Watershed Plan

The County is developing a new Watershed Plan for Peterborough County.

• The Watershed Plan is a priority action item in the County's 2023-2026 Strategic Plan due to growth pressures in various areas across the County.
• A watershed plan is a tool that helps municipalities and other interested parties (a) understand the current condition of water and land resources in the study area and (b) plan for the future health of the watershed.

This Watershed Plan will (at a high level and using available resources):

• assess the extent and condition of forests, wetlands, streams and groundwater in the study area
• consider anticipated environmental stressors and land use changes (such as climate change and urbanization), and
• identify high-level strategies and tools to help maintain, and in some cases improve, environmental conditions in the watershed in the face of these stressors and land use.

The intent of this Watershed Plan is to:

• address the requirements of the Provincial Planning Statement related to watershed planning
• provide a basis and framework for more detailed priority-based subwatershed studies in the future, and
• inform sustainable growth, infrastructure planning, and restoration efforts on a County-wide scale.

Montrose Environmental Group (Montrose) is leading a multi-disciplinary team who is working closely with the County and a Technical Advisory Committee (comprised of representatives from the local First Nations, municipalities and conservation authorities) to develop this Watershed Plan on behalf of the County.

Montrose, on behalf of the County, is seeking input and feedback from interested individuals and organizations (as outlined below) in 2025 and 2026. Please check back for project updates and notices for upcoming opportunities to get involved, or reach out to be added to our project email list.

Timeline

The County’s Watershed Plan will include three phases, as follows. We are currently advancing Phases 2 and 3 together.

• Phase 1 - Project Launch and Background Review (completed in April 2025)
• A PDF of the Phase 1 presentation to Council is available 
• Phase 2 - Watershed Characterization and Draft Planning Strategies (in progress)
• Phase 3 - Watershed Planning and Management Recommendations (in progress)

 The Draft Watershed Plan, including both the Phase 2 characterization and the Phase 3 management recommendations, are expected to be available on request in Q1 of 2026.

Engagement

We welcome feedback on this project through all phases via email or phone.

Representatives from the Williams Treaties First Nations, governmental agencies, utilities companies, academic institutions, lake associations, land trusts and other interested environmental organizations from within and around the County were engaged over March 2025 to introduce interested parties to the project, gather perspectives to inform the vision and objectives for this Plan, and try to ensure the study team had gathered all of the relevant data.

The Phase 1 engagement took place over March 2025 and is summarized in the Phase 1 Engagement Summary.

Over the summer and fall of 2025 the Montrose team has been working on compiling and summarizing all the data collected and assessing these data. The team is also considering the current planning context, the current and anticipated land use pressures and stressors, and the feedback received to date to develop:

• an up to date watershed characterization (Phase 2 reporting), and
• draft high-level recommendations for next steps in terms of planning, management and monitoring to guide sustainable growth, infrastructure planning, and restoration efforts across the County.

Although this study originally anticipated separate engagement for Phases 2 and 3, the team and County have agreed that most parties will be interested in the Phase 3 recommendations that emerge from the Phase 2 technical information. Therefore, it has been agreed that the second round of engagement will be a bit delayed so that both the Phase 2 and 3 outcomes can be presented in Draft to all those engaged.

• Phase 2 / 3 engagement is anticipated to occur over the winter and spring of 2026. More details about the key findings, draft recommendations from this work, and the  engagement opportunities will be posted as soon as they are available.