Chatham-Kent Shoreline Areas Sustainable Community Plan

Drawing on recent extensive planning experience, the Municipality of Chatham-Kent will create a Shoreline Areas Sustainable Community Plan that will clearly define the balance between public access, private development, and preservation of natural areas in its lakeshore and shoreline communities. The plan will contribute to the overall environmental sustainability of the municipality’s lands bordering lakes Erie and St. Clair, its two major river systems (both navigational), and its more than 4000 rural and urban drains, creeks, and streams. A major goal will be to consolidate the recommendations from the many municipal plans already in place and the existing conservation authority and provincial and federal ministry plans and recommendations relevant to the catchment area. An action-oriented sustainability plan of this type, for a clearly identified catchment area, is unique, in that multiple plans and strategies are often not coordinated with respect to development and environmental protection. The plan will identify a vision for the shoreline lands within the study area which will assist in guiding decision-making concerning those lands. By focusing at the community level, where governments and citizens must work cooperatively to ensure environmental protection, the plan will encourage a long-range perspective that considers all the consequences of development within the subject areas. Chatham-Kent will make the plan available online so that processes, issues, opportunities, and solutions that may be transferable to other shoreline communities can be accessed by all interested municipalities.

(Project description from original funding application)