Delay in renewing Ontario water testing program leaves participants on edge

A volunteer-led program that helps monitor the health of hundreds of lakes across Ontario has been on hold because agreement with the province has not yet been renewed.

For 30 years the Federation of Ontario Cottagers' Associations has partnered with the provincial government to run the Lake Partner Program.

Last year, 629 volunteers with the program collected samples from 546 Ontario lakes at 917 different sites (some larger lakes have multiple sampling sites).

Those samples are then delivered to the Dorset Environmental Science Centre, which has a Ministry of the Environment lab to test the water samples for phosphorus, calcium chloride and water clarity.

The Federation of Ontario Cottagers' Associations says its most recent five-year agreement with the province ended in March 2025.

"The 2025 data is at risk unless an agreement with MECP [Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks] is confirmed now," the organization said in an update. 

Ontario Ministry of the Environment spokesperson Gary Wheeler told CBC News in an email that the province has not cancelled the program, however.

"We intend to work with our partners to implement renewed agreements for the 2025 season," Wheeler said.

Elizabeth Favot, an aquatic ecologist at Laurentian University and volunteer with the program on Lake Nipissing, said phosphorous levels, in particular, can tell researchers if a lake is at risk of issues like algae blooms.

She said many scientific papers have used data from the program for their findings.

"The volunteer hours going out to collect the samples is what makes this program so powerful and how we can monitor such a large number of sites," said Favot.

She said it would not be possible for government scientists to test the same number of lakes on an annual basis without the program.

The City of Greater Sudbury, for example, has been monitoring 68 lakes within the city limits thanks to the program.