During "10 minutes open session" of regular town council meetings for the Village of Grand Manan, island residents are given the opportunity to voice their concerns regarding the island to council. Council is unable to provide comments on the issues addressed by citizens, but the floor is open and citizens have the chance to be heard. 

"I've come today because I feel there is a lot of missing information about our island that could be important in the decision making process," said Sharon Greenlaw who came to the meeting to express her concerns over the island's water supply. 

"12 years ago, we did a Methylmercury study on Grand Manan, and I worked with a bunch of people at McMaster University at the time," said Greenlaw. "I'm here today about the water. We took a picture of the water table from the Hubble at the time, and we offered it to the village at the time, and the village turned us down. The image showed the two plates coming together--the North American plate against European plate. The information should have been added to the knowledge of the village. The reason I am saying this is because I hear there are proposals to make a quarry in the back of the island, which could be a place for toxic storage or dumping."

Greenlaw went on to clarify the amount of knowledge she possessed on the island's water supply, which she believes council needs to consider before making any decisions to allow business proposals to potential affect the water supply. 

"I also worked with Paul Arp from the University of New Brunswick, and they did the study on all the wells that thought they were artesian that they could get information from on the front of the island," said Greenlaw. "We studied where this water was coming from because we thought the force of the bay was causing these artesian wells to be had. We found out that, no, every well that was tested--and there were several--actually could be followed back to a marsh or a bog on the back of the island. Not only could they follow them back by the biomass, which is the leaves and the little bits of pieces in the water, they could tell you which bog they were from."

Greenlaw ended her speech to council by reminding councillors that access to clean water is an internationally protected human right.

"The Hague Court has just brought in water a declaration on water as a human right," said Greenlaw. "There is a declaration of the Hague on water security and that is to ensure that good governance involves the public and all interests of all stakeholders in to be included in the management of water resources. Because the water resources of Grand Manan depend immensely on the back water because on the front of the island we have high deposits of copper at Mill Hill and arsenic at the terminal, etc, we need the back of the island's water to dillute the island's wells at the front of the island. I think that information is needed because the water belongs to all of us. Our councillors represent the people of Grand Manan, and I hope they think of that above and beyond the interests of companies."