Report of the President to the AGM

Whitewater Ontario
Presidents Report to the Annual General Meeting
Best Western Hotel, Peter Borough, Ontario, November 3rd, 2007

This my first report to the membership as president of Whitewater Ontario. It seems, in retrospect that it was a busy year - I don't know where the time went.

Liability Insurance
The year started with an immediate requirement to provide membership information to Canoe Ontario for the purposes of renewing insurance coverage for our members. You may know that liability insurance premiums are based on membership numbers. The insurance itself indemnifies instruction sessions, exhibitions and races but not recreational outings. Recreational insurance may be available to WO members upon special application to Pearson Dunn insurance, broker for All Sports Insurance Package.
While recreational paddling members of WO have to mandatorily pay for insurance which they don't use I did try to have the insurance policy reviewed with no effect. The broker likes it as it is and we have precious other alternatives. We need this insurance for our races, we get $16,500 a year in grants from Canoe Ontario to support slalom racing, that is our primary mandate and that is what allows us to financially manage everything else we do - like it or not.
Recreational Paddlers
I remind the recreational paddling community that Whitewater Ontario, as a Non Governmental Organization provides a conduit to government on river preservation issues. Recreational Paddlers will benefit themselves and their sport by supporting Whitewater Ontario in a society where government tends to ignore the individual’s voice in favor of big business, big unions and big government. Having said that I recognize the volunteer contributions to many towards the Les Amis Kipawa Legal Challenge fund.

River Preservation Issues
I immediately started getting notifications from various sources advising that such and such a project is being foreseen on such and such river. I attempted to respond to these sorts of project notifications with a standard response:
1. That any environmental assessment should consider the historical use by recreational whitewater boaters
2. That reasonable accommodation and mitigation be incorporated into projects to allow navigation to continue unfettered
3. That a team of WO designated paddlers could be assembled at the project proponent's cost to determine the recreation merit of any river feature
4. That Whitewater Ontario wishes to be the stakeholder of record for all river projects in Ontario.
Especially the Ministry of Natural Resources was less than helpful in this regard. Their mandate appears to be the exploitation of resources to the exclusion of all other values besides power generation. Efforts must be ongoing, by registering WO as a contractor of record to gain access to the MNR's registry of designation sites, currently not publicly accessible.
The Judicial Review of the Kipawa River Laniel Dam refurbishment was heard in Federal Court on October 23 and 24 in the Supreme court building in Ottawa. It made me feel proud to be a Canadian. Robert Monti was able to distill in the judge an apprehension of government bureaucrats acting in the face of the CEAA and NWPA claiming that the invocation of section 6(4) of the NWPA flew in the face of public consultation.
I attended the Canadian Heritage River conference in Winnipeg at my own expense presenting a paper called: "Putting teeth in Environmental Assessment Screenings" in which I indicated that river preservationist needed to use the courts to ensure changes to the CEAA are made.
This year WO became registered as a member of the Ontario Environmental Network (OEN) which should help in our river advocacy initiatives. I was successful in getting the Water Caucus of the Canadian Environmental Network (RCEN) to use the recreational value of whitewater as an issue for their meetings and discussions.

Financial Issues
Our Government Grant has been cut. Where is the wisdom in that? Our membership numbers are down, our costs are up, not the least of which is the insurance. Our office expenses were about 90% of our Provincial Grant and now they exceed our grant.
Our office expenses include accounting, phone, postage, website, for which we also get office continuity and support for meetings and a central point of contact for our members inquiries.
So we will have to examine ways to restructure our office functions/hours in light of the funding cut backs – or develop other sources of funding. We will continue to meet via teleconference as much as feasible considering the cost of transportation, this is our most economical alternative.

Minden
There was no 25th anniversary party. We lacked horsepower to make it happen but there is no shame in having a good 27th We continue to hope Victor Ettel will take on the job of Property Manager. In the interim Gary and Cammy have held the fort. How lucky we are to have them in our fold. We have garbage problems: the municipality has increased standards at its landfill so that recycling is mandatory: this is complicated by the fact that locals dump there trash in our bins. So much for no trace camping.
Over the summer I appointed Jeff Strano as VP of Marketing Operations hoping that he might use his local contacts in Minden to shake up some support for the preserve.
In addition, I made arrangements with Sir Sanford Flemming Recreation and Tourism Students to conduct Management and marketing studies for Minden Wildwater Preserve. Their final reports form a great resource for us but as for implementation: we lack funds. For this I have applied for a $35,0000 grant from MEC and in the next year I will also apply to the Trillium Foundation.
Orillia Light and Power advised us that our annual rent for the shoreline property at the take out has been increased to $200 a year plus GST and coinsured name on our liability policy held by Guthrie.
I conducted a work weekend in Minden with Gary George. He and I made modifications to the buildings plumbing to solve the dish washing problem. There were nine volunteers on May 22 and I issued each of them a monthly camping pass for June in appreciation.
There were some discussions concerning the safety training taking place on the Gull. I informed the users, of our expectations and I am certain that the trainers are very clear and amenable to our requirements.
Discussions were held with the Trent Severn Waterway to try and secure more regular releases and cooperation. A special task force was formed and discussions were held last winter.
Finally, we were successful in getting a Human Resources Student Grant for the summer. The presence of the student helped keep the property in good order while ensuring camping fees were properly collected.

Instruction
The progress to form a joint program with Paddle Canada is ongoing. We were unable to start the program for the 2007 year due to previous agreements with ORCKA and Paddle Canada. Plans are underway to implement the new program for the 2008 instruction session. A proposal has been opened to form a Canoe Kayak Canada/Paddle Canada National program. Details in the VP-Instruction report

Club Development
Very little has happened on this front again owing to the lack of funds however there was considerable email traffic on boater board to try and stimulate interest in a new river preservation network. The importance of having a staff member working on this cannot be underestimated.
There was an effort to promote membership at the Toronto Outdoor Show. I am not convinced that this is working for us.
I made arrangements with the American Wildwater Affiliation. We are now a member. As a result all Whitewater Ontario members may receive a discounted individual membership.
I have operated my personal blog at www.whitewaterontario.blogspot.com offering commentary on current events for Whitewater Ontario and also Les Amis de la rivière Kipawa focusing on key river preservation issues.
Communicatons
Jim Tayler prepared the 2007 event book on a cost recovered basis.

Racing

We were successful in securing grant funding through the Provincial Quest for Gold program to hire a full time coach in Ottawa. This years racing program was expanded with new races and efforts to include open boat classes. At the high performance level Ontario athletes accounted for more than 50% of the boats winning places on the national Junior and Senior slalom teams. And Ontario won the Brian Greer Trophy as best province at the national championships.

Efforts to expand the racing program including club development in other parts of the province have been constrained by limited funding and in many regions, lack of local expertise or interest.

Other

Future ideas include Whitewater Ontario registering as a contractor for National Defense and providing support for soldiers who have been de limbed below the waste. Kayaking can provide them with satisfaction and personal accomplish at the level of the able bodied.


Acknowledgements

Thanks to Donna Boadway for her excellent administrative support and Steve Pomeroy for keeping me honest in all my dealings, and Carol Westwood for keeping me straight on task, Jim Tayler for keeping me optimistic, and Gary George for giving me something to say more often than he would have liked. This has been a real team effort. Let’s forge ahead and create a new day for Whitewater Ontario.