Mark Mattson LLB ’88 has dedicated his career to supporting a national clean water movement. Photo by Dylan Neild

ALUMNI PROFILE

LAW GRAD: An Environmental Visionary

“I believe all of our water was meant to be swimmable, drinkable, fishable.” This is the credo of Mark Mattson LLB ’88. It has also become a national clean water movement.

In the process, the environmental lawyer and grassroots activist has marshaled the forces of some very high-profile people to his cause. Among them: musicians Gord Downie of The Tragically Hip, TV producer Moses Znaimer, Canadian Olympic skier Karen Percy Lowe and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is effusive in his praise. Kennedy, whose work in cleaning up the Hudson River in New York spawned a global movement of ‘riverkeepers’, told View that Mattson’s grassroots work has helped establish “one of the fastest growing water protection movements in Canada.”

Mattson, who serves as president and waterkeeper for the Lake Ontario Waterkeepers (LOW) is the Canadian board representative for the Waterkeeper Alliance a collection of more than 200 Waterkeeper organizations worldwide. According to Kennedy, Mattson “embodies the best values and traditions of Canada.” He especially praised Mattson’s talents as an activist and leader in agitation, legislation, litigation, education and innovation.

“It’s all because of Mark’s leadership. I love Mark. I love Mark Mattson. He’s a national treasure for Canada.”

Mattson started his career in the early 1990s in criminal and environmental law. He then specialized in environmental law, doing pro bono work for environmental groups, and set up LOW in 2001.

In 2007, he wrote that the main difference between environmental and criminal law was due process. Unlike criminal court, where a defendant has the opportunity for access to justice, “decisions about environmental hazards that also take away freedoms of people and communities are not given the same access to justice,” Mattson argued. “Threats to drinking water, air and food are also threats to our rights to safely fish, drink and swim in our waters. Illegal pollution is normal and environmental law enforcement is mostly non-existent.”

Over the last decade, Mattson has established himself as one of Canada’s most dedicated environmental lawyers and activists. He has acted as counsel for environmental and public interest groups at more than 50 hearings, including the Walkerton Inquiry. In 1992, Mattson has appeared before the International Water Tribunal in Amsterdam as a joint plaintiff with Cree opponents of Hydro-Quebec’s controversial James Bay hydroelectric dam project. The tribunal ruled that Hydro-Quebec should stop the project to preserve the rights and culture of the Cree.

Mattson says his group strives to hold large corporation to “the highest standards.” The battle isn’t easy though. While government regulators have no trouble enforcing licensing laws against small fishermen, hunters, family owned gas stations and those who have septic tanks, large corporations and municipal operations “have special status. Money, influence and political clout often determine who gets the short end of the environmental stick and not laws.”

Mattson co-authored The Citizens Guide to Environmental Investigation and Private Prosecution. With LOW vice-president Krystyn Tully, he hosts a weekly radio show and podcast, and helped create swimdrinkfishmusic.com, an online music and audio community devoted to clean water.

Mattson twitters his views on everything from nuclear energy and Ontario’s Green Energy Act to invasive species on the Great Lakes.

Through LOW, he has established the Clean Water Workshop, which mentors law students in environmental legislation. Mattson says he hasn’t been able to include students from his alma mater so far, but hopes the workshop will spread to Windsor.

He says his experience at UWindsor was “amazing,” adding that he met great friends and professors and loved living and studying next to the Detroit River.

Whether arguing for greater public involvement in the citing of wind farms or extolling the benefits of a new Google app that allows homeowners to monitor the amount of energy they are using, Mattson has been a warrior for clean water. As he puts it: “You have to push the democratic tools from the grassroots over a lots of places.”

Which is music to the ears of ardent admirers like Kennedy: “He is a visionary.”