HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2012-03-01, Page 10PAGE 10. THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, MARCH 1, 2012.Homecoming committee meetsfor seventh time ahead of event
Policing
costs
debated
by HE
The 140th Homecoming
Committee met this past week for
the seventh time to organize the
140th celebration for the Village of
Brussels at the Brussels Legion. It is
only five months until the big
weekend. Co-chair Don McNeil
called the meeting to order and there
were 13 present.
Committee chairs gave their
reports and things are falling into
place for the weekend of July 27-29.
The parade is confirmed for
Saturday, July 28 at high noon. The
theme for the celebration is “Come
Home to Your Country Village” and
celebrate western style. All
businesses, organizations and
groups are encouraged to start
planning early and to put a float into
the parade. Parade chairman is
Murray McArter.
The 41st annual fastball
tournament hosted by the Brussels
Tigers will start as usual on Friday
evening and continue on through
Sunday. There will be some breaks
in the action to accommodate some
of the other activities, like the
parade, over the course of the
weekend.
The community multi-
denominational outdoor church
service and picnic has its plans in
place. They have booked an exciting
musical group and encourage
everyone to mark Sunday, July 29 to
attend the service at the Maitland
Conservation Park.
The Boothill Bash is a great
western complement to the
weekend’s activities. The event will
take place at the Optimist end of the
village and will feature barrels,
poles, reined cowhorse, trail
challenge and team sorting. The
action begins Friday evening and
continues Saturday through Sunday
when presentation of the awards will
be held.
The exciting car show committee
with chair Don McNeil has been
very busy since the new year. They
have their advertising in place and
have created an exciting poster to
promote the Sunday event. The
event is for all cars and motorcycles
pre-1985 and they expect the main
street of Brussels to be full from 9
a.m. until 4 p.m.
People have to eat so the Brussels
United Church will host a breakfast
on Saturday morning for all to enjoy.
The Brussels Agricultural Society is
hosting a beef barbecue on Saturday
evening and the St. John’s Anglican
Church is hosting their pork chop
barbecue on Sunday evening, both
events will be at the arena.
These are some of the major
events planned and there are many
more to learn about. A great and
exciting source of information is
being developed as each day goes
by. Jim Prior is creating a website
and hopefully it will be up and
running soon. Folks out of our area
will be able to keep up with all the
plans and the activities via the
website. Inquiries about plans at this
time can also be found at
www.huroneast.com or on Facebook
“140th Brussels Homecoming”.
After some concerns were
expressed by Huron East Council
about the rising police costs in the
recent incarnation of the OPP
contract, Huron Detachment
Commander Chris Martin answered
some questions councillors may
have had.
Martin, who has been a member of
the OPP for 27 years, was at the Feb.
21 Huron East Council meeting,
where he told councillors that the
increases in the OPP budget have
been rising along the cost of living
line, it just hasn’t appeared that way
because the OPP contract had only
been negotiated every five years in
the past. This has now changed and
the budget will be presented every
year now and going into the future,
Martin said.
Councillor Larry McGrath,
however, was disappointed with the
increase of 10 per cent overall in the
budget presented last year, because
as he told Martin, he and the rest of
council is well aware that their
options are limited.
“We haven’t got any other
options,” he said. “We either go with
the OPP or we go with the OPP.”
Martin said that while the increase
seemed like a large one, it was
because the OPP wasn’t allowed to
upgrade every year as they are now.
The OPP, Martin said, is now
working on 2010 levels, where as
before the 2010 levels came in, they
Here we are at the end of February
and enjoying an extra day in the year
of 2012. It is a leap year and we have
Feb. 29 added to the month. There
are few around Walton that get to
celebrate their real birth dates so an
extra happy birthday to them.
The weather is still bouncing
between trying to be winter and
trying to be spring. According to the
calendar, it is only 19 days until the
first day of spring. The old saying
about weather in March – in like a
lion and out like a lamb or vice
versa, we will choose in like a lion –
we would rather have wintery
weather now and not in April.
There are a few people dealing
with health issues at this time. We
wish Brad Knight a speedy recovery
from his knee surgery and that he is
back to his normal busy self soon.
Linda Smith spent some time in
hospital and we wish her the best in
her recovery.
Our thoughts and all the best
wishes go out to little Emily Bauer,
daughter of Vincent and Lindsay
Bauer. She has been in a London
Hospital for a week and we hope
they are getting to the bottom of her
health issues.
The Cranbrook Dart Club had an
exciting evening on Feb. 22 for all
18 players in attendance as Jane
Zwep shot the perfect score of 180.
It was too high a score to finish the
game, but quite an accomplishment
and everyone congratulated Jane on
her skill. There were lots of other
good scores during the evening with
Annette Lewington hitting 117 and
Frank Workman hitting 125.
Congratulations to Brian and Jan
Deitner on becoming grandparents
for the first time. They have
welcomed a grandson named Liam
to the family. Proud parents are
Kylie and Jonas.
A group of snowmobile
enthusiasts have returned from a
week’s trail run. They travelled to
Quebec to ride the groomed trails
and to explore the area.
Enjoying the ride were Curtis
Ryan and Lauren, Matt Ryan, Ken,
Brenda and Scott Dalton and Matt,
Kevin and Richard Haney. They
travelled about 1,100 miles starting
at Riviere-du-Loup and making the
loop around the Gaspe Peninsula. It
was a 12 to 14-hour drive to their
starting point and they had great
groomed trails and lots of nice
scenery. They stayed at hotels and
bed-and-breakfast homes and found
the people great.
Celebrating birthdays this past
week include Chris Lee, Carly
Terpstra, Terry Nichol, Beverly
Stevenson and our Leap Year babies
Ryan Baan and Nathan Bachert.
Happy birthday to all.
By Jo-Ann
McDonald
Call
887-6570
PEOPLE AROUND
WALTON
NEWS
FROM WALTON
Looking for local heroes
There are so many people out there who do
so much to improve their community.
Now you have a chance to say thanks.
Nominate that special person for the 27th
Annual Citizen Citizenship Awards.
Each year a committee chooses an outstanding citizen from each of the Blyth and area
and Brussels and area communities to receive an award for contribution to the
community. If you know someone you think should be honoured, please fill in the ballot
and send it in. You may attach a longer explanation of why you think your nominee
should win, if you like. If you have nominated someone before and he or she didn't win,
please feel free to try again.
I nominate
as Citizen of the year for
I feel she/he deserves this award because
Nomination Deadline April 29, 2012.
Name and phone number of nominator
❑Blyth
& area ❑Brussels
& area
Have A New
Addition?
Call for prices and details
519-523-4792
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Let everyone know about
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The
Citizen
Locals snowmobile in Quebec
By Shawn Loughlin
The Citizen
Continued on page 31