HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Times Advocate, 2006-10-25, Page 44
Times–Advocate
Wednesday, October 25, 2006
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Editorial Opinion
TIMES ADVOCATE
PUBLICATIONS MAIL REGISTRATION NUMBER 07511
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Assistance Program (PAP), toward our mailing costs.
Canada Jim Beckett – Publisher
Deb Lord – Production Manager
Scott Nixon – Editor
4 Published by Metroland Printing,
Publishing & Distributing Ltd.
Metroland 424 Main Street South, P.O. Box 850
Exeter, Ontario NOM 1S6 • 519-235-1331
Peter Winkler -General Manager, Southwestern Ontario Division
EDITORIAL
Meet your
candidates
South Huron voters having a tough time
making their minds up about who to vote
for in the municipal election can get to
know more about their local candidates in
Thursday's all candidates meeting.
The meeting kicks off at 7 p.m. in the Ranch House
Inn, with all candidates given the chance to offer their
views on the issues and why we should vote for them.
More importantly, the public will be allowed to ask
questions and put their candidates on the hot seat.
Unfortunately, with the 'vote by mail' process, some
of us have already voted. Those who haven't, and
would still like to learn more about their candidates,
should make sure they attend Thursday night's meet-
ing. Historically, they haven't been very well attended.
This time around, attendance should be higher due to
the high number of candidates (16), the fact there are
no acclamations and there have been certain issues
that have raised the ire of some residents, including
the Crediton/Centralia sewer project and the cancella-
tion of the large garbage pickup, just to name two.
There seems to be a heightened interest in municipal
happenings and hopefully that is reflected with strong
attendance at Thursday's meeting and with high voter
turnout.
Read the instructions
There's a tendency to overreact, but there should be
some concern over the number of ballots that have had
to be rejected by South Huron because they haven't
been completed properly. Clerk Sandra Strang updated
council Monday night and reported that of 268 ballots
received by Monday, 47 had to be rejected because
they were improperly completed. That's not an encour-
aging sign, although it's early and it's hopefully an
anomaly. Strang also said voters have been telling her
they're not reading the instructions.
Needless to say, the instructions are there for a rea-
son — so voters complete their ballots properly.
Truthfully, it's not a very complicated process and any-
one who reads the instructions should be able to figure
it out.
But make sure you read them. You only get one vote.
Make sure it counts. If you're confused, call or visit the
town hall or watch the streaming video on the town's
website.
Making life more dangerous
Hans Monderman doesn't look like a revolu-
tionary but he has a radical idea. He wants to
make people start thinking for themselves
again.
Monderman is a man who likes danger not
because he has a deathwish but because he
knows it makes life safer. Monderman is a traf-
fic engineer in Holland with a plan to recreate
the ways roads are built, starting with
the elimination of highway signs, traffic
signals and just about everything else
that tells people how they are supposed
to be driving.
Monderman has also replaced the tradi-
tional carefully controlled intersection
with a traffic circle that tells an
approaching driver nothing of how fast
he is supposed to go or who has the right
of way, forcing the driver to pay attention
and rely on his own judgement.
Monderman has also removed the sepa-
ration between pedestrians, cars, bicycles and
just about everything else on the road, forcing
everyone to pay attention and get along. The
idea has cut the number of accidents on "his"
roads to almost zero.
Around the world, the theme of more safety
with less regulation is taking hold with ideas
such as removing centre lines on highways
which once again found that drivers with no
centre line to guide them drove more safely
and had a 35 per cent decrease in the number
of accidents.
While Monderman seems to be onto
something about making people look
out for themselves, perhaps the con-
cept needs to be taken one step fur-
ther. In other words, less of every-
thing.
Maybe it's time to strip away some of
the items on cars such as signals and
brake lights that most drivers can't be
bothered to use anyway, although
everyone around them is depending on
them. Instead of relying on the other
idiot behind the wheel to tell you what
he's going to do, perhaps we could just give
him an extra 10 feet and it won't matter.
Maybe it will be a revolution.
PAT
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