By Tracey Arial
www.thesuburban.com
Laval’s new city council will announce changes to the flood plain rules at their July 14 meeting. Residents living in Laval West hope that their needs will be taken into consideration this time.
“What we know from the city councillors is that they don’t know what the rules are going to be because the legal department is preparing them,” said a Laval West resident who doesn’t want his name in the paper. “They checked what happened in other cities and they’re trying to apply those rules.”
There’s a good chance that the new rules will allow swimming pools, fences and backyard sheds to be built, but it still won’t allow home extensions, garages or new buildings on lots in the area. So says a website set up by Comité des citoyennes de Laval ouest.
That’s not good enough says our anonymous source. He thinks that Laval should refuse to apply the 2005 ministry of environment study just as former mayor Gilles Vaillancourt did from 2005 until he left office.
“The Parti québécois were in then and they created the problem and they didn’t even think of what that would do to people,” said the resident, who is among 3,000 home owners affected by new flood plain zone rules. About a third of the lots now fall within a 20-year flood zone, while the others are in a 100-year flood zone.
“There’s a dam built at the head of the Mille Îles River in 1976, and that dam does its job well,” he said. “The 2005 study doesn’t take the dam into consideration. That’s why reality is so different from their study. We never get water here. The last water we had was 1998 and a few streets had water on it. We’ve never claimed any money for water damage since 1976.”
The city of Laval has done their own study, but so far residents haven’t got a copy, which is something they’d like.
“Laval is different from every other place and they are not using their right to have a particular case respected. We want them to make an exception to this rule for our neighbourhood.”
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