Split between the townships of Huntsville and Lake of Bays sits Peninsula Lake—Pen Lake for short—a pristine, 2,000-acre lake home to a vibrant cottager community. The lake, however, is also known for its rocky outcroppings and shallow shoals. As a result, the Peninsula Lake Community Association (PLCA) maintains warning buoys near treacherous spots.
But after years of careful maintenance, 10 of the lake’s 15 buoys are in need of replacing. As it turns out, buoys don’t come cheap. According to Lori Tersigni, the PLCA’s president, 10 buoys would cost approximately $9,000, a figure that falls beyond the volunteer-lead organization’s budget.
In search of support, the PLCA reached out to both the Township of Huntsville and Lake of Bays Township. “The reason we went to the townships was that, in the past, Huntsville had given some funding. They gave a capital grant to some of the other lake associations,” says Tersigni. This money was provided to assist with maintaining buoys on smaller lakes in the area.
While there was no guarantee of funding, the PLCA felt it was worth a shot to ask the townships for help. Huntsville agreed to provide funding for buoys on its side of Pen Lake, but Lake of Bays was hesitant.
During an April 9 meeting, the Lake of Bays council discussed the proposal with the majority of councillors voicing concerns over the cost of the buoys as well as the liability associated with funding them.
“This is a nice thing to do, but it’s not our responsibility,” said township CAO Bryan Brown during the meeting. “If someone doesn’t follow the rules or somebody hits one of those items and their boat flies over, they’re going to look to sue, and they’re not going to sue the Pen Lake Association. They’re going to sue the township because we provided the money that bought those buoys. We take responsibility when we do that.”
Municipalities have no responsibility over waterways as they fall under federal jurisdiction. According to Transport Canada, it’s the Canadian Coast Guard that places and maintains buoys on Ontario waterways. Fraser Govan, a past director of the Lake of Bays Association, says that the coast guard has been the organization responsible for buoys on Lake of Bays and Muskoka’s other larger lakes, including Rosseau, Joseph, and Muskoka. But it doesn’t maintain buoys on the smaller lakes.
According to the coast guard, it maintains 17,000 navigation aids across Canada. To have buoys maintained by the coast guard, one of the main criteria is that the waterbody must be charted to the standards of the Canadian Hydrographic Service. This would include a depth chart that shows the coast guard where buoys need to be placed.
Govan says that his father charted Lake of Bays back in the ’60s. Having this chart has allowed the coast guard to maintain buoys on the lake.
For lakes that don’t meet the coast guard’s criteria, residents are allowed to use private buoys to mark dangerous areas as long as they comply with the coast guard’s Canadian Aids to Navigation. This means meeting certain height and colour standards, and having the letters “PRIV” printed on them along with the name and contact information of the buoy owner.
Transport Canada adds that while private buoys can be helpful to identify dangerous areas, residents and lake associations are not mandated to provide them. In fact, if there is an accident involving a private buoy, the owner may be held liable for any damage, especially if it can be proven that the buoy was not up to coast guard standards.
Since the PLCA’s buoys are considered private, the association has both general liability insurance and director and officer liability insurance for the volunteer board. Tersigni adds that the PLCA is diligent about complying with coast guard standards. The association has a map of where all the buoys are located, an alert system, and a committee devoted to checking that the buoys are in the correct locations. The PLCA also takes the buoys out each winter, performing maintenance before returning them in the spring. “We’re really, really diligent about what we do, and apparently that’s the key to litigation success,” says Tersigni.
Without the money for new buoys, Tersigni says the PLCA will place the old buoys back into the water this spring until it can find an alternative funding source. “I would rather protect those I can protect on the lake then pull them all out and say, ‘Too risky for us,’” she says.
Lake of Bays, however, hasn’t fully pulled its support. Mayor Terry Glover has scheduled a follow-up meeting with Tersigni to see if there is any way the township can help out.
“It’s wonderful that the volunteers are doing all they can to keep everybody safe,” Glover said during the council meeting.
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