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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes Advocate, 1992-02-26, Page 4TIrnes-Adveasta, February. Mt V11112 fir: Am swan Nem DOW Adr sn Harte Dominoes r: Don Smith COMPOSitlen r: Deb Lord Publications WO NegistretIon Number oaes t *L. 40 rs.ss I Ices.) oilbaasad teausaihmaaalassidamallillgallabal/LSSIOATS _ Ostekle 40 aiea fell lout.) et enilettet metier.ddtese 610.00 plea MAO postage (told 540.00) [ties •4.20 G.S.T. OuteMs Caaada 041.00 • • I I)t'(t )I I \I Public scrutiny, the surest way This is a time of year when the differing policies and practic- es of our -local municipalities become very apparent. Under the Municipal Act, councils are required to release an annual statement of what they are paid, so the public can better understand what elected officials receive as payment. The differences can be quite illuminating. Some councils deliver statements of remuneration directly to reporters, say- ing they have nothing to hide. Others will only release sucl, f; g ures when asked, others will come up with many excuses as to why the figures aren't available. Who is paying these people? You are. The Grand Bend office, for example, claims to have released the remunera- tion figures secretly to council, but not to the public. It would seem in Grand Bend that council is not a publicly elected body which meets in public. The point of the Municipal Act regula- tion is that by releasing remuneration totals to council, the ratepayers thereby see them. Not so with Grand Bend, a council which claims to be making the public process more open, but is doing the opposite. Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of the way in which council members are paid, is that there is almost Ino rhyme $nor reason to the various methods em- ployed, even amongst neighbouring townships. For example, you may have noticed last week's report that the Stephen Township reeve will receive $275 for signing cheques,°up from $222.60 last year. But the Hay Township reeve re- ceived $700 for the same function in 1991, and a whopping $875 in 1990 - all for a few signatures. . Usbome Township, however, awards no cheque signing fees to its reeve be- cause the treasurer has the authority to sign all cheques. The reeve only signs cheques when the treasurer is on vaca- ' tion, and is not paid for that function anyway. This is not to suggest that the Usbome reeve is somehow getting short-changed. Remuneration seems arbitrary and nonsensical at times, which is why we do our best to let those who are paying the bill, see where the money is going. The same applies to municipal staff salaries. We recognize this is a sensitive _subject for many of these employees, be- cause in this nation we somehow corre- late personal worth with our salaries. In smaller towns, villages, and townships like our own, it sometimes appears im- possible to separate the employ* from the position, but we still feel it is essen- tial to let the public know how much they are paying their own civil servants. Again, some councils insist on being completely open about staff salary pay grids and. increases, others insist such things are secrets under the Freedom of Information and Privacy Act. In some cases, the public conjures up wild images of how overpaid their mu- nicipal staff are, only to be brought back down to reality when the actual figure appears in these pages. We've also seen cases where council would like to con- ceal the fact that a longstanding employ- ee has received so many salary increases over the years that there are a dozen or more people in the area who would glad- ly do the job at half the price. For the most part, municipal employ- ees aren't really as overpaid as many would like to believe, but councils should be prepared to submit their wage budgets to public scrutiny. The public, not coundil, are the employers, after all. Hiding the figures will not fare well with voters who need to see their tax dollars being spent wisely in a time of zero -percent pay increases, pay cuts to save jobs, and high unemployment. We will continue to press local munici- palities for statements of remuneration, salaries, and pay increases, not because of a perverse desire to annoy politicians,. but because we truly believe the public has a right to know. Most have no prob- lem with this, but those who feel a need to suppress the facts will not go unno- ticed. Acting my age Whenever I was rambunctious as a child, my mother used to tell me to act my age. She meant, of course, that I should act like an adult. "Act your age," our stem teachers used to demand when we .made paper airplanes in- stead of paying attention in class. When we were restless because of the - wart spring sun. When we couldn't wait to escape the torture of math or grammar. Yet we were doing precisely that; acting our age. After all, we were young. I'm sure I've said it many times myself without realizing how foolish it was.. "Why don't you act your age. Alexander!" What was the boy supposed to do in- stead of clowning around, read the obituary columns in the newspaper? -So it came as quite a stack to me when this same Alexander - who_ttas recently turned 13 - told me, his rather, to act my age. At first his remark bothered me. What had I done? Then 1 un- derstood. I ,had committed Ohne of the unforgivable sine; of a parent: I had embarrassed him in Isom of his friend. I had said "how**. ly tlwesome." . Apply That is a phrase re- served for Alexander's genera- tion. When they say it, they're true. When I say it, I'm false. I had crossed over into their terri- tory, violated their space. Bad form. "Get real, Dad! Act your age!" I should have said something like "Remarkable" or "extraordi- nary" or "how very unusual" Those terms would have been expected behaviour from an old fogey like me. From someone who not only remembers World War ll, but who was bom during the Great Depression. Fossils are Peter's Point • Peter Hessel supposed to use fossil language ioatead of pretending that they're still alive, that they belong f In this [Mudd. Point taken. Alexander. 01 try not 10 disappoint you . [Aplin. Es- pecially when one of your peers batt hear me. I11 act easy afire and demand that your roam is meat and orderly. A.D.H. that your bed is made every morning before you g0 to school, and that you do all the other little chores around the house we had agreed upon. Re- member? 111 act my age and re- mind you that you still haven't paid me back the thirteen dollars you owe me for the tape you had to have so urgently when we were at the mall and you had for- gotten your wallet, as usual. No, it has nothing to do with being sore. I understand perfect- ly that people should act their age, especially fathers. Everyone should know their place, espe- cially fathers. I will no longer use terms that belong in the nineties when I'm the kind of guy that reminds people of old movies. Yes, the late-night kind of old movies. Np, not the dent movies, Alexander. Now you're being insulting. They were long before my time. I will act my age and always address pu and your Friends in a manner that Is proper for an old- er pereoct. I epee with you, par- ents should nu dress like kids or talk like kids. They shoal un- derstand that the •11o.o, pardon me. I man the Wove of the ME serheurion Is doe yams p: PiC410 am some 5 "Men are never so likely, to settle a question rightly, as when they discuss It freely." ... Thomas Macauley P bilobed E•o& Nrerfisi t at la / 424 Mat., Exeter, Ostarlo, NOM les byJ.W. E 'MNoatfo•e la. TeMMeee 1-$411.2'61 e.e.T. seioeneees "Here goes — I'm turning on the news.'" Shape of things to come There were a few at Monday evening's Reform Party meeting who weren't entirely sold on the ideas being presented. Most of those expressed some concern that while this •upstart party is promising some attractive changes to Canada's political landscape, some of these re- forms are just too good to be true. . Others echoed the sentiments that the big three parties have been warning the nation of in past weeks, that the Reform Par- ty has some kind of hidden, right-wing, Christian fundamen- talist agenda that they're not re- vealing to a public unwilling to hear of it. All I know is that these new- comers on the block are getting more attention in this riding than if all the Family Coalition Party, Christian Heritage Party, and Li- bertarians were to set them- selves on fire in the Goderich town square. These are definite- ly the early days of a fourth ma- jor party for Canadian politics, much like the first stirrings of the CCF challenged the two- party system several decades ago. But who are these reformers of today (1 suppose you recall that the Liberals used to be known as reformers in the first few years of this century)? Do they leave any clues as to where these ad- dictive policies came from? I have to admit I was fascinat- ed, or even a little dismayed when I spotted a stack of photo- copies of the words to O Canada at Monday's meeting. Who do they suspect might not know the • words? Then there was the man who stood up and lambasted Canadi- an society for not being struc- tured as well as that of the Unit- ed States, a system he said has Hold that thought ... By Adrian Harte not caused problems like ours. Obviously he was forgetting that the U.S. Constitution was not a century old before the nation di- vided in a war which claimed more Americans than any con- flict since. Some people should choose their examples with more care. On a more serious note, I dis- covered why MacLeans colum- nist Alan Fotheringham likes to call the Reform leader "Presto" Manning. Mondays speaker Patrick Muttart glibly said the party sees Canada not as a foun- dation of races and ethnic groups, blit as a federation of provinces, That sounds like what a lot of people would like to hear, but I doubt that such a nice tum of phrase would slow down the special interest groups lobbying Ottawa for a piece of the Constitutional , pie for one second. Those people will not disappear just because a new government is elected. As dis- tasteful as it seems at times, Canada's problems will have to be dealt with through negotia- tion, not wishful thinking. I'm still not certain how the re- formers' scheme for holding lo- cal .referendums will work. They say a significant govern- ment issue like the GST should be taken to a public vote. So how do you get public approval for a new tax, or a potentially Unpopular policy? Do you risk losing taxation by having it vot- ed down, or do you offer voters a choice of taxes on a ballot? 1 still haven't got a solid concept of how the referendum idea would work in that context, if it would work at all. But what is certain is that the Reform Party is on the rise at a time when it stands to benefit the most. The Conservatives ap- pear doomed, the Liberals weak, and the NDP unlikely to make the kind of gains they did in On- tario. Without Quebec's sup- port, the Reform Party isn't like- ly to win the next federal race, but they will be a bigger factor than their detractors believe - their policy book does spell out a set of party beliefs, something missing from the big three these days. This is already shaping up to be a week of politics. Friday morning, if all goes well, I will be listening to a speech from Bob Rae. Saturday morning, it will be Joe Clark. How will 1 be able to reconcile the "wisdom" of those two with what I heard Monday. The only sparjt of sanity in the whole week is that Formula One season opens on Sunday. Pop. chips and a TV set - that's what Canadians want. What's on your mind? (•et(11) t14• (;[Blur The Times Advocate continues to welcome letters to the editor as a forum for open discussion of local Issues, conoems, complaints, and kudos. The Times Ad- vocate reserves the right to edit letters for brevity. P1e08e send your letters to P.O. Box 850 Exeter, Ontario, NOM 156. Sign your letter with both name and ad- dress.. Anonymous letters will not be published. r,.