Loading...
The Citizen, 1995-11-22, Page 4Photo by Bonnie Gropp Looking Back Through the Years From the files of the Blyth Stan- dard, Brussels Post and the North Huron Citizen 6 YEARS AGO Nov. 22,1989 More than 100 people attended a meeting in Lucknow to hear guest speaker, Professor William An- drews, a part-time resident of Bel- grave, speak on the serious trouble with the environment. The large number gathered indicated the change in people's attitudes in recent years, Andrews said. At the Royal Winter Fair, Leroy and Lila Rintoul and daughters Kim and Debbie, of RR2 Lucknow took several awards in the beef car- cass class. Jan van Vliet of RR2 Brussels took top honours in the pig competitions, earning the pre- Letters THE EDITOR, This afternoon I dropped in to my local Zehrs food market to pick up some bread. Glaring in my face were yellow signs apologizing for the increased price of bread due to expensive wheat. I promptly announced to the patrons that a loaf of bread contained less than 20 mier exhibitor and breeder awards. Dianne and Darlene Black of Belgrave had prize-winning live- stock in the Queen's Guineas com- petition and Eldon Cook of Belgrave captured the prize for breeder's herd and progeny of dame in the Brown Swiss class. Royal Homes in Wingham laid off 41 production staff. The post office in Monkton was closed and the service privatized. West Wawanosh council defeat- ed a motion to support Brookside Public school in their effort to recy- cle through the use of blue boxes. 1 YEAR AGO NOV. 13,1994 The Brussels 5 R's Thrift Shop reported a very good year, with sales reaching $44,000. Each of the five community churches received cents of wheat as I removed the sign from the shelf. Management later explained that the price of bread had not increased in 10 years. During this discussion I pointed out that selling bread includes transportation, labour, electricity and of course management expense. The cost of the wheat in a loaf of bread has risen about four cents in the past year. Country Harvest Bread price increased approximately 66 cents a loaf. Zehrs own bread price increased 10 cents a loaf. The same amount of wheat used a $500 donation with the rest going towards building renovations and future plans. Former McKillop Twp. and Seaforth trustee on the Huron County Board of Eduction, Graeme Craig retired from the board. He was appointed to the Temporary Advisory Group for the Ontario Training and Advisory Board. Top students in the Blyth Legion's Remembrance Day essay- writing contest were Tammy Walk- er, Pamela Elliott, Joyce Beacom, Melissa Snell, Mandy Dunbar, Tina Muehlethaler and Michelle Klasen. Scott McDonald arrived in Brus- sels to assume the role of branch manager of CIBC. to make a loaf of bread will make one box of cereal. A box of cereal has gone up $1 since spring. I hope that Zehrs or any other bread retailer has the common sense to remove these signs before I go shopping next week. If not, I'm prepared to supply the labour to take these signs down and stick them in the appropriate place. On the other hand, I think farmers should hire Zehrs to market their products because these guys really know how to make money. Yours truly, Michael Hunter, Bread eater, Bruce AgVise. PAGE 4. THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 1995. C The North Huron itizen ► CNA BLUE RIBBON AWARD 1995 P.O. Box 429, P.O. Box 152, Publisher, Keith Roulston BLYTH, Ont. BRUSSELS, Ont. Editor, Bonnie Gropp NOM 1H0 NOG 1H0 Phone 523-4792 Phone 887-9114 Advertising Manager, FAX 523-9140 FAX 887-9021 Jeannette McNeil The Citizen is published weekly in Brussels, Ontario by North Huron Publishing Company Inc. Subscriptions are payable in advance at a rate of $23.00/year ($21.50 plus $1.50 G.S.T.) for local; $33.00/year ($30.85 plus $2.15 G.S.T.) for local letter carrier in Goderich, Hanover, Listowel, etc. and out-of-area (40 miles from Brussels); $62.00/year for U.S.A. and Foreign. Advertising is accepted on the condition that In the event of a typographical error, only that portion of the advertisement will be credited. Advertising Deadlines: Monday, 2 p.m. - Brussels; Monday, 4 p.m.. Blyth. We are not responsible for unsolicited newscripls or photographs. Contents of The Citizen are © Copyright. Publications Mail Registration No. 6968 Change the system It's understandable that municipal politicians are upset at the prospect of the tax rate going up again this year because of education tax increases, but the reality may be that there are two choices: pay more or give our kids less. From county council through to local councils, the anger over the possible tax increase is building. Councils have been firing off resolutions to the Huron County Board of Education calling for a zero tax increase. After all, both municipal and county officials say, we've held our tax rate down, now it's up to you. The difference is that municipal councillors have more control over their budgets than trustees. Today's trustees are captives of the decisions of provincial governments and local trustees in the past. There's no doubt the education system is a mess. Vested interests look after their own priorities while starving other areas of the system. Most often it is the kids who get hurt. Already there isn't enough money for each student to have a textbook so there are classroom sets. It means teachers can't assign homework and students who get behind have a harder time catching up. Three successive provincial governments have cut funds to education, yet the two previous governments also drove up expenses by initiating, and insisting on implementing, junior kindergarten. Dating all the way back to Bill Davis's tenure as education minister, we have the huge administrative costs of county school boards. Governments for decades have been talking about the need for tax reform to get education off the municipal tax bill but no one has done it. Seventy-five per cent of the education budget is taken up by salaries. Only a dreamer thinks the local board trustees can do much about that. Only a massive change in legislation by the provincial government could reduce the salary burden and there's no doubt that would provoke a strike that would have people turn from taxpayers to parents overnight, demanding politicians get the teachers back to work. Stuck with having control only over 25 per cent of their budget, trustees are left to deal with large cuts in transfer payments from the province by talking about parking charges for students' cars. It's a silly system. It needs to be changed. But the power to change the system rests much higher than local trustees. If municipal politicians think they can do the job better than the current trustees they should run for the board of education next time out. In the meantime they should pressure the provincial government to change the system. Lord knows it could use some real "common sense". — KR Spreading wealth, or hoarding it? People in Third World countries must wonder about North Americans. On one hand they meet people from Canada and the U.S. who want to help them, on the other they meet people who want to exploit them. In the upcoming issue of our sister publication The Rural Voice, there arc heartwarming stories of Ontario farm families working to help the less fortunate people in poor countries around the world. There is the Canadian Foodgrains Bank which takes wheat and corn grown and donated by Canadian farmers, and takes it to places of need in Africa and other trouble spots. This grain is used not only to feed the hungry in emergency situations, but is used to pay wages for people working to dig wells or build dams to make themselves self-sufficient in the long term. There's the story of Agri-Skills, a farmer-run program that raises money to send Ontario farmers to share their skills on farms attached to orphanages in Mexico, Honduras, Nicaragua and Haiti. Against this is the example of companies building record profits by shifting their manufacturing to countries where they can get people to work for a fraction of workers' wages in North America. Opponents of free trade have always faced a moral dilemma: in arguing against the shift of jobs to poor countries are they really just arguing to maintain a privileged position for first world workers or are they arguing against exploitation? Recently it was revealed that the president of one U.S. company made $12.4 million in 1994,50 per cent more than all the 3,800 workers in his plant in Monterrey, Mexico. Most of us would prefer to associate with the givers than the takers. E ditorial