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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1993-02-17, Page 4The Citizen is published weekly in Brussels, Ontario by North Huron Publishing Company Inc. Subscriptions are payable in advance at a rate of $20.50/year ($19.16 plus $1.34 G.S.T.) for local; $31.03/year ($29.00 plus $2.03 G.S.T.) for local letter carrier in Goderich, Hanover, Listowel, etc. and out-of-area (40 miles from Brussels); $60.00/year for U.S.A. and Foreign. Advertising Is accepted on the condition that In the event of a typographical error, only that portion of the advertisement will be credited. Advertising Deadlines: Monday, 2 p.m. - Brussels; Monday, 4 p.m. - Blyth. We are not responsible for unsolicited newscripts or photographs. Contents of The Citizen are © Copywright. Publisher, Keith Roulston Editor, Bonnie Gropp Sales Representatives, Jeannette McNeil and Julie Mitchell gar CNA CCNA VERIFIED CIRCULATION C itizen The North Huron Publications Mail Registration No. 6968 P.O. Box 429, BLYTH, Ont. NOM 1H0 Phone 523-4792 FAX 523-9140 P.O. Box 152, BRUSSELS, Ont. NOG 1H0 Phone 887-9114 FAX 887-9021 Serving Blyth, Brussels Auburn, Belgrave Ethel, Londesborough Walton and the surro4/''/ doe*Pz /0,-4/x, Over thin ice Photo by Lisa Boonstoppel-Pot Looking Back Through the Years From the files of the Blyth Standard, Brussels Post and The Citizen FIVE YEARS AGO February 17, 1988 After postponing its annual Polar Daize Poker Rally once for lack of snow, the Brussels Lions Club managed to pick the only good day of the winter to get the snowmobile off the ground. Some 240 individual names signed a telegram to Brussels-area figure skater Kevin Wheeler at the Calgary Olympics. Kevin and his partner Michelle Menzies of Pre- ston were to perform as part of the closing ceremonies of the Winter Olympics. A former Brussels woman, Shari Baeker was appointed office man- ager of one of the largest General Motors dealerships in the "Golden Triangle", Leggat Pontiac, Buick, Cadillac Ltd., burlington. Ms Baeker is th sister of Karen Hastings and Susan McNeil. A familiar Blyth business changed hands when a new family took over the former Kate's Kitchen. Barbara Walsh is the new owner of the Sunoco station and restaurant which will be called Walsh's Cor- ner Café. Larry Walsh, with the help of Pat Jenkins, Lisa Bailey and Mike McDonald, was to manage the restaurant and gas bar. Blyth Reeve Albert Wasson was voted a four percent increase in his stipend. Grey Township ends its year with a surplus of approximately $78,000. Belgrave Co-op showed a bottom line profit for the year of $89,711, compared to $44,968 the previous year. The profit at Auburn branch was $13,164 up from $204. 12 YEARS AGO February 18, 1981 Brussels ended the year with a surplus of $56,455. Continued on page 5 PAGE 4. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1993. ditorial Have your say Huron County residents who care about health care should be preparing now to make sure their opinions get heard by the steering committee looking into the establishment of a District Health Council (DHC) in Huron. So far the committee is a bit of a mystery to most people. Paul Carroll, a superintendent with the Huron County Board of Education, has been named the chair of the committee and nominations have been made for the rest of the committee but no members have yet been named by the Ministry of Health. Once they have, however, hearings will be held to get the feelings of the people of Huron on whether there should be a DHC, a governing body for all health-care in the county. Healthcare professionals in the county will be sure to have their opinions on what should be happening but sometimes the best interests of the professionals and the best interested of the consumers are not the same thing. The voices of the ordinary people of the county should be heard. As Dr. Maarten Bokhout, Huron's medical officer of health told county council Feb. 4, the important thing is for Huron to give a clear signal as to whether it wants a DHC or not. Healthcare is a difficult subject for many people to grasp, but it is a life and death issue for county residents. It will take a good deal of research for people to know the ramifications of a DHC for the county. As Hullett Township Reeve Tom Cunningham said, "Unless the public is given sufficient information, they can't make up their minds." The Ministry of Health should immediately get information out to the public about what the issues are. The decision as to whether or not Huron gets a DHC is a major one. We need an informed public, and a public that makes clear just where it stands on the issue. If the public does not get involved, the Ministry maybe able to do whatever it wants, whether it's in the best interests of Huron residents or not.—KR Grass-roots shift good news The news that the Teeswater Co-op will take over ownership of the Belgrave and Auburn Co-ops from United Co-operatives of Ontario (UCO) seems like a good move for local supporters of the Co-ops. Belgrave Co-op was proudly independent for many years, started and supported by the local community. In the 1970's, however, when the co-op found itself in financial difficulty, it went with the trend of becoming part of the UCO organization. It was a move that kept the_ localbranch healthy for a number of years, but the move of UCO to be more than a wholesaler to member co-ops, as it had started out to be, was a bad move. The bureaucracy ballooned. UCO wallowed in debt and didn't seem to have any way of setting its house in order. Meanwhile at the local co-op, it became more and more difficult to do business as a panicky UCO management took over more and more of the management of local branches, even ones that had been run profitably as the Belgrave and Auburn branches have been. Then two years ago UCO decided something had to be done. It wanted to go back to what it originally was: a wholesaler to independent local co-ops. It started looking to ways to turn UCO branches across the province into independent co-ops again, but to lump them into larger units to take advantage of economies of scale. The marriage of the Teeswater branch, which has remained independent, with the Belgrave, Auburn and Mildmay branches, seems to be a good one. Jeff Hurst, manager at the Teeswater Co-op, is a former manager at Belgrave and knows the community well. He has promised to give local management a free hand in running the Belgrave and Auburn co-ops. It's good to see, in these days when the sense of co-operation in the rural area often seems to have been lost, that the co-operative movement is getting a new lease on life locally.—KR Silly regulation need changing There was a considerable amount of time wasted at the February meeting of Huron County Council when council went into private session so councillors could freely discuss the salary they were offering to pay a candidate for the clerk-administrator's job. Councillors were confused over the Freedom of Information and Privacy Act provisions about revealing government employees' salaries and worried what would happen if the figure became public. It's a silly rule, one that should be changed immediately. Perhaps there should be some right to privacy to secretaries or truck drivers but the salaries of top government employees should be public information.—KR