The Rural Voice, 2002-02, Page 52HURON
Box 429, Clinton, Ontario NOM 1L0
519-482-9642 or 1-800-511-1135 Website: www.ofa.on.ca/huron Email: huron@ofa.on.ca
CountyFederation o Agriculture NEWSLETTER ' The Rural Voice is provided to all farmers
f 9 in Huron County by the HCFA.
Issues will keep us busy in 2002
By Charles Regele
President, Huron County Federation
of Agriculture
Usually this space is to take one
subject of major importance at the time
and add one's comments to it. This
month it is your President's turn.
Farmland Property Tax:
Make sure your farm or farms are
listed correctly under the correct tax
class.
There are two (2). programs you
must apply to:
1. Farm Business Registration
(registers your farm business)
2. Farmland Property Tax: this puts
your farm property in the Farmland Tax
Class (25 per cent)
For a farm with a house on it two
categories need to be mentioned to be
classed properly. They are: Res/farm
Taxable Full and Farmlands Taxable
Full.
If there is a problem with your
assessment classification, ACT NOW
by calling OMAFRA at 1-800-469-
2285.
If you are renting land the owner of
the land must get the Farm Business
Registration number and signature of
the tenant, on the Farmland Property
Tax application form.
Rural Education:
Problems in Education, like
Farmland classification, appear to be
quite complicated. A lot of time and
effort has been spent by individuals and
groups giving reasons why school
boards should not close schools, rural
or urban.
I have volunteered to sit on a
committee jointly established by Perth
and Huron Federations of Agriculture. I
personally have been involved with this
issue for three and a half years. This
joint committee has developed a Rural
Education Strategy. One point in our
strategy pushes for changes in the Rural
Funding Formula. Such a formula
needs to keep the following points in
mind:
a) large geographic Boards in rural
areas are at a disadvantage under the
current formula because we do not have
the population densities.
b) small school size should not be
discriminated against from a funding
aspect and the value of education. If all
elementary schools in the province
48 THE RURAL VOICE
under 350 students were to be closed
this would result in the loss of 53 per
cent of Ontario's elementary schools.
c) provincial funding must reflect
the fact that if portions of schools are
closed then this space should be
removed from the formulas to
determine accommodation levels.
Avon Maitland District School
Board is not designated rural, and that
has to change.
So far I have talked about what the
province needs to do. The school board
also needs to streamline its costs and be
more transparent with administration.
Trustees need more timely factual
information in order to •make decisions
that will work. It is very easy to get
frustrated when the procedure pits one
community against another (as I have
experienced in the past). One thing is
clear — because of our sometimes harsh
winters, our distances between our
schools now and our large numbers
who need busing, changing the Rural
Funding Formula is of the utmost
importance.
Board Work and Commitment:
The Huron County Federation's
Board of Directors made up of 25 - 30
farmers of most commodities. We take
a pro -active approach whenever
possible.
Stable funding has allowed us to put
energy and dollars into problem areas
by means of lobbying our MPP and MP
and working towards solutions by
getting input from all players.
hi the past we have supported the
Farm Hiker Tour, 4-H, Slice of Huron
and others too numerous to mention.
The last several years we have been
part of the Pork Rally in Toronto, Grain
and Oilseed Rally in Ottawa, Grain and
Oilseed Rally in Guelph and 401. We
also made many calls to our Members
of Parliament over the seriousness of
these issues.
We have taken a balanced approach
If you are an OFA Member
in Huron County and
did not receive your recent
Newsletter package,
please contact our office
at 1-800-511-1135 or
519-482-9642.
at every opportunity to tell Government
Task Forces what farmers need in the
long and short term.
As of this week we have met with
our MP to request to him that the
Made -In -Ontario solution for grain and
oilseeds be pushed in order to see an
Enhanced Market Revenue program in
place for the 2001 crop year and
increased contribution to NISA if
money is available.
The Federal government has been
discussing the threat of terrorism. In my
opinion that discussion should be
broken into three areas: border
crossings, airport security and food
security. Programs need to be in place
that would keep Canadian farmers in
business to produce safe food.
The Huron Federation is also asking
about the details in the appeal in dairy
that New Zealand and the U.S. has
asked for on Canada's ability to export
milk through producer contracts with
processors.
We are also being briefed by our
chicken representative director/second
vice-president, Nick Whyte on the
ongoing appeal between producers and
processors.
On other fronts, nutrient
management, taxation, education and
hydro issues are hot items right now.
As you can see the Huron
Federation works on a variety of issues.
In my opinion we work very effectively
together as a board, considering the
wide variety of commodities
represented.
I welcome constructive criticism.
We do not need comments that in the
end try to split one sector of agriculture
from another. This only reduces our
ability to work together for our
common cause which is "Farmers
working for Farmers."0
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(519) 482-9642
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