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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Huron Expositor, 1987-07-15, Page 2A2— THE HURON EXPOSITOR, JULY 15, 1987 .A . . . Huron •• • ' '.. ' ' .• xpositor BLUE . . RIBBON • • , SINCE 1.860, SERVING THE COMMUNITY FIRST AWARD 1987 .. . 'Incorporating • . . . • The Brussels Post • . ED BYRSKI, General Manager HEATHER McILWRAITH, Editor PUI3lisiled in , . Seaforth, Ontario . • • . .. , • Every WednesdayMorning • Member Canadian Community Newspaper Assoc, • Ontario.Comrnunity Newspaper Association , 011121r1b-Pre cgroVh CH CommonwealthrPress Union , internationalPress Institute . , Subscription raies: " • .. -The Expositor is brought to you Canada '20,00 a year, in advance each week by the efforts 'of: , Senior Citizens • '17,00 a year in advance Pat Armes, Nellie Blake, Outside Cancida's60.00 a year, In advance Bessie Broome, Karen Gar-Single Copies .50cents each dner, Joan Guichelaar and.Bob • McMillan. Secondclass mail registration' Number 0696 , . • . . , . WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 1987 • Editorial and Business Offices - 10 Main Street, Seaforth Telephone (5.19) 527-0240 Mailing Address - P.O. Box 69, Seaforth, Ontario, NOK 1WO • No Surprise I he threatened secession of Exeter from Huron County by the town's mayor Bruce Shaw shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. There have been conflicts and resulting frustrations brewing and fester- ing at the county level of government for years. What the threat does, simp- ly, is bring to attention the division between the urban and rural interests at the county level., • The conflict has always been much in evidence at the county pro- . ceedings, but council and administration.would never admit such a split ex-. isted or interfered with the dispensation of county government. However, the very nature of the makeup of county council lends itself to certain confrontations and adversarial situations. The council is predominantly rural, and representation comes from the- townships. A councillor's first priority is to his or her respective township, village or municipality and that commitment cannot help but carry over into the couriL -ty government scene. Councillors encounterdifficulty trying to provide ef- fective county government While protecting their own interests. It simply, is not always possible. • There has to be a certain selflessness displayed by the players at the county table and .yet, they would be remiss in not defending the best in- terests of their respective municipalities. There is a fine line of compromise that has to be adhered to. Certainly, if decisions are to be of benefit to the county as an entity, then • petty differences and an attitude of regionalism must be shoved aside. That can only be divisive. The urban -rural conflict has. been evidenced on Innay occasions but councillors would loudly deny that type of narrow-mindedness existed. It really can't be avoided under the present system. Many municipalities had difficulty providing funds for improvements to the county's largest airport at Goderich and there were concerns about rebuilding the museum in Goderich While others advocated moving the facility to Vanastra. Those represent just a few examples of the situations that can create rifts between urban centresand rural municipalities. No doubt it appears to rural representatives that funds, and services gravitate to urban centres while rural representatives hold. the balance of power at the council table. It is something of a dichotomy There are many incidents which have precipitated the move by Exeter, the county's failure to act on .a .recommendation to establish an industrial development office and concerns over county planning procedures, most notable among them. The town wants to engage its own private planning consultants beginning next year rather than use the county planning department and Shaw says there is no reason the town should not fook after its own library. The county has been having problems with its library System", trying to wrest control of the system through a private member's bill, and health unit staff have gone public in their attempt to bring attention to a critical situation in that department. The mayors, not part of the county structure of government, have banded together and appear to be working independently as an ad hoc committee. One has to wonder if they are working in that fashion because of apparent indifference at the county level or. because. they feel they can't get solid representation at the county level. Many overtures have been made in the past for the restructuring of the county system. Perhaps now is the time. Signal -Star. • •Geographically,they're no closer I was questionned the other day about small town living.. "I don't know bonanyone could live in a small town -what is there to do?," I was asked. • • Admittedly there was probably a time when I asked the same .question, but since SWEATSOCKS • being introduced to small town living in 1981, the questibn rarely enters my mind. In fact I've grown to resent the query, which comes across to me, as a demand for justification of. my choice of residence. I dislike feeling as though I must defend my choice of headquarters by providing a verbarlist of things there are to do? In ac- tual' fact there's nothing I can do in the city .that I can't easily access from the small town of Seaforth. To all appearances a visit to Seaforth may reveal that the town has - no movie theatre, no multi -recreational • complex, no air- conditioned shopping malls, no automatic bank tellers, and no university campus of- fering course upon innumerable course - for interest sake and/or self betterment. Father objects to editorial Just a few comments regarding the "tempest in a teapot" created by comments made by my son, Gary Williams, alderman for Ward 5 in the City of London, concerning t TO THE EDITOR some bypothetical alternatives for highway expansion into the Huron -Perth area. First of all one can have no objection to the reaction by Mayor Rosa. Any mayor worth his salt must take umbrage at any comments which appear to be negative towards or critical of his municipality. My concern is with the editiorial on page A2 "No credit to town" and initialed by H.M. The editorial page in any paper is my favorite page where I have grown ac- customed to finding well -reasoned, logical, intelligent articles. I am afraid that this one does not qualify On any count!!! I do not understand whey anyone should feel 'in - stilted' by a plain statement of facts or how they could be interpreted as 'a very real at - tads on the intelligence of Seaforth residents and the importance and viability of a small town in a big world'. In spite of the heading I think that Gary and his high school classmates can be orisidered a credit to the town and, incidentally, his high school years from age 13 to 18 were the aim total of his association with Seaforth. I think that if H.M. had done a little reseach she would have found that Gary, at age 18, graduated from Grade, 13 at the head of his class, was its valedictorian, and that he and most of his classmates went on to successful and varied careers but that most if not all of there Went 'anywhere' where the opportuni- tY to OW existed. flow the comment "Seaforth has had 2,000 people for the last 50 years" can logically called "anetiticated' I do not understand, unless he is being faulted for not stating it correctly. He really should have said "Seaforth has had about 2,100 peo- ple, With some ups arid dOwna, since it Was raised to tarn status 112 years ago". The coMments dealt with in paragraph 5 of the editorial certainly have no bearing on the intelligence or wisdom of the people who chose, or are forced by circumstances; to continue to live in Seaforth. My wife and I have lived here for 31 years and, like many others. we continue to live here because we like the town and its people. What would reflect on our intelligence or wisdom would be the act of burying our heads in the sand and refusing to admit that it has faults and drawbacks. There is no gainsaying the fact that we are "not going to get major industrial development ih Seaforth" because We jest do not have a place to put it. Seaforth does not have any large, or even median sized, parcels of land which are serviced, or could be serviced, and are ready to be developed industrially. It is equally true that it is "an hair away from anywhere" and those of us who have any background in Seaforth know many people who have left Seaforth plat because- of that fat. With respect to the comment on the skilled work force I sup-. pose a lot depends on the interpretion of the term "skilled work force". It may be just coincidental but in this paper one week ago an advertisement by one of the oldest and most respected businesses in the town notified us that it was closing doWn an im- portant part of its business because of a `shortage of expetienced help'. What flights of imagination it took to distort these plain statements of fact into painting the residents of small towns as "Stupid, fumbl- ing individuals" I do not knew but 1 do knont Turn to page 9A by Heather McIlwraith . But while a city may offer all these things and more it doesn't make it the ideal place to be. My years of city living taught me that, Oh I have nothing against the city, but it certainly doesn't have it over the small town as much as people think it does: • I =mull) in a subdivision at the east end of Kitchener. 'In many ways that subdivi- sion, because it was fairly isolated, was like a small town of its own. Our street was separated from major roadways by a rather thick bush, and backed onto several acres of farmland. It was not however a small town. Beyond that bush there was a much bigger entity altogether - a city, and we were a part of it, And I enjoyed growing up in that environ- ment. There were movie theatres, shopping , malls, tee complexes, automatic bank tellers and a thriving university campus all within the confines of 'Kitchener, And when none of those things sparked our interest there was a Main Street which we could cruise until we ran out of time and/or gas. Those same things are still available to me today, despite the fact I now live in a small town, • I know. there are no movie theatres in Seaforth. There were plenty in Kitchener. But it still took 20 to 30 minutes to get to the • nearest one, when there was a showplaying I, wanted to see. There was always a pro- blem finding parking - never any for free, and always, always a substantial line-up at • the door. Turn to page 9A • 1 Yoe, 1,qy you ON TAi.6- ENPAN6ERE0 L/Sr BUT WE L10.1cAer TAKE A CHANCE oNANY ' PLY-43y-/V/6NT4R •I Chiddist The equipment checklist for athletes preparing to attend major sporting events may have been radically and permanently altered by the recent action of the organizers of the 1987 World Summer University Games, currently underway in Zagreb, Yugoslavia. The organizers, in their wisdom, have seen fit to issue each mate participant of the games with a condom, as protection against the possible spread of AIDS in that country. While perhaps a prudent move in light of the rapid spread of the dreaded disease world wide, one has to wonder if the issuing of condoms to athletes entering a country isn't taking the whole thing a bit too far. After all, these people are there to play games – not to "play around". It also conjures up a very weird image of -the scene in the registration lines at the games. "Okay, here's your gym shorts, room key, deodorant and condom." "What's the condom for?"' ."If you don't know, Buddy, you don't need it! Next!" Of course, the discriminatory practice of issuing the protective devices only to the male athletes in groups could eause rip- ples of unrest among the female portion of the entourage. "Okay lady, here's your gym shorts, room key and deodorant." "Where's my condom?" permanently altered .FROM THIS ANGLE by Patrick Raftis • 111111.111116 "You don't got one." "What if I want to – uhh – you know?" "Lady, there's a dozen soccer players standing right over there. I just handed each one of them a condom. You figure it out. Next!" If this kind of health planning catches on among other groups, it could lead to a quite an alteration in public attitudes toward the ortce widely-distairted device. Condoms have always been controver- sial. Shortly after I left my alma matter, the college newspaperwhich I saw inter- mittently featured an on-going campaign against the removal of condom -dispensing machines item the washrooms, Most of the letters to the editor were in favor of re- inatatment of the inaehines. Personally, I could never see what the big deal was. Unless classroom and broom -closet sex had experienced a wild sage in popularity since I graduated, I tould't understand why students and staff coald't purchase their protection elsewhere without seriously tramping their lifestyle. ' After years of completely ignoring the product the media is presently trying to come up with an acceptable policy for allowing ajndom advertisements on televi- sion and In print. Perhaps if other sporting events were to adopt a policy similar to that of the World Student Summer Games, producers of pro- tectives could steal a page from the film companies for their campaigns. A given brand could then become "The Official- Prophylactic of the 1988 Olympics". In addition to giving the condom instant • respectability, such a campaign would also provide some much-needed new material for television and nightclub com- edians. Word has it, David Letternian is positively salivating at the prospeet. Meanwhile, we can only hope that all the male participants at the World Students Games have had enough basie sex educa- tion to know the proper use for the devices they were issued. It would be embaraseing indeed if the swim team from ale of the less -sophisticated countries were to show tip for an event wearing what they thought was a new type of low -friction bathing suit. Defence proposals are a waste EDITOR'S NOTE - Some Weeks ago The Huron Expositor offered its readers the op- portunity to take a more active ride in the newspaper. Readers were invited to be guest columnists and express their view- point on any given topie. The :allowing is One of the columns we got in response to our invitation. Anyone who wishes to be featured in this spot should contact The Ex- positor. Columns should be tastefully writ- ten and Tbe Expositor reserves the right to refuse any it feels does not fit that criteria. My member of Parliament recently sent me a glossy pamphlet sairiMarizing the new Defence White Paper presented by Defence Minister Perrin Beaty. It seems to me that some of the proposals presented therein are badly flawed from e practical standpoint end/or are also luinecessery. These proposals are presented as six main goals, each of which is to be attaitied,by number of steps: 1) To Create a Three Ocean Navy; 2) To Reinforce Serveillance; 3) To Strengthen Tal•itorial Defencet 4) To Improve The Credibility of our Contribution to Alliance Deterrence in Europe; 5) To Revitalize the Reserves; 6) To Build a Firmer Foundation for Future Defettee. I have great difficulty with most of the Steps towards the first goal. I can aecept the decision to add six frigates to the six now under construction which, along with four modernized destroyets, will give us a credible Coast Guard along Out whole coastline I think that there may be some there but I can live with that as long as I atrinot asked to etiviaage it es a 'Defence Foree'. GENERAL DELIVERY by Ernie Williams , It seems to me that the next step, the.pro- posed acquisition of 10 12 nuclear powered submarines, is quite a different matter. It is not proposed. that thesebo nuclear inisile carrying vessels bid simply ordinary tub - Marines carrying ordinary, conventional artilettient. The rationale for the nuclear power is that these vessels will be able to cruise tindetwatet for lot* periods of tittle Without needing to surface and thus will be able to patrol IMO& the atetie ice cap to detect whether submarines of other nations are tieing these waters. I am Atte that we know that this is happening now. If our sub - matte encounters an intruder What is it go- ing to do? Ask it politely to leave or sink it? Are we really ready to start Wald 'Wet 3 jag because a .Met or US atibinerine ta violating air sovereignty? Perhaps the cap- tain Will Nat Make an entry in the ship's lOg and submit it to headquarters when he Marne to base. This is not quite the same situation as sending up a fighter aitereft to identify an airborne intruder where the in - trader MI be forced to land or turn away and can be definitely identified So that diplernetie protest dart be It Seeing to the that implementation of the next step proposed, the installation of Medan fiXed ecleigee SaVeillatite eqUifr • ment would adequately fulfill our arctic surveillance requitement and provide us with just as much information. It seems to me also that conventional diesel powered submarines mild fulfill oar NATO committtheht just at well as nuclear' powered ones since, with the possible excep- tion of the United States, all the other NATO partners that participate 10 naval exercises are still opetating some diesel powered sub - Marines so neither our operating capabilities not our pride should suffer On that aecount. In shrhmaty, it seems to me that, if we must hate more submarines, and I have seen ao evidence that we do, our needs could be fulfilled by purchasing conventional, diesel powered vessels at a saving of many billions of dollars. It seats to me that Mr. Beatty has Spent too Much time in the Navel Officer's Mess with a group of senior officers who are ex- periencing delusions of grandeur as Well as visions of enhanced promotion opportunities in an expanded empire. It seethe to rne also that I have probably used up all the space the editor will grant me and have only dealt with part of one itein in the pamphlet so I had better leave the rest for another (ley: