HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1989-02-15, Page 1Controversial Blyth bylaw delayed one month
VOL. 5 NO. 7 WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 1989.45 CENTS
Close, but
no medals
for local
skaters
There were no top placings for
the area’s best skaters at the
Canadian National Figure Skating
Championships in Chicoutimi, PQ,
over the weekend, but the dis
appointments have done nothing to
lessen local fans’ high regard for
their heroes.
In their third trip to the Canadian
Nationals, Kevin Wheeler and
Michelle Menzies placed fourth in
the Senior Pairs competition, which
was won by Seaforth’s brilliant
Lloyd Eisler and his partner Isa
belle Brasseur; while Peter Mac
Donald and Kerrie Shepherd plac
ed eighth in the Junior Dance
Division, a devastating drop from
the championship form they dis
played in getting to the Nationals.
Mr. Eisler and Miss Brasseur will
advance to the World Champion
ships in Paris next month.
Locally, Kevin and Michelle’s
performance was seen on CKCO-
TV on Friday, where they just
missed placing third because of a
fall by Michelle as she came down
off an overhead lift and a later
near-fall by Kevin, although former
figure skating champion Brian
Pockar, announcing the event for
CTV with Johnny Esaw, called the
pair “very brave ... real comers.”
Just prior to their first slip, Mr.
Pockar said “This pair will be very
strong contenders for a medal
today.”
All four local skaters will appear
as guests at the Brussels Figure
Skating Carnival on February 25,
where they will skate some of the
routines that have put all of them in
the winners’ circle so many times
in the past, as it will again in the
future.
Morris farmers oppose rails-to-trails
A group of Morris Township
farmers have become the first
Huron County landowners to for
mally protest the ‘Rails to Trails’
proposal, following the lead of their
municipality, which rejected the
scheme last month.
The group is also the first to
Valentines can also be best friends, and four-year-old Paul Walker is telling his sister, Nicole, 2, that he loves her better
than anybody else in the whole world as he presents her with a valentine arrangement made for him for the occasion by
his neighbour, florist Wilma Scott. Paul and Nicole are the children of Cathy and Doug Walker of RR 1, Belgrave.
request the help of their municipal
ity in returning the abandoned
railway line across their farms to
agriculture, a request the township
later turned down.
Represented by a group calling
itself the Ground Hog’s Day Com
mittee, 10 of the landowners in
volved met with Morris Twp.
council in regular session February
7 to seek the support of council in
presenting their concerns to the
provincial government, which
could have the final say in the
matter. Jeanne Kirkby of Walton,
spokesman for the committee, told
the meeting that “100 per cent” of
the landowners on Concession 10
are opposed to any public use of the
rail corridor.
The “Rails-to-Trails” campaign
has been gaining strength across
Ontario over the past few months,
Continued on page 12
Concilliation was in the air when
Blyth village councillors returned
Feb. 7 to the subject of whether the
procedural by-law should be per
mitted so that councillors get
copies of council minutes earlier.
The councillors decided to post
pone the passing of the amend
ments to the procedural by-law for
a month to see if the new guide
lines can be met by village staff
before putting them into law.
Councillor Dave Medd, who had
proposed the amendments that set
off a storm within council that saw
Reeve Albert Wasson take the
proposed changes to the Ministry
of Municipal Affairs, set the tone
for the meeting when he asked
Clerk-treasurer Helen Grubb if
there were changes that could be
made to his amendment that would
meet her objections. He proposed
changing the requirement that
minutes of special meetings be
delivered to councillors three days
after the meeting, to make it five
working days.
Mrs. Grubb said that she was
worried about more than that
clause, saying she was worried
what would happen in a case such
as the current one where she was
scheduled to leave on holidays the
next morning. How could councill
ors possibly get their minutes in
■the one week limit given by council
in the proposed amendments?
Councillor Dave Lee wondered, in
such a case, if the other employee
from the village office couldn’t be
present to record the minutes.
Reeve Wasson said he tended to
agree that the latter proposal might
be a solution in the future. But he
said, what really bothered him was
that all this could have been
accomplished in a non-confronta-
tional manner “then we wouldn’t
have had Helen’s concern about
what would happen if the minutes
weren’t out in time. Would she be
fired?”
“I would like you to consider
sitting on this for a month or two,”
he told councillor Medd. “Let the
staff see how they can cope with
it.” Reeve Wasson said he hadn’t
had a chance to go over the
procedural by-law to see what
changes he’d like to see made but if
the by-law were going to be amend
ed, he’d like to make amendments
too. But, he said, “You don’t have
to legislate the world in order to get
things to the way you would like to
see things happen.” He cautioned,
however, that he was only making a
suggestion to Councillor Medd.
Councillor Medd accepted the
suggestion, saying he would be
willing to give the staff a trial
period of a month without having
the by-law passed. The other
councillors agreed and the matter
was set aside.
Storm masks
Brussels burglary
The screaming blizzard that
closed some roads and kept most
motorists at home last Wednesday
and Thursday also served to con
ceal the actions of one or more
persons who broke into a Brussels
store and made off with $10,000 to
$12,000 in merchandise.
A spokesman for the Wingham
detachment of the OPP said that
the thief or thieves gained entry to
McDonald Home Hardware and
Lumber by breaking the lock on the
store’s main entrance sometime
Continued on page 2