Times Advocate, 1993-07-21, Page 1Continuing our
Storewide Sale
25-70% tiff
Selected Items
Cash & cry lb.
COUNTRY 11.095
Exeter
(. ;also r-Ktweak
Insurance
Service
Experience
Value
235-2420
North Middlesex & Lambton
Srt• 14��s.�
Wednesday Juts 2. 1993
Inside
Zurich Fair
Three vie
for crown
page 2
Sweet business
Making honey
at
Ferguson's Apiaries
page 5
Forel
Golf school
in
Exeter
Second front
Gala Days
Ailsa Craig
holds annual
turtle races
page 23
Social
contract
unfair, says
township
EXETER - Usbome Township
council voted at its July 6 meeting
to send letters to the provincial re-
garding welfare and die social con -
The motion, which was carried,
stated that a letter would be sent to -
Premier Bob Rae, Floyd Laughren
the- minter of finance and MPP
To cil's understanding, a
family of four on welfare can re-
ceive the equivalent of $45,000 per
year -in payments.
The motion stated that council
believes most municipal employees
in Ontario don't earn this amount.
The councillors feel the social
contract is unfair and should not be
borne by the working municipal
employees in this province, the mo -
More
information
needed for
college
support
EXETER - Usbome Townstup
council has decided to wait on a de-
cision to support a feasibility study
on the closing of Centralia College.
During the July 6 meeting coun-
cillors were told the South Huron
Economic Development Committee
is asking local municipalities td
support a feasibility study on the
proposed college closure.
But council wants clarification
first as to whether the commiuec
expects direct financial support
frost the township.
Electrical
storm takes
toll on Exeter
PUC
EXETER - During last Wednes-
days electrical storm a bolt of light-
ning struck a transformer east of the
Usbome Central School, halting
the chlorination of water, and shut-
ting down the two adjoining wells
located near the transformer. PUC
manager Hugh Davis said the—sys-
tem was shut down for about two
hours.
"It's just a question of once the
alarm rings we have to go out and
figure out what happened, and ap-
parently a fuse was blown." said
Davis. "However," Davis also ex'
plains, "this isn't earth shauering,
it's not uncommon for something
like this to happen during electrical
storms."
Exeter Villa nurses Eva Tyler, left; -and Julie 'Duckworth give r- dent
ing hand to cross over afire hose•during,a:praCtkoe evacuation Thurs
Fire.Department and Villa representatkes:pointed:out.the da ::_ •f
filled with water w uild :be nearly impossible to get arer, and t
the emergency exit door,,..
leen Carroll a ,help-
y night. Both Exeter
hose, which when
Dere is no ramp at
Council to refine tipping
fees for businesses
EXETER - Town council doesn't
want to give the impression of hav-
ing a hard line with the waste man-
agement program; realizing some
businesses seem to be unfairly bur-
dened with sudden costly tipping
fees.
Discussion of the program, at
council Monday night, focused
mainly on the growing pains the
program is experiencing.
A report card assessment of pro-
gram so far showed it to be suc-
cessful from a residential point of
view, but not for a number of busi-
nesses that are facing a great finan-
cial burden with tipping fees.
Mayor Bruce Shaw said some
businesses have to be given a bit
more leeway in the disposing of
waste - Darling's Food Market in
ular.
In 1992, it cost the store S30 to
di of 'waste of a 30 cubic
dumpster at the landfill. By January
of this year that price increased to
S60.
But under the new July 1 waste
bylaw, it costs the store $12 a cubic
yard.
That works out to $360 for what
cost them $30 in 1992.
"The situation with Darling's is
unique," said Shaw.
He said the store has a built-in
compactor of its own. The garbage
is thrown in then compacted before
being taken by a private waste re•
moval service to the town's landfill.
Darling's has invested a lot of
money into the procegs, he said.
The store, Shaw said, took the ini-
tiative long ago to deal with its own
waste.
"For years we haven't had to pay
for their garbage disposal," he said.
The mayor said the process used
b the store cannot be effectively
cribed.
It's something you have to see
'being done in order to understand
the uniqueness of their situation,"
he said after a tour of the operation
earlier on Monday.
The problem is that cardboard
cannot be separated during this pro-
cess and that is one clement making
the tipping fees so high.
They can't change it over night
and adopt a new system," Shaw
said.
But councillor Robert Drummond
doesn't necessarily agree that spe-
cial concessions should be made to
any business.
"Cardboard is a .byproduct of
their business and that is the cost of
doing business" he said. -
"Council doesn't deal with the by-
products of farmers, for tycample,
and deal with their leftover ma-
nure."
"But we have added to Darling's
costs of doing business," Shaw
said.
"For some people the costs have
tripled," said councillor Bob
Spears.
"It is a complex issue," said ad-
ministrator Rick Hundey.
"We might remind ourselves that
if the industries are speinding as
much to recycle as to dispose of
their waste, then the incentive to re-
cycle has disappeared." -
"They are looking at changing the
operation," said Glenn Kells, the
town's work superintendent "But
it's not something that can happen
over night?
Councillor Ben Hoogenboom
said he also agreed with the mayor
regarding Darling's situation.
'We are looking at about a 90 per
cern success in diverting most ma-
terials.'
"We don't want businesses to lose
the incentive because we are being
won't make room for speical cas- A
es," he said.
"We have made some great
strides up to this point and we need
to keep assessing," Shaw said.
Council will be reviewing the
costs of tipping fees and try to
come up with a temporary formula
for commercial dumping by the
next meeting.
"When we started the system we
new we would have to make some
adjustments," Shaw said.
Early ice planned
for Zurich arena,
but will it pay off?
ZURICH - The Zurich arena will •be testing haling ice available three
weeks early this year, although reeve Bob Fisher said he has his doubts on
how that can be financially feasible.
Councillor Marg Deichert reported to council last Tuesday evening that
the community centre board concluded if it got 25 hours of business a
week use, then it would break even. If 35 hours could -be rented then the
arena would be making money.
"If we're going to make money by putting ice in three weeks early, why
don't we keep it in all year round?" queried Fisher, questioning the conclu-
sions of the board.
"Must be something wrong," he sod.
- The request to provide early seajon ice,at the arena came from Ivan Bed -
aid, who approached the community centre board on behalf of the Zurich
Minor Athletic Association on July 7. •
Despite the early ice, minor hockey in Zurich will be facing some new
expenses this season. Ice rental rates are going up a dollar from $72 to
$73 an hour, including GST. This will be to help cover increasing electri-
cal costs, states the arena board.
The other blow is that council decided to roll back its subsidy on ice ren-
tal charges to the association. In face of recreation gram cutbacks from the
provincial government, council elected to half the ice subsidy to $5 an
hr,ir from S1n an holm,
eacb�rs
hit hard by
contract
75 cents
By Catherine O'Brien
T -A Staff
CLINTON - Teachers and other education staff in Huron County will
be facing a tough financial squeeze in September when proposed wage
reductions associated with the Rae government's social contract are com-
bined with an increased provincial tax grab.
The Huron County Board of Education announced July 12 that a propo-
sal to cut $2.48 million from its budget was in place as required by the
social contract.
The board's proposal would see teachers and other education staff who.
make over $30,000 forfeiting $3,645 in wages during the next school
year.
"We [the board] had to put together what it would cost to meet the so-
cial contract mons," Arnold Mathers, a board representative, said
on Friday.
- The board factored in the average salary for a teacher and applied the
'worst case financial scenario.
'That's how we came up with this framework," Mathers said.
And the worst case over the three year wage period would see some
teachers lose more than $10,000 in salaries if the fail safe components of
the social contract must be used by the board.
Only school secretaries, teacher assistants, board -employed bus drivers
and members of CUPE will not be affected by the wage clawbacks.
Teachers, as the largest employee group, are expected to forfeit more
than $2 million dollars in salaries over the next three years.
"But there is also a fairly large income tax increase that goes back to
January 1 [19931.
"It has to start September 1, and has to be taken at double the rate in or-
der to recapture back to January," said Mather$.
The tax increase is associated with the Rae government's budget in
May.
"That's going to impact on everybody, especially the ten month people
who could not have it [the tax] taken off in July and August," Mathews
said.
Teachers don't receive pay cheques during the summer.
While the board has no control over the tax grab, there is some room
for negotiating the salary cuts outlined in the social contract.
.In arpress release issued by the board last week, it was stand tint r:
53645 wage reduction could be reduced to S2,910.
But the Toronto leadership of the teacher federations would have to
• local agreernenis.J-be esiablisimmkeatiemlbagagotaiviancie
ers and the board. -
The expenditure clawback can be vedncetl per cent if local agree-
ments can be reached to find more creative solutions to the mandatory
freeze -unpaid leave options.
It is also possible that other cost -Owing measures could be identified
through a voluntary review of board expenditures.
Such efforts coup reduce the individual employee penalty by another
$200 or $300.
$ut with absence of negotiated local agreements, the local board will
be required to institute a wage freeze and a system of 12 unpaid days to
recover the imposed grant revenue reductions which started July 1, 1993.
Wage and leave penalties would remain in place until March 31, 1996.
In order to schedule unpaid leave for teaching staff, it would likely be-
come necessary to reschedule the school year calendar to group profes-
sional activity days in some fashion.
This would minimise the disruption for students and parents who
would have to plan alternate child care arrangements, the board said.
Continued on page 2