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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1985-12-23, Page 8Cal Krauter has earned the right to sit back and enjoy this retirement after nearly 30 years service for the village of Brussels. He's had a chance to look back on his years in recent weeks. Brussels alriStMRS FAPE What could be jollier than a note to say thanks to all our friends and customers? McCUTCHEON GROCERY inaluir11100.1:1"; I 1 I illillin.141111111111111111111%/111111111101, • • . • • • • • • • • • ..ril 41j.111.41 • • % I .l) ....-W -41114...6 41317 1111111111111191111111111 swierail 4:p41)32.7„0/ 1/ fib\s Merry Christmas One of the great pleasures of the season is to express our warmest thoughts to those whose friendship we value so highly Howard & Jean Bernard Bernard Fuels, Brussels ertif G cane The Gift That Always Fits! ERSTER,'S Clothing and Footwear Main St., Blyth 523-9709 OPEN Mon., Dec. 239-8:30p.m. Tues., Dec. 249-5:00p.m. VISA WELCOME PAGE 8. THE CITIZEN, MONDAY, DECEMBER 23, 1985. Krauter gets a chance to look back on 30 years of community service For a man who has been known for an inventive use of language who could coin a phrase for just about any appropriate need, it's obvious that Cal Krauter takes pride that in the long run, his actions speak louder than his words. The former reeve of Brussels is sitting back now after giving a good part of the last 30 years to the service of his community and he can recall many things he's proud to have been part of. Mr. Krauter first became a member of Brussels council in 1957 and became reeve in 1963, staying in the post until 1968. He took a slightbreak of about six months before he became a commissioner on the Public Utilities Commission and remained as a commissioner, and later chairman of the PUC until early December of this year. He was chairman of the first county planning board that brought in the first official county plan in any county in Ontario. He was chairman at the same time on the county land-division commit- tee and he and his fellow members thought there was a slight conflict between the two jobs being a policy maker on one side and an administrator on the other so he and members of the land division committee who had been also members of the planning board, resigned their planning board positions to sit only on the land division committee. This he contin- ued to do from 1971 until 1975. In 1976 he became Reeve again and has held the position until retiring this fall. Back in his first term as Reeve of Brtissel's Mr. Krauter served as Warden of Huron County in 1968. During that term he took on the reorganizing of the county's con- stitution. "At that time there were 13 committees on county council at that time and each councillor sat on two committees." (Total there were nine). It was during that time, too, that the county elevated clerk-treasur- er John Berry to be a county administrator. "I drove all over Ontario to where they had them (county administrators) and then I got their ideas and formats and I came back and I had a meeting with all the chairmen of all the committees and I said this is what I would like to do. They thought that was great. Those fellows just took it right up and even set his wages way higher than they'd been. So I thought boy; when you light a match, you sure set a fire." His straight-to-the-point obser- vations enlivened many discus- sions over the years. He recalls when the planning consultants first began to talk about an official plan for the county. "These fellows thought everything from No. 8 (highway) south was Huron Coun- ty and north of it didn't amount to much. They said "Oh that would- n't develop." And I said, "Look, we'll develop it. We're not stupid. We're not pigs or something, that don't know where we're going. You're talking about Highway 41 going to London. Up here we've got Highway 86 going to Kitchener, Guelph, Toronto, Hamilton," "Oh," they said. Planning has worked well for Brussels, one of the first munici- palities in the county to have its own official plan aside from a few headaches over buildings that were zoned improperly in the first place. Council business has changed over the years, he says. When he first got on council "we had nice easy meetings once a month. The paywasn't too good." When he first became reeve the councillors got $100 a year and the reeve got $200. One of his proudest achieve- ments came through a problem at the local nursing home. There were some residents at the nursing home who couldn't pay the fees to the home owner and yet could hardly be put out because of this. Mr. Krauter went to the town solicitor and asked to have a resolution written asking the pro- vincial government to institute a program that would help pay the fees for people who couldn't afford to pay their own fees. He was told he couldn't do it, he says now, but he circulated the resolution across the province and it won support from every county and at the mayors' and reeves' convention and eventually the extendicare system was adopted by the pro- vince. Today people can apply for the assistance and if they qualify under a point system, they can be helped even when they're resi- dents of a private nursing home. Another highlight was when he got changes to the billing for the local municipal telephone system. People would often not pay their telephone bills until the amount wa added to their tax bills. In the meantime, however, Brussels, as the initiating municipality, had to borrow $40-$50,000 a year so the telephone system could pay bills until the money came in from overdue telephone bills at the end of the year. Reeve Krauter forced the tele- phone company to collect its own , bills and saved the village interest rates. He got kudos for doing it from an unexpected direction when people came to him wonder- ing how he had managed to lower their taxes so much, forgetting that they used to paytheirtelephone bills with the tax bills but now were paying it monthly. Construction of the new Brus- sels dam also rates high on his list of things that have improved the village over his years in office. One of the ongoing challenges over the years, and one that will challenge his successors, is the need for industry. "The big cry has Continued on Page 9 Celebrate! Warmest appreciation for your kind association. Happy holiday! Brussels 5` - $1.00 Store Merry Christmas Wishing you health and happiness during this holiday season. Murray and Carol Long Murray Long, Carpenter Brussels