Great Lakes

Both proposals would encompass more than 1,700 square miles and cover dozens of known shipwrecks.

Sturgeon are native to Lake Ontario and the Genesee River, but habitat loss and overfishing decimated the population, causing it to dwindle to almost nothing by the early 1900s.

"We have built everything up that we could possible do to be resilient against high water and now we are finding ourselves on the extreme opposite."

The last 12 months over Lake Ontario have been the driest since 1966, according to the International Lake Ontario-St. Lawrence River Board.

"It's like a program or code based on historical water supply records that can simulate what could happen from different decisions."

When the ice melts each spring, the ship visits each of the five lakes to measure basic water quality and sample the “lower food web” -- the tiny animals, plants, and algae that support fish and other aquatic life.

"The risk of flooding on Lake Ontario and the upper St. Lawrence River has declined from moderate in December 2020 to low."

“When I was around 12 years old, I lived far from the ocean,” he said. “So I surfed on my bed, on my pillow. I always imagined my pillow was a surf board and I was in the wave.”

"I mean it's huge for us. We have been trying to recover from the damage from 2017 and 2019 so to know that this will help alleviate the chances of flooding for 2021 means a great deal."

"We realized that it would be beneficial for the Board to be smaller so they can make decisions in a quicker fashion."