About Us

We motivate people to take action to help rescue, restore, and rehabilitate Lake Simcoe through education and community leadership.

The Rescue Lake Simcoe Coalition (RLSC) was formed in 2003 through the coming together of its founding groups. The founding Directors saw that if Lake Simcoe’s health were to improve, empowered and informed people would need to be part of the answer.

Education and empowerment of local groups is the way we make a difference. We focus on promoting dialogue between citizens and their governments around the lake. By sharing information and opportunities for collaboration and action, we learn what is relevant, and work together towards important goals.

Our vision

To be an inspiring umbrella group that provides leadership and motivates people to take action to protect Lake Simcoe.

Our mission

Save Lake Simcoe and protect its future. 

Our goals

  1. To reduce the annual phosphorus.
  2. To increase environmental awareness and concern in the Lake Simcoe watershed.
  3. To increase public participation in activities that promote the health of the watershed.
  4. To encourage land use planning decisions and building techniques that will protect forests, wetlands, working farms, and Lake Simcoe.
  5. To increase environmental and climate awareness and concern in the Lake Simcoe watershed.

Board of Directors

We are a group of local community members who believe strongly in the work being done by the Rescue Lake Simcoe Coalition— and each brings a unique perspective and skillset to the organization.

Click on each board member to read their full bio.

Jonathan Scott

Executive Director

Jonathan Scott is executive director of the Rescue Lake Simcoe Coalition.

Through various roles, he has always been a passionate, dedicated environmental advocate, focused on delivering practical solutions.

He was elected Town Councillor in Bradford West Gwillimbury in a December 2020 by-election and re-elected in October 2022 with over 79% of the vote.

A small business owner, Jonathan is Vice-President at Key Gordon Inc. He is a seasoned consultant in advocacy and business development, and previously served as director of communications for the Ontario government caucus and as a senior advisor to a former Premier.

Jonathan currently serves as Chair of Bradford’s Green Initiatives Advisory Committee, Co-Chair of CONTACT Community Services and Chair of the Nottawasaga Valley Conservation Authority. He also sits on the board of VIA Rail Inc, the Crown corporation that operates Canada’s national passenger rail service. He previously served as Vice-Chair of Conservation Ontario and as a member of the Ontario Greenbelt Council.

In his community, Jonathan is a passionate advocate for local support services. As Council’s liaison to the Helping Hand Food Bank and its fundraising chair, he helped raise over $1 million to support those in need. Jonathan previously served on the board of St John’s Presbyterian Church.

He was also a student trustee with the Simcoe County District School Board and Vice-President of the Ontario Student Trustees’ Association.

Jonathan regularly appeared on CTV News Channel, CBC News and SiriusXM Radio, and wrote for Monocle, Salon, The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star, Municipal World, and other publications, including a popular monthly column in Bradford Today.

His community service has been recognized with the Town’s Outstanding Achievement Civic Award, the Bradford Legion’s Community Service Award and as an Emerging Leader by The Peak.

Jonathan is an honours graduate of Bradford District High School and the University of Toronto. He earned his law degree at Cardiff School of Law and Politics, an MBA from the Smith School of Business at Queen’s University, and a Master of Laws from the University of Toronto Faculty of Law.

Jennie Ucar

President

Ms. Ucar is a retired Elementary School Principal, who has been spending seasonal time at Lake Simcoe all her life. Throughout her educational career, she focused on environmental education, wrote the Environmental Education curriculum for the Toronto District School Board and also for the David Suzuki Foundation in partnership with the Board. She has been a member of the RLSC Education Committee for two years and joined the Board in March 2020.

Susan Sheard

Secretary

Having lived on the southeast shore of Lake Simcoe for almost three decades, Susan is an educator who is passionate about the health of Lake Simcoe and the environment in general.

Gail Speirs-White

Director at Large

Gail Speirs-White is a new Board member who lives in Barrie. Her professional work has been as a rural land-use planner which evolved into an environmental land use and policy planner. She enjoys kayaking and canoeing and continues to marvel at the abilities of farmers to grow our food.

Mary-Jane Hanley

Director at Large

MJ Hanley lives two minutes away from beautiful Lake Simcoe (LS) and respects her local environment. Her family moved to the area to swim and canoe in the lake and enjoy hikes in the surrounding forests. As a Senior Environmental Health & Safety Scientist with forty years of experience in the Industrial, Commercial and Institutional sectors, in indoor and ambient air, water and land pollution and remediation, she brings a wealth of experience to help protect and promote awareness for the lake, its tributaries and watersheds. She was the past Chair of the Air, Water and Waste Management Association (AWMA) – Ontario Section. She is a member of the Friends of the Maskinonge River (MR). She volunteers for the Town of Georgina to help with environmental issues like tree conservation and preservation, MR and LS water quality protection, road salt pollution and local land use and development environmental
protection. She also volunteered for RLSC for the past four years before joining the
Board and for the Canadian Cancer Society for over twenty years.

Member Groups

Member Groups of the Rescue Lake Simcoe Coalition are local organizations who help support and promote our work.

For more information about becoming a Member Group, click here.

  • Barilla Park Residents Association
  • Bayshore Village Association
  • Canadian Freshwater Alliance
  • Carden Field Naturalists
  • Chippewas of Georgina Island First Nation
  • Concerned Citizens of King Township
  • Concerned Citizens of Ramara
  • Crescent Harbour Association
  • DeGrassi Cove Association
  • Eight Mile Point Community Association
  • Innisfil District Association (IDA)
  • Innisfree Ltd. DeGrassi Point
  • Nature Barrie
  • North Gwillimbury Forest Alliance
  • North Mara Beach Residents Association
  • Ontario Headwaters Institute
  • Ontario Water Centre
  • Orillia Naturalists Club
  • Simcoe County Greenbelt Coalition
  • Snake Island Cottagers Association
  • South Lake Simcoe Naturalists
  • West Oro Ratepayers Association
  • Windfall Ecology Centre
  • Yonge Street Monthly Meeting (Quakers)
  • York Simcoe Nature Club