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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes Advocate, 1992-02-12, Page 2• Pep 2 TUnss-Advooale, Fsbntary 12,1192 I Ane you expecting or giving anything special on Valentlne 's Day? What do you think? "I'm going to give valentines to my class at McCurdy Public School" - --„leemAgenw.- Exeter `alearn expecting a dinner out” Crofton "Yes, I'm going to give and receive valentines from ply friends but not #toile ►__boyfriends" Patty Hilppern Huron Park "Not really. It's more of a Hallmark holiday than a genuine one. We remember it but nothing extravagant" cou rtney-Hnselka Exeter "I'm giving Little Pony valentines. My birthday is the day before Valen- tine's Day and I want a Little Pony, another cup: cake doll, a train ...." Huron County council looking to keep- budget to five percent By Fred Groves GODERICH - The ten Huron County urban municipalities in- cluding Exeter, Hensel( and Zurich will see an adjustment to their county road rebates. In order to prevent the county roads deparunent from increasing its overall levy by two percent, a recommendation has been made that when the county's budget is set, it will mean a zao increase from the roads department. At Thursday's county council meeting, a 22-8 in favour of vote, recommencied that the Exeter re- bate will be increased from $78,333 to $78,457 while Hensall's is down $21,811 from $22,409 and Zurich's will drop slightly to $7,62x, from $8,501. i" The final budget which is sched- uled „ lie be. « -, )ate next month, is cot�itig. `'• Apse scru- tiny by, ►•heti eunoia, County Engineer Dennis Merrell reported to council three different alternatives to help compensate what he expects to be a loss of funds from the Ministry of Trans- portation. Council's recommendation will see the urban municipalities receive a 40 percent rebate, down from 45 percent. However, at least one county councillor was not satisfied. "'There must be other ways. I urge council and the engineers to come up with alternatives," said Goderich Township's Bill Clifford. At last month's county council meeting, it was clearly indicated ru- ral municipalities would be paying less in taxes because of full market value assessment. "Some people are winners and some are losers. The assessment is not uniform, urban is different," said Merrell. He said some services provided by the roads department will suffer such as reduced resurfacing and a reduced maintenance program. "We as farmers are getting cern- plaints," said Hallen Township's Tom Cunningham. "I wonder if it's. shortsighted to have the weeds grow and have trouble in our fields." light budget:. -Huron County mit is attempting tokeeptheir --biallgetUt about five percent. • Some committees have already submitted preliminary drafts and one of them, the Library Board's budget, was not accepted. Chief Li- brarian Beth Ross was told to re- consider and bring back a zero per- cent increase. "This is a very difficult situation for our chief librarian to be in and still maintain service," said Gode- rich Township's John Doherty. Last year there were 280,000 vis- its to Huron County library branch- es. "If you cut services and bring in a zero percent budget, that might be fine this year but it will have impli- cations in five years. I suggest two or three percent," said Doherty. Clerk -Administrator Nigel Bell - chamber said it is possible the bud- get could be six percent due primar- ily to the increasing cost of Social Services. Exeter's Bill Mickle said even five percent was too much. "I would encourage not to look at five percent but something lower. There area lot of people out there hurting," he said of the county's ec- onomic outlook. Bellchamber said the 1991 year end figures are not in yet and he also said the county salaries are only increasing by an average of two ,percent. Provincial increases are one pert nL Mickle was not satisfied with, the two percent increase because be felt there were hidden increases and said smoke and mirrors were being used. "We should be looking at hard and fast rules. The two percent is not two percent when you add grid on top of it which is another one percent" weather , • • : ' slppesy , conditions well into Monday caul many traffic accidents. This single car accident occurred around 1:30 on Highway 84 Just west of County Road 31. The driver, Ann S. O'Brien of Zwkh was not injured in the accident whk.h saw her 1980 Chevrolet impala overtum. Accidents EXETER - The Gmeter OPP de- tachment reported vehicle Beddow' this pest week. Winter road conditions appear to have been a main caused these mishaps. Last Tuesday a vehicle operated by Bnaoe Grinion of St. Marys went out of control on ice coveted roads at the curve on Qty. Rd, 6 sear Kukton. There wereno iy ju- ries, bort the vehicle sestaieed 10 - Vire a reticle operated Eden Dale of Clintonwent off highway 4. Only aijno, injuries were sustained sod light champ to the vehicle. Ftk*ay a vehtle °pealed by James Oke of Easter, slid out of control oa Ctv. Rd. 6. The vehicle s wroly Mim40t the driv- er maimed minor • • • Maybe by 1993 Gas service one step closer for Zurlch ZURICH - YiWge council have learned that it is one step closer to mein ural tat piped how Zurich is the fauaesahle fee. Union Cies officials have sketched outs tativd pias to dotard a S00 psi Wee west .fitom Hansell to service the village. Jaen south aloAnother plan considered ng the Goalies toad w Dashwood. •q beenas put aof pias by Grand Bead, but thto service Zurich at appears to sun be name years away. NeveAbejess, if an economic study to gauge the num5cr of poten- tial gas customers in Zurich is favorable, and perhaps if govenunent energy incentives are available, the pipeline could go ahead. In fact, the line could even be installed this summer, although act- ing clerk Steve Armstrong said that scenario was "not likely" and a more realistic completion date was the summer of 1993. While government funding may be an added incentive, Armstrong said "If there's enough customers they just run it, and look for a 4-5 year pay back on the line." Exeter Liberal delegate surprised by Elston's defeat HAMILTON - Exeter lawyer Kim McLean went to Hamilton on the weekend to support of Liberal leadership candidate Murray. Elston, and as he de- scribed it Monday afternoon, "12 hours later, he lost by nine votes". ` Bruce County's Elston was expected to win the bid to lead the provincial party which lost to the NDP in the 1990 election, however, as other candi- dates were forced out of the race some lent their support to Lyn McLeod and others released their delegates to choose freely. In the end; five ballots later, McLeod emerged as the winner, if by a nar- row margin. McLean speculates that if Elston had been able to fuer just five more delegates to support him, he might have been able to win over the few more he needed to win. Other observers have suggested Els- ton's late entry into the leadership race hurt his chances of winning supporters. McLean said that he personally saw Greg Sorbara as his -second choice, who lasted until the fourth bal- lot, by which time McLeod was already ahead of Elston. McLean said he had considered McLeod "not tough enough" for the leadership position, but after the Sunday morning breakfast with the party's first female leader, he said he may have n'iisjudged her. "She did a really good job of healing," said McLean. "That's the way irgoes, and we're all Lib- erals at the end of it." With no provincial election in sight until 1995, McLean said.all six leadership hopefuls took turns bashing the 17 month-old NDP government, which McLean described as having a "brilliant" leader but a very poor cabinet. Other local representatives at the Hamilton con- vention included Joe Hogan and Usbarne reeve Pat Down, who incidentally was the only one of the 16 from Huron County who supported Lyn McLeod. All delegates to the convention were required to vote for. their candidate on the first ballot, but were allowed to change allegiance from the second ballot on. McLean said there was evidence of such shifts in support at the convention, especially since candi- date Steve Mahoney actually lost votes on the sec- , and belt7t, and while David Ramsay threw his sup- port behind McLeod, she did not gain jll his 216 votes. - Hospitals facing cutbacks Continued from front page close in the area due to its large amount of out-patient care. Deters said the challenge of matching the one -percent funding increase to the fixed cost increases the hospital faces will be facing will be difficult,. but at the same time he acknowledged that the province's hospital system has per- haps had it "too easy" in having its demands for funds met in the past. "It's not just our province, it's all over," agreed Deters. Hospital administrator Don Cur- rell will be announcing some of those cost-cutting measures later in the week after a hospital board meeting. "We're hoping for not drastic changes, lays put it that way," con- cluded Deters. . Dr. Maarten Bokhout at the Hu- ron County Health Unit, an agency which oversees general health pro- grams in the area, including school immunizations, parenting„classes, • health inspection: disease control, family planning, and an informa- tion system for seniors among other things, said be is not yet stere whether the ate-per+oent health care funding increase will be applied to his agency, but be fully eapaxs drastic cutbacks in the budget through the use of some "funny - looking figures". He said the unit's telephone bud- get goes up four or five percent each year and wonders how that can be cut in light of budget re- straint. Continuing education pro- grams for staff, asid Bokhout, are a good idea, but may have to go by the wayside if .the matey is no bager there. °There's no question that the hos- pital* are facing the same problems we do," be said, suggesting. [bat some hospital administrators in the county are likely ooIvti dqg *aft cutbacks and even bed dams to Meet budget goals. Another gym. Mid 1 is that the cost of equipment goes up even in emcees of inflation. As mora high-tech ,WI bpd equipment god supplies come on Me ***et hospitals, notto ,settlefor second best. arewec ftd to pur- chase it. The public also often de- maadt the more aversive supplies $ and drugs. Bokhout said one exam- ple is how plaster casts are only one tenth the cost of the new plas- tics. Plaster is also more rigid, but patients prefer the more costly plas- tic because of its light weight. High-technology equipment is of- ten showcased by hospitals wanting to appear up to date, and manufac- turers also play up to those needs by loading equipment with elec- tronic automation, even though manual machines work well with experienced staff, said Bokhour afford to go on increasing health Bokhout said the province can't budgets by nine or ten percent each year "forever". Dan Meidinger, director of fi- nance at the Clinton Public Hospi- tal, said while they will manage to finish the fiscal year in March with- out a deficit, the one -percent fund- ing increase for 1992 will make the upcoming budget discussions diffi- cult "We're taking a serious look at it now," said Meidinger, adding that smaller hospitals like those in the county do not have as much flexi- bility for cost cutting like large ur- ban hospitals. "You can't go close 25 beds, be- cause you're closing most of your hospital,” he observed. The possibility of the board fac- ing a deficit budget for 1992 is very real, said Meidinger, and the wind- fall realized by closing the chronic care beds due to renovations like this past December is not likely to be repeated in 1992. 81LL HASKETT We'reglad youasked! 606 FLETCHER :As funeral directors, we we concerned with the health of bereaved jleople, both emotional and physical. k is for this reason that we feel compelled to wam those friends and relatives of the bereaved of the dangers of ''sharing' tranquilizers with them. We realize this is often done in the spirit of caring and with all good in- tentions. 8ut physicians warn that prescription medicine should never be taken by anyone tor whom it was not prescribed. There's another reason, too. Noted theologian Paul kion says the use of mediation to alleviate tip pain felt by bereaved people may actually show the,proosss of recovering from their grief. Often, Irian writes, se- dation merey4Mprs the reaction until a later time; then, there may not be a group of supportive people present to help the person through it. We invite your and qs, which will be [answered in pri- vate or pitMWyj through s oolu TARlO FuUtAfEEAAI E AS.SUCIATK J enooraoraMdl el65/CP)il FUNWAAL HOME Phpno 235-1220