Harrietsfield homeowners win contaminated water victory

Harrietsfield homeowners struggling for more than a decade to deal with contaminated water have won a victory. The former operators of a recycling site last week lost their Supreme Court appeal of a provincial order directing them to test residential wells monthly for contamination. The operators, including the now-closed RDM Recycling, were ordered by the court to follow the ministerial orders implemented by the province’s minister of environment after claims surfaced that they had contaminated residential wells in the area. Lawyer Kaitlyn Mitchell and a co-worker with Ecojustice represented community members Marlene Brown, Melissa King and Angela Zwicker, who were interveners in the case. “The interveners argued that the ministerial orders should be upheld. The orders require those responsible for the contamination to undertake monitoring, studies and planning for remediation of the site,” wrote Mitchell in an email to the Chronicle Herald this week. The first appeal was dismissed in November, as appellants Roy Brown and Michael Lawrence, now deceased, tried to have the orders dismissed. They were upheld by Justice Denise Boudreau. “The inclusion of the appellants in this order is a possible, acceptable outcome, given the definitions provided in the Act. As such, I uphold…

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