new nests in an effort to provide protection of these values during forest operations.

• Nest flights are flown in the winter during conditions where the snow is captured in the nests but the rest of the tree is blown free of fresh snow.
• A few new nests were found and existing sites were verified during the flight.
• Derrick showed slides of different types of nests located during the flight such as a goshawk nest located in a poplar tree about ¾ of the way up the tree; osprey nests located in the tops of trees.
• He showed a heron colony of considerable size
• Of interest, a bear nest was located in a tree; bears feed on fresh deciduous branches in the spring and leave piles in the crotch of a tree.

The values are mapped and Area of Concern prescriptions (AOC) are provided to protect the nest site and minimize impact of the bird’s surrounding habitat required for nesting periods.

The Chairman thanked Derrick for his presentation.

Abitibi River Forest 2011-12 Annual Work Schedule- Bree Andrews

Bree provided the members with a summary of the Abitibi River Forest AWS for 2011-12 as per the following:

• The plan represents two years of operations for flexibility purposes and the ability to react to changing markets.
• Approximately 32,000 ha. are in the plan
• At post harvest stage, natural regeneration areas will be assessed and reported at the annual report stage.
• Approximately 7200 ha of area has been identified for planting as result of ground surveys and will be further netted down with ground surveys
• 2.3 million trees are scheduled for planting this spring; no aerial seeding is scheduled
• Approximately 7,000 ha. have been identified as requiring mechanical site preparation
• Approximately 5,000 ha. has been proposed for chemical site preparation; areas will be netted down following assessment and stratification. No mechanical or manual ground tending is scheduled. Slash pile burning is scheduled as per the FMP.
• Approximately 26,700 ha have been identified for aerial spray tending. Area will be further netted down pending aerial and ground surveys.
• The silviculture schedules outlined conform to FMP silviculture objectives which are to maintain Crown area available and ensure long term forest health.
• 595.4 kms. of branch roads have been proposed for construction
• The AWS also identifies tertiary road upgrade or maintenance as required on 1:20,000 maps.
• Fuel wood areas have been identified on maps and are open to the public for fuel wood extraction; you require a fuel wood overlapping agreement and a permit through the MNR to cut fuel wood. Unless the permit tee has written permission by the harvest licensee to harvest during active operations, there is no fuel wood harvesting to take place until after operations are complete. Fuel wood collection will be kept within 100 ft from access roads and waterways and only dead standing or wood on the ground is available.
• The Company has identified 10,000 ha. available for free to grow assessments
• A new compliance plan has been drafted following the updated guidelines for compliance
• The Compliance program plan will focus on forest management activities with attention on eliminating redundant processes.
• Compliance monitoring efforts will focus on values and values prescription ensuring they are followed correctly.
• A Fire Prevention Plan was prepared and provides detail and procedures that the stakeholders on the forest will follow for fire prevention and suppression. The plan has been updated with new contact names and addresses.

Q: Will the number of planted trees that you have outlined in the plan increase over the forest in the future.

A: The silviculture program will grow over time after the company has had a chance to assess the requirements in the FMP and identify back log areas.

Q: In looking at the numbers you provided us in regards to area requiring artificial regeneration, there are clearly not enough trees to cover the requirements. Do you not have enough money to plant the area?

A: The Company has a number of issues to deal with and catch up on in the silviculture program. We are currently assessing areas and will build on the program needs as required.

There was a round table discussion that took place about the Renewal Trust Fund and the concerns that have been generated in the past regarding the lack of funds in the renewal accounts to provide adequate renewal work on the areas that had been harvested. The LCC recalls this situation taking place on the RMF forest and on the Nighthawk forest. We need to have a discussion on the Renewal Trust Fund; how the fund relates to silviculture activities to ensure a balanced renewal effort takes place on the forest. We also need to have the silviculture gap identified on the ARF investigated and explained.

Action Item 02-11-02: MNR will ask for a representative from FRMG to present a discussion on their silviculture program at the next LCC meeting scheduled for March 28, 2011

Action Item 02-11-03: MNR will ask someone to come and discuss the Renewal Trust Fund concept required to administer balanced silviculture programs for each forest, possibly for the next meeting in March.

The Chairman thanked Bree for her presentation.

Romeo Malette Forest 2011-12 AWS- Lino Morandin

Lino presented the Romeo Malette Forest to the LCC members and provided the following information:

• Approximately 1500 ha. will be artificially planted with 1.8-2.0 million trees
• Approximately 44 ha. are scheduled for aerial seeding
• Approximately 1278 ha. are scheduled to be left for natural regeneration
• Approximately 900 ha. are scheduled for mechanical site preparation
• Approximately 500 ha. are scheduled for chemical site preparation
• The company is scheduled to complete 4000 ha of aerial regeneration surveys
• The Musgrove Main Road is scheduled for a further 4.4 kms of new construction and road straightening and widening from 1-29 KM.
• There is no road decommissioning or bridge replacements scheduled for this year.
• A 2000 mm culvert is scheduled to be replaced on the Kenogaming Road to replace an old bridge and one culvert to replace on the Winter Lake Road.
• The estimated harvest level for this year for spruce/pine/fir (SPF) is 230,000m3
• The estimated harvest level for this year for hardwood (HWD) is 146,000m3
• The licensees on the forest for this year are Tembec, Georgia Pacific and Millson.

Q: How much area around Bromley Lake is still left to harvest?

A: There is still about 3-4 years of harvest area that remain; Bromley Lake is situated in the Romeo Malette Forest and is adjacent to the Gordon Cosen forest. There are areas scheduled for harvest in the Bromley Lake area in both FMPs.

Q: Are there any plans to burn slash piles?

A: There are no slash pile burn plans; Slash piles will be made available for grinding operations as opportunities arise.

Q: What will happen to the Tembec mill facility in Timmins?

A: Presently, wood from the forest is still allocated to that facility.

Q: Why doesn’t Cochrane and Chapleau use wood closer to their facilities than harvest wood from the RMF?

A: The Chapleau situation is unique in the fact that the area that they harvest has too many mixed wood stands; in order to conduct harvest operations, all merchantable species must be utilized in the stands. In this case, the hardwood is not marketable because of excessive distance from mills.

Q: Why can’t the hardwood on the Martell forest be marketed?

A: There is closer hardwood available for the hardwood facilities.

Q: What is the status of the Nat River crossing near Horwood Lake?

A: Tembec will not return to that area until after 2019; there have been discussions with MNR on possible options for that location.

The Chairman thanked Lino for his presentation.

Abitibi River Forest 2012-22 FMP Update- Kees Stryland

Kees provided the LCC members with an update at the FMP Planning table on the following:

• A caribou mosaic has been made for the forest which identifies habitat
• A wolf study will take place; apparently three packs of wolves have been identified.
• Caribou have been collared for tracking purposes as part of the caribou conservation plan.
• A presentation on the Woodland Caribou Conservation Plan by Michael Glutch is scheduled to take place at the Cochrane Transfiguration church on March 8, 2011.
• The Planning team are preparing for stage 1 of the management planning exercise-Long Term Management Direction strategy for the forest.
• A Current Forest Conditions Report is near completion.

The Chairman thanked Kees for his update.

LCC Meeting Schedule Discussion- Bill Russell/all

Bill introduced the discussion to the table and provided the following background:

• The Timmins LCC traditionally met every second Wednesday of the month throughout the year and took the months of July and August off for the summer.
• This schedule provided the members with 10 meetings to attend per year.
• The second Wednesday of the month avoided crucial times of the year such as Christmas vacation and ended early enough in June to avoid summer vacations that are scheduled towards the end of that month.
• The meeting date was re-scheduled to the last Wednesday of each month to accommodate the District Manager’s schedule.
• Since the re-scheduling took place in January 2010, the committee now has a chance to reflect on the change in meeting dates as we have had a year to review the changes.
• In the last year from January 2010 to January 2011, the LCC members met 7 times. April was cancelled due to an early spring which left MNR with an early field project start up; no speakers available to present any topics at the meeting; the October meeting was also cancelled by MNR due to lack of speakers available to present topics to the members; the December meeting was cancelled because the date fell within the Christmas holiday season.
• The District Manager, with the schedule change, was still only available for a portion of the meetings throughout the year.

After a general discussion around the table regarding the merits of moving the LCC meetings to the last Wednesday of the month, there was a motion put forward to move the LCC meetings back to its original time of second Wednesday of the month, thereby alleviating some of the concerns.

            “Due to the concerns that were discussed regarding the LCC meeting date, I hereby motion to schedule the LCC meetings back to its original time of every second Wednesday of the month”

            Motion to accept- Barry Edwards

            Seconded by- Marc Lapalme

            All in favour- Some members want more discussion.

A few members embrace the last Wednesday of the month as it frees up their conflicting schedules; if it were to go back to the second Wednesday they will not be able to attend. This led to a discussion regarding the months like December and June that are tough to implement.  It would probably be no issue to change the meeting dates for those two months and will accommodate most everyone at the table if that was a chosen solution.

Because of Kerr/King procedures of meeting engagement per Timmins LCC Terms of Reference, a second motion cannot be tabled on this subject at the same meeting.

This subject will be discussed again at the next meeting.

Action Item 02-11-04: The LCC Meeting Schedule Discussion will be tabled at the next meeting in March.

Round Table Discussions

• Nice tribute to Don Buck
• Enjoyed the presentation on Values collection; would like to see more presentations by district staff about their work
• Congratulations to Millson on their new wood allocation
• Enjoyed the variety of topics tonight

The meeting adjourned at 9:06 pm

Next Meeting is scheduled for March 30, 2011 at the Fire Boardroom of the OGC.

Please contact Gail Krawchuk at gga@ntl.sympatico.ca if you cannot attend.

Minutes typed by:                                                       Minutes approved by:

……………………                                                      …………………………

Gail Krawchuk                                                            Bill Russell

LCC Secretary                                                            Chair