Excess construction waste fill is continuously being imported and dumped into the existing Nelson Burlington quarry, though it is unclear what type and quality of fill this is. There are no indications in the report that all of the fill is being sampled and tested in order to ensure that it is not contaminated. The new Ontario Excess soils regulation only requires that a tiny amount of fill sample be tested, which is totally unrepresentative and inadequate, especially from ‘Brownfield’ sites. Nelson stated that they can NOT test every truckload of imported fill. This is an ongoing and highly worrisome issue for the local community as the fill has the potential to contaminate the water-table. Local wells draw on the Mount Nemo water-table daily, they are entirely dependent upon it (it is their only source of water), and the water must remain safe to drink, free from toxins that may leach from sporadically tested, potentially contaminated, fill. The distressing lack of stronger regulation and monitoring of this fill is not addressed in any of Nelson's application reports. Water quality must be a priority for governments in this application, because Mount Nemo’s groundwater aquifer is potentially at unacceptable risk.


According to Niagara Escarpment Commission regulations, the use of off-site material is restricted to minimal slope construction. Without thorough, consistent and accurate testing and recording of this imported fill, there is no factual way to confirm that the fill is safe to be forever in direct contact with the groundwater table. Without this confirmation there must be no moving forward with new pits, which will ultimately also accept possibly contaminated fill, and further compromise the drinking water for the many people who depend upon it remaining safe.