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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes Advocate, 1998-01-21, Page 2Page 2 Times-AdvoFate; January 21,1998 Regional wrap up Perth hospitals receive $870,000 PERTH COUNTY -.Hospitals in Perth County will receive nearly $870,000 to cover the - cost of restructuring operations, reported the St. Marys Journal Argus. . St. Marys Memorial Hospital will receive $279,800, Stratford General Hospital will receive $477,800 and Listowel Memori- al Hospital. will .receive r$110,800. All_ eight hospitals in Huron and Perth are now run by one board with shared -services. The funding supports the steps .these hospitals have taken and reim- burses them for one-time operat- ing costs related to restructuring. North Huron restructuring underway NORTH HURON The North Huron Municipal, Restructuring Committee presented an interim draft report at a meeting in Bel - grave Jan. 8 outlining the com- mittee's work, stated the -North Huron Citizen. The following issues were considered: to retain local auton- omy; accountable and responsi- ble local government; maintain- ing alocal volunteer base and sense of local-- community; present and -potential operation . overview; fairness and equity; .economic, environmental, social' and cultural 'needs planned and provided:. Back to normal at Goderich hospital GODERICH - Almost. every- thing's back, to. normal at' Gode- rich's Alexandra Marine and General Hospital this week after -a rare antibiotic resistant bacte- ria. scare virtually stopped the hospital from operating. The Goderich Signal Star re- ported that surgery had been sus- pended, births were being han- dled at other hospitals and visitors were restricted as a cleansing program was launched just before the New.Year to rid the hospital of the bacteria. - Elmwood man sentenced for threatening clerk ELMWOOD An- Elmwood man was sentenced .10 five months in jail for threatening a store- clerk with a weapon the clerk believed to. be real, stated the Walkerton Herald -Times. -.The incident happened at a Beckers ' store in Hanover -on Dec. 30 when 54 -year-old Grant Stanborough told a female clerk he was going to spend the night with her in the store. He helped' himself .to a hot chocolate and announced he was not going to pay for it and he did not carc•if she called the police. He pulled out what the clerk believed to be a gun from his jacket and threat- ened to shoot her, at which point she phoned the police. . He paid for the hot chocolate and left thc store, but was arrest- ed before he was off the proper ty.Police found a plastic revol- ver in his possession. Ipperwash not cost more than $2 mil iPPERWASH - The massive police containment of the 1995 native occupation of ipperwash Provincial Park cost more than $2 million, reported the Parkhill Gazette. In total, OPP spent $2.12 mil- lion on wages, overtime, meals, accommodations and vehicles during the riot. This information was obtained from a Toronto re- porter who pieced together the information from documents ob- tained under the Freedom of In- formation Act. [1\LTHF WEWS _ U.C. moderator visits Exeter Restructuring suggestions. Giving suggestions on how Grand Bend should restructure it- self tself was a major part of last Wednesday's Grass Roots for a Greater Grand Bend meeting. • Here, Oxford County_MPP and parliamentary assistant to the ministry of municipal affairs Er- nie Hardeman (right) talks restructuring to Grass Roots spokesperson and resident of Southcott Pines Roy Merkley and Southcott Pines resident Jim Milne. The future of Grand. Bend on the hot seat MPP for Oxford. County told Grass R oots members and local politicians a restructuring proposal should be designed By Chantal! Van Raay T A Reporter "It's important that we don't lose .:sight of the fact that a single -tier . • govcrmnent is not the only answer. - GRAND BEND Members of The options arc endless," he said. - ..Grass Roots- for a Greater Grand "There's no reason to say a'two-tier Bend met with localpoliticianslast • municipality can't provide services: - Wednesday to discuss the future of I don't think 'you should discard it Grand Bend and surrounding area. . as an unacceptahlc option." Two years ago ,.Grass Roots for a - Southcott Pines' resident and Greater Grand Bend Community spokesperson ,for Grass -Rooits Roy met to discuss the support of a uni- Merkley . explained 16 the group • what Grass Roots is "It's important that trying to -address. we don't lose sight "We're all sitting • of the fact that a in the largest urban centre between - single -tier Goderich and Sar - government is not nia. This residential fled Grand Bend - community from the Pinery to. Highway #83. The groups main: concern '.was - Grand. - Bend is the largest single community he- .tween • Sarnia and • Goderich yet it is gov- erned by three separate municipal- ities.. • Wednesday's meeting' attracted politicians; from Bosanquct, Grand Bend and Stephen as well. as Ernie Hardeman and Liz McGrath from Quedis Park 'tb" ditcuus the future of Grand Bend as a single -tier mu- nicipal government. . - - Hardeman the MPP for Oxford County- as -well . as "the. parlia- mentary assistant to thc ministry -of municipal affairs. Because his spe- cialty is in municipal restructuring, he was asked to attend the meeting. Hardeman discussed the future of Grand Bend saying restructuring talks should include the people of the community and ,cost-effective services, as well .as different meth- ods of amalgamation.. "The best solution' to your situa- tion is to look at it locally and come -up with the hest solution for the people in a cost-efficient man- ner," he said. He suggested drawing a big cir- cle and•callipg it the study arca of Grand Bend. "Where do we draw the circle? What is our study arca?" he asked. "What you need is a proposal. You need one to submit to the: conn' munity," he said, adding .that pro- posal should behacked up with facts and figures. ` - arca • is something .the only. answer. - we call the greater The options are. -Grand Bend arca," endless."- tie said, adding the '• - hest -Solation would - he for the greater Grand Bend area to become one, instead of three sep-'' arate entities, as it currently;is. "As soon as that happens, Grass,' Roots will come to an end." • One issue discussed at the meet- ing was hdw healthcare is effected by amalgamation. Dr. Liam O'Conner, a resident • of Southcott Pines who has been a doctor -.for the Grand .. Bend arca • for 27 years discussed the • frag- mentation of medical ser- vices that currently -exists in Grand Bend and surrounding Communities. "People have to go everywhere under. the sun for basic -medical ser- vices that should be available in a community the size of ours." t He said the elderly and sick who do not have transportation to med- ical care outside of Grand Bend arc at a disadvantage. Dr. Peter Englert, also of South - coil Pines elaborated onO'Conner's speech by saying health care in Grand Bend is at its extreme- limit because they are often ignored. "Grand Bend is always ignored . because we're so far away. They say _there's not enough people hut - if you gather them all together- there ogether►here are a lot of people," he said, adding there are twice as many sen- ior citizens in the greater Grand Bend area thanthe rural average. Englert added the Grand Bend area is one of . the most underserviced for doctors in Lamhton County. There are presently three doctors servicing•thc arca and Ingells said for the arca there should be at least .two times as many doctors. -Southcott Pines .resident - Jim Milne addressed the local pol- iticians regarding other services af- fectcd by . the fragmentation of boundaries in, Grand Bend. He -said garbage' IS picked up by three separate munitipalitics and this causes confusion of when gar-, bags pickup actually is., H4 also gave the example of •wa- ter"service. ' - "Water is billed from three separ- ate municipalities even though it comes from the same pipe line." ' Animal control, library, services. artssticIal Services are also. effected by boundaries, Milne said. - • McGrath from the ministry of municipal affairs gave statistics of how restructuring has affected Ontario since its inception , in - 1996.. She said in July ' 1996, when re- structuring talks were .just beginning, there were 815 municipal ities in - Ontario. By Jan, 1997 there were 787. At the beginning of this year the number of municipalities were down to 646 and .statistics show the number should continue to decline to 581 by Jan. 1999, she said. Hardeman forecasted thc • future of sniall municipalities. "i don't think the future is very bright for small municipalities. 1 think in the future we'll sec a great Variation of sizes. There is no mag- ic number hut I think it's foolish to think we can preserve municipal- ities as they currently exist," he said, "I think it's foolish to think we can preserve municipalities as they currently exist." Possible s6hool closures sr Continued from front page space. "Maybe we should kook at taking some of the heat off Exeter Public and adding more enrolment to Us - borne. Boundary issues arc ahways controversial,"•Carroll said. "McCurdy Public School has am- ple extra space that should he looked at somehow," he said. Stephen Central School has limit- ed space available' for extra stu- dents. The possibility of municipal amalgamation affecting Huron County's border at Grand Bend complicates the issue. • Zurich Public School is full. if not over -full, but Hensall Public School has some space. If the ncw funding model al- locates dollars for the maintenance of buildings on a per pupil basis, then thcrc will he money to pay for 10,000 pupil places on thc Huron side. "The question is how do you pay for the upkeep and maintenance of thc other 4,000 spaces. You just can't do it," he explained. To keep all the schools open, more money needs to be taken from classroom spending and in- structional staff. "There's no way we can solve the problem by re -allocating money in- side the budget. We're going to have to look at how many buildings we operate. The issue of school closings was brought to light after a trustee raised the question at last Tucs day's board meeting. "i welcome the opportunity to put the cards on the table. The rumor mill can really go way wrong," Carroll said. "No matter what you do, it's a tough call. There's no easy answer." Thc same information is being gathered for the former Perth County board which will lead to some short-term and long-term de- cisions. Perth currently has 42 port- able classrooms. "We need to look at how many arc actually needed and pare down thc numbers and in fact, we need to undertake a longer term program to get rid of chem all," explained Car- roll. The decision also has to be made to make junior kindergarten con- sistent throughout the hoard..Huron schools have JK but Penh schools do' not. Adding JK in Perth in- creases the stress on the tight space while dropping it in Huron reduces enrolment which in turn, decreases funding. Carroll said the decision can be made as soon as funding in- formation is received from the ,province and could he in place by September. ' "'[hese are really difficult 'matters that have to he addressed," Carroll said. The location for the administra- tion center of the AVDSB will hopefully he decided by March. Thc hoard is'stilling looking at the options of keeping two offices, con- solidating the operations at the Clinton or Stratford site or moving to a ncw location. If the headquarters question af- fects Scafonh DHS, the option of re -locating the students to Central Huron in Clinton and operating' a school within a school could be doge by September. According to Carroll, decisions to close other schools or move stu- dents will not he made within a year. o' Continued from front page itorial board tried to discredit the United Church (though he says he doesn't blame them for the 'con- troversy'), one of the most socially active faiths, because their stance is religions should keep its nose out of politics and the economy. Phipps counters the "whole Bib- lical story" talks a lot more about economics than the evils of sex or sin. He said it talks about feeding the hungry, forgiving debts, taking care of the diseased and other kind works that can be interpreted as ec- onomic stands contrary to the cur- rent right wing 'trickle down' the- ory that started in the '80s with Ronald Reagan's 'Reaganomics' and continues today in current gov- ernments here in Canada. "Food banks are a growing in- dustry in a wealthy country," Phipps said of the growing need for such charities -here in Canada and the shrinking public purse strings. "That's obscene." , Phipps plans to launch what he calls a "major consultation" across the country and release the results.. as' 'Christ and the Moral Economy` in the fall of '99 near the end of his tenure as moderator. Phipps be- lieves we are consumed with being consumers, something he feels is destroying many of our social pro- grams Canadians once held in high esteem. "Everything is in terms of a prod- uct," he said. "We have become consumers of health care and ed- ucation. Through the consultation, Phipps. hopes to solicit those who run food banks, x.second - hand stores and those who specialize in bartering to find . "grassroots alternatives" to market economies. While some may find this -an attack on the cap- italist economy, Phipps says he isn't interested in "corporate bash- ing." During his tenure, Phipps hopes to help: rekindle the voice:of the leftist economist. "Now that I have the public atten- tion (I didn't do it on purpose), what I'm really trying to do is in- volve the church far more vigor- ously in the political debate locally in communities and nationally. Someone once told me. the econ- omy is how we love each other.cbl- lectively." .As far as the direction religion needs to go, Phipps said churches need to better respond to what The needs of their congregations are. "There's a deep hunger for spir- ituality in the community," he said. "Generally, I think people are far more aware of spiritual part of life rather than just being a consumer." - Phipps said what people are look- ing for isn't being offered by the major Judeo/Christian religions, but. added the United Church is ready for the challenge. "The church needs to be a safe place for people 'to come and be as they are," he said. "Not judged, but accepted for who they are. Those who havehad hardship in their lives, who are divorced, ho- mosexual, carrying a criminal record or "whatever social stigma you want to name" aren't accepted fully in many Christian faiths, Phipps said, but they should be. "The United Church is best suited for that. I think we -have the pos- sibility to meet some of those needs because we have the ethos to meet them," he said, adding it is up to lo- cal congregations to shoulder the responsibility to be open to all peo- ple. That acceptance of those deemed to be sinners by other faiths has the United Church sometimes labeled as "wishy washy," in Phipps own words, because of the perception the. United Church doesn't follow what the Bible. says about homo- sexuality, divorce and other things other faiths consider sins. "L think that's total nonsense," Phipps saidwhen told many people feel the United Church panders to the masses. "I think in many ways we have a firmly . rooted Biblical theology. If Jesus isn't about ac- cepting- everyone, what is he all about?" Proposed budget for '98 discussed in Hensall By Chantal! Van Raay ' T -A Reporter HENSALL The . Ausable Bay- field Conservation Authority ap- proached Hensall Council last Monday night to discuss the 1998 proposed budget and how they will have to deal with cutbacks in fund- ing. ARCA general manager Tom Prout explained to council that ser- vices offered by the authority such as educational programs, main- tenance and other such services would be subsidized by the general levy. 1f cuts are made to the levy, these services will have to be either cut or paid for through other means. • One suggestion he made was is- suing user fees. "If we're going to provide ser- vices there needs to be user fees, said Prout, adding because pro- vincial grants have been taken away, user fees seem unavoidable. "Provincial grants.used to be the highest .source. of revenue and user fees used to be one of the lowest," he said. "Now the municipal levy is the second highest source of rev- enue." . The municipal levy currently stands at $344,340, which is where it has been since 1992. ' However, assessment has gone up an average 25 per cent since 1992, said Prout. - "We haven't participated in any of that increase. We have less mon- ey than we had before,' he said. . "The motion passes when we get 51 per cent of the assessment." This means votes are weighted according to the discounted equal- ized assessment in each municipal- ity. Council voted to support the ABCA in 1997 for the levy amount of $11,510. Ontario's teachers encouraged to apply for child care expenses CLINTON - Ontario's teachers•are being encouraged to apply for the $40 per day childcare expense claim. The Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association has filed a challenge to Bill 161 with the Human Rights Commission and On- tario's teachers associations are supporting the challenge. - A memorandum was sent to all public elementary schools in Hu- ron County as an information item for teachers, according to Alma Westlake; president of the Huron Women's Teachers' Association. "Members may wish to file an applica- tion for the $40 per day child care and then when the application is rejected, submit the rejected form to FWTAO. We will then forward these to OTF," thc memo stated. "Thc decision to apply is up to the members," Westlake said. The application form includes a dec- laration that the applicant is not a teacher who took part in the protest or the spouse of a teacher who took part. The form also warns it is an offence to make a false statement. The federations are asking their members to clearly indicate on the forms that they are teachers who took part in the protest to avoid making a alse statement. Wes,tifte said teachers are concerned about the number of parents who claimed expenses who did not have any expenses. She has not received any feedback from the public regarding the OTF action. • Labor Minister Jim Flaherty has extended the deadline to apply for expenses to Feb. 6 because many families caught in the ice storm in eastern Ontario were having trouble filing their applications. "The decision to apply is up to the members"