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HomeMy WebLinkAboutHuron Expositor, 2016-03-23, Page 22 Huron Expositor • Wednesday, March 23, 2016 Citizens Concerned about Health Impact plead with council to not accept vibrancy fund Huron East Against Turbines (HEAT) members arrived in the council chambers once again March 15 to plead their case of the health impacts tied to the large fan-like machines that produce electricity. This particular time, the group said they had a message from a local health sector. In the first week of March, the Huron County Health Unit (HCHU) declared it will investi- gate the fears of residents pointing towards the potential health effects of turbines. It's been a long time coming, stated avid HEAT advocate, Gerry Ryan. "What we are doing tonight is relaying the message we got directly from Dr. Owen the medi- cal officer of health in Huron County, of the action they are going to take. (Which is an investi- gation that will start in May.)" The HEAT members also now known as Citizens Concerned about Health Impact told council that since there are numerous people that have complained about health problems connected to the wind turbines they would like the municipality to hold off on the vibrancy fund . "People are seriously impacted because of this project, the Health Unit is going to do an investiga- tion, it would seem a little odd, that our municipality would try to benefit financially from that," stated Ryan. According to Seaforth Coun. Bob Fisher, last December the Community Vibrancy Fund Agree- ment worth more than $2 million was turned down by council in 2013. He believed at the time if it was brought up again council would accept it. "Two months ago they would probably accept a vibrancy fund, but in two months, we have more than 14 families health (that) has seriously been impacted, children and adults," Ryan said. Jeanne Melady, from Citizens Concerned about Health Impact/ HEAT said if the council is in need of funds they should contact the government. "There is a way for a municipal- ity to get additional taxes, they would need to write to the minis- ter of finance or the minister of energy in Toronto and say they want to have the turbines taxed," she stated while also saying the turbines are usually valued at roughly $92,000, but with the amount of electricity they produce it works out to about $5 million. "Appropriately, turbines are taxed almost like a residency," Melady said since the Green Energy Act prevents them from col- lecting profits, "the way you get money is you take a vibrancy fund." Huron East CAO Brad Knight was on hand for both the Melady and Ryan presentation and he admitted to being rather confused, however he commented that they will wait for the report to come back at the next board of health meeting. MP Ben Lobb introduces new legislation OTTAWA, ON -February 25, 2016, in the House of Commons, Ben Lobb, Member of Parliament for Huron -Bruce, introduced Bill C- 232, An Act to Amend the Excise Act, 2001 (Spirits). Lobb's Private Member's Bill aims to reduce Excise Tax rates for spirit distillers in Canada. The proposed legislation would reduce the current Excise Tax rate to $6.00 per litre of abso- lute ethyl alcohol for the first 100,000 litres of production and $11.00 for all production past 100,000 litres. "Lowering the tax rate for dis- tilleries will increase production and revenue, jobs will be created and more Canadians will be employed. The benefits of lower tax rates are not limited to distill- ery industry, Canadian farmers will benefit from increased sales of alcohol's main components, corn, wheat, barley and rye. The Conservative Party continues to work hard to reduce taxes for Canadians and help foster devel- opment in various sectors of our economy , said MP Lobb. Currently all distilleries, regardless of size or production output are taxed at the same rate of $11.696 per litre of absolute ethyl alcohol. Lowering the Excise Tax rate will allow for the Canadian Spirit Industry to become more competitive on an international scale and allow for investment into new technologies. ATTENTION ADVERTISERS! EARLY DEADLINE EARLY DEADLINE FOR March 30th Seaforth Huron Expositor All ADS must be completed by 2pm on 24t'' For all your marketing needs contact Nancy deGans ndegans@postmedia.com • 519-527-0240 Huron Expositor OFFICE HOUR Mon. - Thurs. 9am - 5p Fri. 8am - 4p CLOSED TUESDAY 8 Main St., Seaforth PH: 519-527-0240 www.seaforthhuronexpositor.com ea orthhuronex 1 ositor.co Shaun Gregory Seaforth Coun. Bob Fisher and the rest of council talked about the 2016 budget on March 15. He suggested changing how much money they give the recreation centres. Seaforth Coun. "cant agree" with budget Shaun Gregory Huron Expositor Seaforth Coun. Bob Fisher stood up at the Huron East council meet- ing on March 15 and due to the num- ber of complaints he has had recently from local ratepayers, the long-time politician said he could not concur with the 2016 budget. If all goes as planned with an agree- ment by all of council, in less than a month the 2016 budget could possi- bly be passed. Before that happens several steps must be taken to make sure everyone is on the same page and at the present time Fisher is not. "I've had a few calls about staff inactivity that I have never had before. I can't agree with the budget how it stands. I don't know how we can change it, we need to try and reduce it somehow," Fisher indicated to all of council while also asking for feedback from everyone at the table. "I would say change what we give to the recreation centres;' Fisher's statements bounced back and forth between comments from almost every councillor at the town hall in Seaforth, but most did not agree with his opinion on the budget. Mayor Bernie MacLellan acknowl- edged the fact that taxpayers from Huron East are concerned about where the budget is at the moment, but he admitted that if more cuts were to be applied it would not change the following years to come. "I already said this last week, I don't think next year's is going to be any different. Even though we don't have the cuts because we have cut ourselves so much, we might have to start picking up those bills next year," MacLellan said. Since this marked the third budget draft and how close it is to being finalized, the mayor urged council to come up with an answer concerning their stance in this matter. "Time is getting short, we could still postpone the public meeting, the bottom line is do we want to pass the budget with the amount we're talk- ing about going to recreation centres, or does council want to say no, we are not willing to accept that budget?" questioned MacLellan. "It's one of the two things the way the recreation centres go:" Brussels Ward Coun. David Blaney, like most of council sug- gested to go through with the budget and not add additional cuts. "Giving them less is not going to improve the situation, they're simply going to end up with a bigger deficit and the real problem is that they are expensive buildings with expensive needs," he said. According to Huron East's CAO, Brad Knight, the impact connected to the amount of extra money that the municipality is parcelling out to the three recreation centres affects the municipal tax levy by 4.3 per cent. "When we combine the munici- pal levy increase with the county and education, the overall tax increase is 9.7 per cent," a com- ment Knight said he wanted to make clear with the public. What if one of the two arenas ice was removed? With utility costs ranging in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to keep all three of the community centres in Huron East functioning, a couple members of council rec- ommended removing the ice permanently. "The unfortunate thing is some of these arenas don't rent a lot of ice time. The ice is in for 175 hours a week and you only rent it for 20 hours," MacLellan stated. "Maybe you just don't put the ice in, that can almost cut these budgets in half and that's huge savings." Tuckersmith Councillor Ray Char- trand said indoor soccer is 'gigantic' in London Ont. and if it ever came down to where the ice would be sub- tracted, adding sports such as indoor soccer or tennis to the facilities may be a profitable income. "I'm sure I don't like to use the word close the arena down. The day is going to come when we can get all the users to one ice surface. The challenge is going to be for the rest of us is, what can we use that facility for?" he said.