The Citizen, 2017-02-09, Page 1INSIDE
THIS WEEK:
IPM 2017 - Pg. 8
2017 Brussels Fall Fair
begins to take shape
CONCERNS - Pg. 16
BIA Vice -Chair concerned
over found needles in Blyth
TRIP - Pg. 20
Blyth woman takes students
to mosque, synagogue
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Serving the communities of Blyth and Brussels and northern Huron County Thursday, February 9, 2017
Turning the page
After defeating their local rivals from Seaforth in the first
round of the playoffs, the Atom Rep Blyth Brussels
Crusaders now take on the South Bruce Blades in game
one of the next round of the playoffs. This series hasn't
gone quite as smoothly, as the locals dropped the first game by a
score of 6-2 in Blyth last Saturday. They are back on the ice this
Saturday in Brussels with game two of the series at 3 p.m. and
then game three is in Brussels on Feb. 15. (Vicky Bremner photo)
Shared public works department to dissolve
By Denny Scott
The Citizen
The largest component of North
Huron and Morris-Turnberry's
shared service project, the public
works department, has been
disbanded.
A confidential letter from North
Huron was discussed by Morris-
Turnberry Council on Jan. 31 as part
of an update on the project which
saw Morris-Turnberry approve a
motion, with regrets, that will see
the joint public works department
disbanded on Feb. 17. On Feb. 2,
North Huron issued a press release
explaining that Jeff Molenhuis, the
senior staff member in charge of the
department, would be retained by
North Huron to head up its own
Public Works Department.
Molenhuis tendered his
resignation, effective Feb. 17, from
the joint public works department
earlier this month.
In the release it was explained
that, as a result of an assessment of
the first fiscal year of the program,
staff discovered the savings that had
been anticipated in the program
couldn't be realized under the
current model.
"The assessment started earlier in
the new year," North Huron's Chief
Administrative Officer Sharon
Chambers said in an interview with
The Citizen. "We received the first
billing [from Morris-Turnberryl at
the end of December and we had to
analyze what had gone into that."
Chambers explained that, due to
the model that was employed in the
pilot project, the savings that
Morris-Turnbeny and North Huron
had hoped to realize had not
occured.
"Looking at the operating model...
we were having some struggles
as it was a pilot project and an
unprecedented approach to
shared services," she said.
"Wrapping up our first year of
review, we did conclude that
because of the model we chose, it
really was difficult to find the
efficiencies we had hoped to
achieve."
Molenhuis said the amount of
reporting that was necessary
prevented him from being able to
recognize efficiencies.
"The burden of the work and the
dual reports that were necessary
didn't allow me to focus on the long-
term planning aspect of the job," he
said in an interview with The
Citizen. "That's what brought me
back to North Huron. There is a
great need to define work programs
and build systems with long-term
planning."
While Morris-Turnberry, in light
of the decision, had stated they
would continue to share the building
department with North Huron,
Chambers said the department was
structured in the same 'non-
traditional' way that the public
works department had been.
"In a traditional arrangement, you
see a shared service as one
municipality leading and billing the
other across the border," she
explained. "This is one where
municipalities retained their
employees and billed services back
and forth across the border. It was
very complex, administratively, and
created a lot of administrative
burden."
She said the fact that each
municipality had maintained its own
staff in case the program didn't work
and that decision, in hindsight, "may
have been a barrier to a very efficient
shared service program."
Molenhuis, who was brought on
for his engineering experience,
among other reasons, will be staying
in North Huron and one of his first
responsibilities will be to provide a
report on how North Huron Public
Works could be restructured to
accommodate his position and
salary.
"We did renegotiate his contract as
a result of him staying," Chambers
said. "It was desirable to go out and
try and share him with a
neighbouring municipality to afford
Continued on page 12
Blyth 140
rental fee
`offends'
volunteer
By Denny Scott
The Citizen
Crystal Taylor, member of the
Royal Canadian Legion Blyth
Branch and the Blyth 140th reunion
committee, is concerned those
running the township are losing
sight of who built the community of
Blyth up in past years.
Taylor, through her efforts with
the Blyth 140th committee,
discovered that the municipality
would not waive the rental fee of
local facilities for the group, which
she felt was indicative of a bad
attitude towards the people in the
community.
"I've been volunteering in the
Blyth area for 36 years," Taylor said.
"Back in the day, when we were
planning community events and we
needed a facility that belonged to the
community, we were never charged
for it, ever."
She said she had been part of
drives to have the Grade 8
graduation and public school
Christmas concerts held at the Blyth
and District Community Centre and
Blyth Memorial Hall, respectively,
and, during a recent meeting with
North Huron staff, was discouraged
by the fact that the 140th committee
was being asked to pay for the rental
of the facility.
"I was offended we were asked to
pay full price for the arena floor for
the event," she said.
While North Huron Council
Representative Bill Knott explained
that there was a tiered rental system
with community groups and
functions like the Blyth 140th
committee paying less than
commercial renters, Taylor wasn't
satisfied with the answer.
"This is a community event that
happens, at most, once every 10
years," she said. "To pay for the
rental honestly makes me feel like
we're losing our sense of
community. The community raised
the money to build the arena."
Knott said it would be wonderful
if rental fees didn't have to be
charged for community groups, but
pointed out that facilities built by the
community then handed to a
municipality don't usually come
with money to maintain the facility.
"Communities tend to build these
things for today and forget about
tomorrow," he said. "There are
maintenance costs over time and
there is no money saved to address
issues at the facility."
Taylor said, even to display a
Continued on page 20