ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ACT VIOLATIONS

August 28, 2025

Environment, Conservation and Parks

Table of Contents

1. Content

Convicted – The Corporation of the City of Timmins

Court Location – Timmins

Description of Offences –

• The convictions are for:
• using, operating, altering, extending or replacing a sewage works without ministry approval
• failing to meet sampling requirements
• failing to ensure that a chlorination system was properly operated and maintained
• failing to retain all records and information related to monitoring activities, namely alarm records, for a minimum of five years from the date of their creation

Date of Offences – Various dates between June 1, 2018, and December 20, 2023

Date of Convictions – March 13, 2025

Penalties Imposed –

• The Corporation of the City of Timmins was convicted of one violation under the Ontario Water Resources Act (OWRA) and five violations under the Environmental Protection Act (EPA), fined $45,000 plus a victim fine surcharge of $11,250, and given one year to pay.

Background –

• The Corporation of the City of Timmins owns and operates the Mattagami Water Pollution Control Plant, a municipal sewage treatment plant located in Timmins, District of Cochrane.

• The plant serves a population of approximately 32,000 in the communities of Timmins, Mountjoy and Schumacher. The plant’s effluent is discharged into the Mattagami River.

• In July 2023, the ministry conducted an inspection of the plant and identified several non-compliance issues.

• The plant operates under an amended Environmental Compliance Approval (ECA). The ECA requires the plant to be operated with a phosphorus removal system, which includes three metering pumps. However, during the inspection, it was noted that the phosphorus removal system was not in use and that the three metering pumps for the system had been removed.
   
• Subsequent correspondence from the city confirmed that these metering pumps were removed in June 2018. All three metering pumps were replaced by December 20, 2023.

• During a review of records during the ministry’s inspection, it was determined that a bypass event occurred between May 1-2, 2023. Grab samples were collected on May 1, 2023, but not on May 2, 2023, as required by the ECA. The city had been previously warned by the ministry for failing to take grab samples in connection with bypass events.

• During the inspection, it was determined that an overflow event occurred between November 10-12, 2022. Only one grab sample was collected at the beginning of this overflow event, and samples were not collected every 8 hours for the duration of the event as required by the ECA.

• During the inspection, it was determined that a loss of chlorination occurred overnight on September 10, 2022, resulting in the final effluent discharging for 8 hours without proper disinfection. No samples were taken as required by the ECA.

• During the loss of disinfection event overnight on September 10, 2022, the disinfection system was not alarmed therefore the on-call operator on duty overnight was unaware of the event. Loss of disinfection was only identified when operators started the next day shift.

• As part of the inspection, the ministry requested all alarm records for the period from January 1 to March 17, 2022. The city responded to this request indicating that the system only retained records for 365 days. This is contrary to the terms of the ECA, which requires the city to retain monitoring records for a minimum of five years.

• The ministry’s Environmental Investigations and Enforcement Branch investigated and laid charges which resulted in the convictions.