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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 1995-10-11, Page 4• CNA BLUE RIBBON AWARD 1995 Home spun Photo by Janice Becker Letters THE EDITOR, The Blyth Festival has completed a successful season, with the last play, He Won't Come In From The Barn, being held over an extra week due to popular demand. As volunteer co-ordinator for the Festival, I would like to take this opportunity through your newspaper to thank the more than 150 volunteers who contributed to the success of the season. Since the beginning of the year, these wonderful volunteers have mailed brochures, press releases and newsletters, distributed posters and flyers, made sandwiches and baked cakes for Opening Night Receptions, ushered and greeted theatre goers at the door, sold raffle tickets, washed dishes and made photocopies, decorated for the Opening Night dinner, sorted and set up books for the annual Book Sale, etc. Volunteers, including our hard- working board of directors, are the heart of the Blyth Festival. Without their time and many talents, we couldn't function successfully. Once again, thank you, thank you, thank you. Your hard work and dedication to the Festival are greatly appreciated. Sincerely, Joanne Walters Volunteer Co-ordinator. P.S. The Festival needs volunteers year-round and we are always looking for new people who might want to get involved. If you are interested, please call me at 523- 4345. A letter to Huron County municipalities DEAR MAYOR/REEVE AND MEMBERS OF COUNCIL: We are writing because we know you are concerned about 1996 tax rates. We wish to advise that we have already reached a 'zero' increase in 1996 estimated expenditures. Even so, we are working to reduce our spending by up to another $3 million for 1996. We have already cut millions of dollars from our spending in the last two years — and we have done so without labour disruptions or closing any local schools. We want you to know that we share your concern about property tax rates. Even though we are cutting costs dramatically, the education share of 1996 property taxes will still go up. There are two reasons: 1. Huron County is in year two of a phased-in increase in property assessment values for education tax purposes. The 20.7 per cent increase introduced in 1994 has already added about five per cent to six per cent on the tax rates — and will do so for at least three more years. 2. Unless the new government changes the way education is financed, there will also be another upward adjustment in the minimum share of the per pupil grant required from local property taxpayers. The impact could also be another five per cent. These are NOT grant reductions. These are changes in the minimum amount required from property taxes to pay the local share of the education bill. They are set by Ontario. The Board has appealed for changes many times. No changes have been forthcoming. We request your support for education finance reform. It is unfair to rural Ontario. We have failed to get any positive response from successive governments. An appeal to the Premier on our behalf may be of assistance. Respectfully - and with concern, Trustees, Huron County Board of Education. PAGE 4. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 11, 1995. C The North Huron itizen P.O. Box 429, P.O. Box 152, Publisher, Keith Roulston BLYTH, Ont. BRUSSELS, Ont. Editor, Bonnie Gropp NOM 1H0 NOG 1H0 Phone 523-4792 Phone 887-9114 Advertising Manager, FAX 523.9140 FAX 887-9021 Jeannette McNeil The Citizen is published weekly in Brussels, Ontario by North Huron Publishing Company Inc. Subscriptions are payable In advance at a rate of $23.00/year ($21.50 plus $1.50 G.S.T.) for local; $33.00/year ($30.85 plus $2.15 G.S.T.) for local letter carrier in Goderich, Hanover, Listowel, etc. and out-of-area (40 miles from Brussels); $62.00/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 © Copyright. Publications Mail Registration No. 6968 A world turned upside down Whether the verdict in the O.J. Simpson trial was the proper one or not (and who are we to say when the jury members lived through every boring second of the trial while we got only newsbits) it had a lot to say about the mindset of Americans in the 1990s. A majority of African- Americans celebrated the verdict as a victory for black people over a corrupt police system. While white Americans saw the verdict as victory for a very rich man, able to hire a team of the most high-priced lawyers in America, black Americans saw an underdog slaying a goliath. White Americans can only shake their heads and wonder how anyone could see millionaire Simpson as a victim of the system. But we're all very good at making ourselves victims today. Wealthy Canadians have convinced themselves that they are victims in the 1990s society. An article in Maclean's magazine last week detailed the growing business of helping upper middle class Canadians set up off- shore bank accounts and dummy corporations to shield billions of dollars from taxes. These tax evaders argue that they are only getting for themselves what the very rich have done for years, people like-the late billionaire K. C. Irving who, despite making his wealth in Canada, begrudged paying taxes to support the society he benefited from. It's that kind of attitude that's behind the Harris government mania to cut costs in programs for the poor and give a tax break to the wealthy. If the cuts were all in an effort to rein in the deficit it would be one thing, but Harris has promised to give a break to Ontario income taxpayers which will benefit those with a higher income more than those with low incomes. Harris proclaims that the tax break will pump money into the economy but for what? Many economists have said that the only thing that kept the continuing recession of the 1990s from being as bad as the Depression of the 1930s is that the social services safety net has kept money in the hands of the poor. Not only did this keep people off the streets or from "riding the rails" in a desperate search for any work, but it gave them money to buy food at local stores and pay their rent and create jobs for others, preventing the kind of downhill spiral that dragged the continent into the grim years of 1929 to 1939. As John MacKinnon, Huron social services administrator, pointed out to Huron County council, welfare cuts will take a half million dollars out of the local economy, which will mean fewer jobs in stores and ultimately, on farms and in factories. Poor people don't have much choice but to spend their dollars in Canada. Harris's tax cut, however, may easily be spent in vacations in Florida or hidden in those off-shore bank accounts, thereby increasing the government's cash crunch by reducing income on taxes for things bought and made in Canada. To take Harris's theory that dollars spent by the rich do more for the economy than dollars spent by the poor to its illogical conclusion perhaps we should introduce a special tax on the poor, and hand that money to the rich. We could call it an equity tax. After all, to listen to them, it is the poor upper-middle class taxpayer who is the real victim in the 1990s. — KR Get involved in planning There's a rare opportunity for Huron County residents to get involved in deciding their future in the coming months. Huron is to get a new official plan and the public is being invited to help design it. Of course when residents become involved, they may become frustrated that they can't do more. Under Bill 163, the recent amendments to the planning act pushed through by the previous NDP government, there are a strict set of guidelines for development that tie the hands of those who would like to see development in rural areas. Although the Harris government has promised to scrap Bill 163, those guidelines are still in effect as this plan begins. If Huron residents want control over the way land use is regulated in the county, they must be ready to get involved in the process. They must be prepared to fight government rules and bureaucratic inertia to make sure they do get a system that is flexihle but protects the rural nature of the county and the environment. Be prepared to speak now or forever hold your peace. — KR E ditorial