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The Citizen, 1987-02-25, Page 5For Auburn trustees fighting bureaucracy of police village can make it seem their village is The forgotten corner If you’re an elected official worried about the future of your community and wanting to do something to change the situation, Auburn is a frustrating place to be. Just ask the four people who make up the village’s board of trustees. They ’ 11 tell you it isn ’ t a lot of fun trying to run one of the few “police villages’’ left in the province. The problem, historically, for Auburn is that it grew large enough to take up parts of three townships (Hullett township, East and West Wawanosh) but never got big enough to be incorporated as a full scale village. “If we were right in the middle of a township,” Al Craig, one of the village’s three trustees said recently, * ‘we (the board of trustees) wouldn’t be here and we wouldn’t have the hassle.” There isn’t much doubt on the part of Joan Armstrong, clerk-treasurer of West Wawa­ nosh township, who administers Auburn’s affairs, that the province would like to see police villages disappear from the political map in the province. Many former police villages have been disbanded and become just hamlets in the middle of townships. But in Auburn, divided as it is among three townships, imperfect as the system is, it would be hard to do without it. West Wawanosh Reeve Cecil Cranston praises the Auburn trustees. “They’re young, progressive lads who would like to see their village working,” he said. Reeve Cranston says he thinks the police village system works well because the trustees are more able to concentrate on the problems of the village than the councillors of his township would be. “If they weren’t the middle men, I don’t know what we’d do. They get nothing but praise from me.” For the Auburn trustees, the goal is getting something more tangible than praise. Their problem goes back to the fact the province doesn’t want to encourage police villages to remain active. Legislation covering police villages allows townships to tack an extra 15 mills onto the taxpayers in the village to look after the affairs of the village. But, as one trustee says, that 15 mill limit hasn’t changed in 40 years. In the meantime, inflation and the expectations of taxpayers has ballooned the cost of operating a municipality. That 15 mills means that the trustees have a grand total of $3,000 a year to spend, and nearly every penny of that is needed for the day-to-day operation of the village’s affairs. What’s more, the trustees aren’t allowed to touch a penny of that money. All bills must be paid through the West Wawanosh office. Controls have become more stringent over the years. Mrs. Armstrong remembers when she took over as West Wawanosh’s township clerk-treasurer in 1965, the village trusteeshad their own bank account; but that’s illegal under the act and they had to give it up. As the costs of government increased, the councils of Hullett, East and West Wawa­ nosh tried to help the situation by taking on more ofthe expense of running their own sections of the village. Auburn used to pay a fire protection bill to the Blyth and District Fire Area Board, for instance, but the townships agreed to include their share of the Auburn fee in their own annual payments. Theproblemofstreetshas long been a nagging headache. Until recently the trustees tried to look after their own street repair costs on their limited budget. They were doubly penalized, however, because as a police village they weren’t eligible for the usual grants from the Ministry of Transport and Communications that incorporated municipalities get. When this was question­ ed, the MTC explained that the subsidy was already being paid to the townships. It was at that point that the councils of the three townships agreed they would look after the maintenance of the streets in the sections of the village which fell within their own boundaries. Bills for other expenses go to the West Wawanosh townships office, and at the end of the year Mrs. Armstrong must divide up the costs according to an accepted formula based on the area of the village in each of the townships: 44.56 per cent to West Wawa­ nosh, 37.57 per cent to Hullett and 16.87 to East Wawanosh. As Mrs. Armstrong says, the 15 mill allotment for village business is never enough to cover costs and the townships must always pitch in to make up the difference. It’s that idea of “pitching in” that upsets the Auburn trustees. Jim Schneider, board chairman, argues that that 15 mills is a red herring. “What about the rest of the tax dollars Auburn people pay?’’ he asks, pointing out that residents of the village pay the usual taxes other residents of each of the townships pay. The trustees don’t think they ’ ve been getting their fair share of those tax dollars put back into the village over the years, until recently at least. Armed with their determination to change the course of events that has seen Auburn’s main street turn from a thriving place to a virtual ghost town when both the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and the local general store closed within months of each other (the store has since reopened) councillors began to make their plight known to the townships councils. The campaign has yielded results. New sidewalks were laid down last summer along parts of main street. Each township helped replace the sidewalk in its part of the village. West Wawanoshhas agreedto improve­ ments on another street in its part of the villagethissummer. And with help from East Wawanosh, the trustees were able to get Huron county to include the paving of two streets in its jurisdiction as part of this year’s county paving budget (just to make life more interesting the trustees have to deal with the county over county road 25, Turnberry St. and Mill Road.) The problem for residents who have a complaint about something in the village is not knowing where to go with the complaint. “I think Auburn taxpayers are confused,” said Al Craig. They see the board of trustees and “they don’t know whether they should complain to us or to the township.” The nightmareof who does what really reaches a crisis on Goderich street, the village’s main street. Auburn’s economic problems probably go back to the opening of the Huron county’s new bridge across the Maitland river in 1954. For travellers, it was a huge improvement. They used to cross the river on narrow, iron bridges, had to make a sharp turn and then turn again up a steep hill that took them right through the centre of the Members of the Auburn Board of Trustees are fighting to get township councils and the county to get things done. Members their community moving but often find thejob a frustrating one of the board are: [from left] Harry Arthur, secretary, George as they are ignored by the province and have to deal with three Collins, Jim Schneider, chairman and Allan Craig. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 1987. PAGE 5. Auburn is one of the county's prettiest villages but village trustees would just as soon it wasn't so peaceful that strollers could walk down the middle of the main street. village. The new bridge was part of a by-pass that allowed people to zoom past the village, hardly slowing down. For many of the once-busy Auburn main street businesses, however, it was the beginning of the end. Now the road is one of the biggest problems for the three townships, says East Wawanosh Reeve Ernie Snell. The street forms the boundary line between Hullett on the south, and East and West Wawanosh on the north. While the rest of the village can be divided neatly the main street problem can be a matter of which side of the centre of the road things are on. A recent problem arose, for instance, about whose liability insurance covered the people removing snow from the main street. The village can’t have insurance of its own, and so the jurisdiction on the main street became important. Despite all the headaches, the trustees express their appreciation for the help of two of the townships. In a lot of cases, says Al Craig, the townships have knowledge and sources of information the trustees don’t (the provincial government does not include the village in its mailings on new programs, grants, etc.) But while the trustee praise the help of the councils of the two Wawanoshes, they don’t hesitate to criticize the council of Hullett Township for what they consider its lack of co-operation and communication. Focus of much of the frustration are the roads in the Hullett side of the village. While Hullett township has a program of rebuild­ ing one and a quarter miles of road in the township each year, says George Collins, newest ofthe village trustees, the roads they are rebuilding are often better than the streets in Auburn. “I don’t think there are many places in the township where two cars can’t meet, but I can show you about three places in Auburn,” he said. It’s his understanding, he says, that Hullett townships has a five-year road improvement plan and that Auburn’s half-mile of streets isn’t on it. While the Auburn councillors say they aren’t against the township rebuilding the concession roads, they feel their taxpayers have been paying the same amount of taxes as rural residents for many years and getting little in return. Next in the list of the trustees complaints against the township is a lack of communica­ tion with the township council. In March last year, the trustees presented a four-page brief to Hullett council outlining programs they feel should be carried out. They say they’ve never really had a reply to their brief, although one of the items requested, sidewalk improvements, has seen some work done. “What makes it frustrating is you go with all the ideas and they don’t give reasons why they can’t do it,” says Mr. Collins. The trustees get the feeling that the council thinks if they just ignore them long enough “maybe they’ll go away.” “They’re not used to the squeaky wheel (approach)” says Harry Arthur, secretary of the board of trustees. Hullett Reeve Tom Cunningham, while defending his township off the record, said he could not reply to the Auburn complaints without consulting the rest of his council. He said the township is planning meetings in Londesboro and Auburn in the next month to give residents of both communities a chance to make their wishes for the future known. If anybody hopesthe present board of trustees of the village will go away they’re likely hoping in vain. The trustees seem determined to breathe new life into the village. They’re unhappy, for instance, that red tape killed a proposed 16-lot subdivision on the south side of the village which they think would have sold quickly if it could have been built. Jim Schneider estimates that 10 per cent of the houses in Auburn changed hands lastyear, indicating there is interest in living in the village. The problem is, getting the conditions right for growth given the convoluted politics of the community. The trustees seem determined, however, to remain the “squeaking wheel” until they get the action they think necessary to get their community moving.