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$1.25 GST included Serving the communities of Blyth and Brussels and northern Huron County Thursday, April 12, 2012
Volume 28 No. 15
POOL - Pg. 15Huron East Council backsaway from joint pool STUDY - Pg. 17 Blyth receives fundingfor new business studyCOUNTY- Pg. 6Huron County expressesinterest in Youth CentrePublications Mail Agreement No. 40050141 Return Undeliverable Items to North Huron Publishing Company Inc., P.O. Box 152, BRUSSELS, ON N0G 1H0INSIDE THIS WEEK:
Tax increase in limbo as county debate continues
Wood stove fire
Members of the Fire Department of North Huron from the Blyth fire hall answered the call
when a fire was discovered at David Werkema’s farm on Moncrieff Road. Firefighters were on
the scene containing a fire that started between a wood-burning stove and an adjacent shed
which held wood for the stove. After an hour and a half the firefighters were able to deem the
fire beaten and return to the hall. (Vicky Bremner photo)
Gowing lobbies
for county-wide
fire department
Budget talks were scheduled to
continue on Wednesday at Huron
County Council’s Committee of the
Whole meeting with this year’s tax
rate increase still hanging in the
balance.
After adding several small items to
the draft budget over the course of
the April 4 meeting, the budget was
set to increase just 0.48 per cent, a
small increase many Huron County
councillors were prepared to pass
onto the taxpayers. However, several
other councillors felt the county’s
reserves were being underserviced
with such a small increase and felt
the increase should be closer to
two or three per cent with anything
over 0.48 per cent going into
reserves.
Ashfield-Colborne-Wawanosh
Reeve Ben Van Diepenbeek says that
he wasn’t a member of Huron
County Council during the years in
the 1990s when zero per cent
increases were passed several years
in a row, but that he was on council
after those years when the county
levy had to be raised 20 per cent for
two consecutive years to make up for
the years of zero-increase budgets.
“If we raise the budget two or
three per cent every year, that should
build up a decent reserve,” Van
Diepenbeek told councillors.
“You’re going to fall behind the
eight ball down the road.”
Van Diepenbeek called the budget
with less than a half per cent
increase “unrealistic” and said the
budget would not be fair to
departments such as public works,
which has “spike years” from time to
time.
Director of Public Works Dave
Laurie explained that 2024, 2025
and 2026 will be spike years for the
roads department and that to meet
those spikes (over $13 million in
2024, over $23 million in 2025 and
over $19 million in 2026)
approximately $4.5 million will have
to be put away annually in addition
to the annual costs the department
will incur.
Laurie said there will be similar
spikes with bridge repairs in 2022,
2032, 2040, 2052 and 2062 that
should encourage saving now. Total
replacement costs over the next 70
years will run well over $350
million, requiring an annual
reinvestment of $5.1 million.
A transfer to the highways reserve
from the Public Works Department’s
capital items that came in under
budget was made in the amount of
$798,000 and the majority of the
county’s general surplus was also
transferred to public works.
The county carried a surplus of
$893,820 and Central Huron’s Jim
Ginn suggested that $800,000 of the
surplus be transferred to the Public
Works Department, which was
passed.
Ginn was warned, however, by
Chief Administrative Officer Larry
Adams, among others, against
allocating nearly the entire surplus to
one department when there are many
other departments in the county
facing tight budgets as well, such as
the Planning Department and the
Huron County Health Unit.
The move, however, was
approved. The remaining $93,820
was moved into an unrestricted
reserve, set aside for “unforseen
circumstances”.
Councillor Paul Klopp addressed
the ‘found’ $1.8 million from the
Health Unit’s budget that had now
been transferred into the county’s
general revenue. Klopp felt that
since that money was the taxpayers’
Volunteers have always been a
driving force behind small
communities like Blyth, and with
National Volunteer Week this year
comes the launch of a new website
to make it even easier to donate your
time to a worthy cause.
Local Volunteer Network Agency
members Pastor Ernest Dow and
Rev. Gary Clark will be welcoming
dozens of community volunteers out
on Sunday, April 15 to honour their
service and launch a new website to
make it easier to find where the need
for volunteers is in the community at
helpinblyth.ca
In addition to launching the
website, organizers hope the April
15 event will highlight the good
things being done by volunteers in
the Blyth community.
Clark says the event will feature
the Blyth Festival, the Blyth station
of the Fire Department of North
Huron, the Blyth Legion, the Blyth
Legion Ladies Auxiliary, the Blyth
Lions Club, the Blyth Masonic
Lodge and all of the village’s
churches in an effort to highlight all
of the community’s volunteers.
“It’ll be a celebration of
volunteerism,” Clark says.
For the afternoon, which will be
held at Memorial Hall, displays will
be made honouring each service
group or collection of volunteers.
They will then be displayed in the
front windows of various businesses
throughout the village for the rest of
National Volunteer Week.
The inspiration behind the event
Mayor Paul Gowing is tired of
Morris-Turnberry being the only
municipality in Ontario without
even a part-share in a fire
department and thinks the solution is
a county-wide fire service.
Gowing said Morris-Turnberry
has encountered “a great deal of
difficulty” through negotiations with
“one of the costliest [fire services] in
the county.” He said he owed it to
the ratepayers of Morris-Turnberry
to at least investigate a potentially
cheaper option.
“We should at least question if this
is an option,” Gowing said.
Gowing said his proposal was too
big to discuss at the April 4 meeting
and should be put on the agenda for
a future strategic planning day.
Huron County’s EMS service was
an example Gowing used of a
county-wide service being rolled out
appropriately. He said providing fire
service in a similar manner would be
a good idea for the ratepayers of
Huron County.
“It just makes sense,” Gowing
said.
Central Huron Mayor Jim Ginn
said he would support investigating
the possibility, citing his own
municipality’s issues with fire
coverage with the very same fire
department Gowing cited: the Fire
Department of North Huron.
“I would support looking at it,”
Ginn said. “We’ve had a bit of an
issue in Central Huron being
covered by five different fire
departments.”
Central Huron Deputy-Mayor
Dave Jewitt asked if there are any
other county-wide fire departments
in Ontario that Huron could use as a
model, however, Gowing said that to
his knowledge, Huron would be the
first, if they went ahead with the
proposal.
Ashfield-Colborne-Wawanosh’s
Ben Van Diepenbeek said he would
support investigating the idea, but
that staff should prepare a report first
listing which fire departments cover
which parts of Huron’s different
municipalities and the costs
involved. Chief Administrative
Officer Larry Adams said
Emergency Services Chief David
Lew would prepare the report.
Goderich’s Deb Shewfelt said he
supported the investigation as well,
By Shawn Loughlin
The Citizen
Continued on page 14
By Shawn Loughlin
The Citizen
Blyth honours its volunteers
Continued on page 20
By Shawn Loughlin
The Citizen
Continued on page 19