HomeMy WebLinkAboutHuron Expositor, 2002-03-13, Page 11Church
hopes
to expand
on park
land in
Vanastra
Huron East council is
entering negotiations with
the Vanastra Community
Christian Reformed Church
about the possibility of the
church buying some of
Vanastra's parkland so that
it can expand.
"Tuckersmith council
met with them last October
on site. They would like to
put an addition on their
church," Clerk -
Administrator Jack
McLachlan told council at
its Feb. 20 meeting.
McLachlan said the
community has four other
parks and will retain
parkland to the south of the
parcel the church hopes to
buy. He added that the
church will keep as many
trees as possible on the site.
News
Heads up...
Susan Hundertmarkphoto
Ian VanDoornik in Grade 1 at St. James Catholic School took part in a tour of Seaforth
Community Hosital last Thursday.
Board gets extention on loan application
after ambigous application makes it hard
By SteW Slater
Special to The Huron Expositor
After tilling out a mistake -
marred, ambiguously -worded
questionnaire from Ontario's
education ministry, the two
district school boards in
Huron and Perth Counties
have been granted an
extension on their application
for the Student Transportation
Loan Program.
The program provides
interest-free loans to such
"coterminous" boards when
they implement government -
approved computer software
for efficiently scheduling
cooperative bus routes.
At the January meeting of
the Huron -Perth Catholic
District School Board, staff
reminded trustees that the
two boards already partake in
a significant level of
cooperative transportation,
but explained that officials
had decided to apply for the
grant in hopes that further
savings could be achieved.
However, they also decided
to ask for an extension
beyond the Jan. 31
application date, because of
the considerable time
necessary to study the
software alternatives. coupled
with Huron County's very
recent conversion to the 9-1-1
rural address system.
At the board's subsequent
regular meeting, Monday,
Feb. 26, director of education
Gaetan Blanchette confirmed
the extension had been
granted, with Huron -Perth
and the Avon Maitland
District School Board now
expected to hand in a full
loan application by the end of
June, 2001.
But also included in the
information packages for the
meeting was a photocopy of
the original application
questionnaire, which was
filled out in part by officials
from the two boards and
submitted by the Jan. 31
deadline, along with a letter
stating "it will be impossible
to (fully) complete this
assessment and review within
the timeframe expected under
the application."
The questionnaire, which is
just over one page long, can
hardly be considered
adequate considering it was
created by employees of the
Ministry of Education.
In the program's title atop
the first page, the second
letter is missing from the
word "Transportation." And
for the final question, the
person responding on behalf
of the Huron -Perth and Avon
Maitland boards was forced
by ambiguous wording to
insert a clarifying note.
In the question, the
respondent is asked to answer
"yes" or "no" to the following
statement: "Existing
resources are not duplicated."
The Huron-Perth/Avon
Maitland respondent
answered "yes." hut
obviously didn't want this to
be misinterpreted to mean
that resources ARE
duplicated. So an extra note
was included, stating, "this
statement is correct --
Existing resources are not
duplicated."
Blanchette wasn't
concerned about grammatical
or spelling errors. He did,
however, criticize some of the
wording in the questionnaire,
saying it pointed to the wider
issue of the Conservative
government's unswerving
promotion of such
cooperative ventures.
"(Government officials)
have this great idea about
working together and how it's
going to save all this money,
but they don't actually know
about how it all works within
the school hoards," the
director of education said.
He reiterated that the two
hoards have already worked
together on transportation
schedules for many years. He
also explained that, in small
boards like the ones in Huron
and Perth Counties, often
only one person per hoard
handles all transportation -
related duties, sometimes in
conjunction with other
responsibilities.
These people will still be
necessary at both boards even
after a cooperative
computerized system is
implemented, so the savings
could be quite small.
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