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The Wingham Advance-Times, 1983-03-02, Page 1Fr. fin FIRST SElON bit ijnin ancitiEtin Wingham, Ontario, Wednesday, March 2, 1983 Single Copy 50c Blyth Branch Library Box 2U 4 Blyth, Ont. = NOM 1K* , Jan. 4 O. A PUBLIC SPEAKING competition was held at. Sacred Heart School in Wingham last week with the following winners: in front, Jeffery Sanders and Lori Belanger, Hospital on out The Wingham and District Hospital has, finally received the news it was waiting for: the Ontario Health Ministry has approved its proposal for a modest expansion and has agreed to provide a share of the funding. Although the hospital still must raise the bulk of the money for the project, this allows it to proceed with its planning with more con- fidence. The approval, announced in a news release last Thurs- day, says the ministry will supply $250,000 toward the new wing, which will allow expansion of the emergency,. outpatient and radiology departments. "The hospital and com- munity are to provide the both junior; and in back, Julie Koopman, Jennifer Sanders, senior, Dwight Hallahan, junior, and Bill Kinahan, senior. en light nsi rest of the necessary fun- ding." It adds that work is ex- pected to start sometime during the late summer. Norman Hayes, hospital executive director, said the hospital board already is involved in the planning process and is almost ready to begin working drawings. Once the project goes to tender, he added, the board will know whether or not it can afford to continue. If the numbers look right, he said, construction could start in August, with com- pletion possibly late next year or early in 1985. The proposal to add a new outpatient and emergency wing at the south end of the hospital, attached to the Riverviw Drive -In under r�w ownership Effective March 1, Audrey and Gus Hamilton are the new owners of the Riverview Drive -In, Wingham, which they purchased from Mrs. Florence Delmage. The Hamiltons are no strangers to Wingham, since they formerly operated an eating establishment at the north end of town, at the site of the old Royal T, and Mrs. Hamilton had been employed at the Riverview for the past two years. Mrs. Delmage and her late husband, Don, had owned the Riverview for the past 12 years after buying it from Donald Rae. At that time it was operated strictly as a drive-in and was open only in the summertime. Since then, the Delmages added an eat -in area and kept the restaurant open year-round, with the exception of a few weeks in the winter. Business association forms parking authority The Wingham Business Association will form a parking committee to study the town's parking problems and look into the purchase of possible parking lots. A committee was formed several years ago, but it has virtually disbanded. And since most association members said they feel parking in town is still a problem, the committee idea was rejuvenated at last Thursday night's meeting. Murray Gerrie, who chaired the meeting, said he and several other association representatives, net with council and the police chief last month. Mr. Gerrie said council members are eager to help the association solve Wingham's parking problem and suggested the association establish a parking authority which could work with council to obtain more off- street parking. In other business, ways to decorate the main street were discussed. Members were unanimous that a campaign to clean up the main street should be started and the horticultural society should be contacted regarding planting flowers at Cruickshank Park. Hours for the Easter holiday were discussed and set at the meeting. In light of the April 1 Good Friday holiday, the stores will remain open Thursday evening, March 3i. current emergency depart- ment, has been around in one form or another for a number of years, but this is the first time the health ministry has given the green light. To get that approval, the hospital scaled down its original plans to one storey instead of two, for an estimated cost savings of about $300,000. The second floor in the original plan would have contained consulting rooms and offices for visiting specialists and other health professionals. The scaled-down plans call for a one -storey building, with the possibility of adding one or two additional floors sometime in the future, and carry a price tag estimated to be in the neighborhood of $1.4 million. Besides the ministry contribution, the project would be funded from the hospital's own capital reserves, a bank loan, contributions from Huron and Bruce counties ' and a, public fundraising cam- paign. A meeting of the hospital board management com- mittee was scheduled for Tuesday night, and Mr. Hayes said the topic of the fundraising campaign would probably be discussed. The hospital will probably have a professional fundraiser come in and set up the campaign, he said, with a Gadshill man dies in mishap A Gadshill man was killed last Thursday night when his car skidded on an icy road and slammed into a bridge abutment along Huron County Road 30 near Ford- wich. Cpl. William Skelding of the Wingham OPP detach- ment reported that John C. Pryde, 30, of RR 1, Gadshill, was northbound on the county road at about 11:15 p.m. when ' the accident occurred. There had been a little snow earlier that evening and the road was quite slick, he said. Apparently the car slid into the bridge. Mr. Pryde, who was alone in the car, a 1977 Ford station wagon, was pronounced dead of the scene. kick-off date to coincide with the start of construction. While the public fund- raising is an important part of the financing package, the majority of the financing is already in place, with the contributions from the hospital, the health ministry and the hospital foundation, and a line of credit at the bank, he noted. utting program suspended to allow professional a - sment Prompted by the concern of residents and of some of its own members, the Wingham Town Council has temporarily called a halt to its winter tree -cutting program. Before it starts again, council plans to bring in a firm of tree professionals from London to assess the trees and advise on which ones can be saved. The tree -cutting, which had been rolling along in high gear this winter, was suspended late last week following an informal meeting of several members of council. Some 40 trees had been cut already; and another 20 were scheduled to fall before spring. A prime mover in the drive to save the trees is Coun- cillor William Crump, under whose cautious directions only 16 trees were felled during all of last winter. Councillor Crump, who had urged the previous council to bring in tree surgeons in an attempt to preserve the aging maples, claims the town could save many of the trees for less than it spends cutting them down. Dead wood can be trim- med out; holes can be pat- ched to prevent rotting,, and trees can be cabled to prevent splitting at a fork, he pointed out. He admittedthat some of the trees are beyond saving. and have to be cut, but Survey is planned of Clark property Wingham Town Council has decided to have a survey done of the Joe Clark property on Josephine Street before proceeding. with any action on alleged zoning violations by the company. The decision was made at a special closed meeting of the council with its solicitor Mondayevening. . Follovtring .the rieeting, Mayor ex- plained the' s" lidItor had advised paving the survey done because of 'uncertainty about the exact location of property boundaries. This, uncertainly had surfaced during the recent Ontario Municipal Board hearing on the town's zoning bylaw, when it was pointed out that the map which forms part of the bylaw is rather vague, since even the thickness of the lines on the SUCCESSFUL RACER—Sarah Middleton, a member of the local AWANA club, picked up two trophies for her success with her racing car recently. The car, which she made at home with some help from her dad, Bob, raced to first place in a local club meet and then placed second in the AWANA Grand Prix for Western Ontario at Stratford. This isSarah's second year in the AWANA club, a non -denominational Christian youth, group which meets at the Wingham Bible Chapel. map can alter boundaries by several feet. The .OMB rejected a petition by Mr. Clark to* leave his property unzoned pending resolution of a dispute over its use by the trucking company. Council received an of- ficial. complaint last year from neighboring residents after the1/4company erected a .new .balding ..to Wash out,. cattle trailers. The residents have charged that this use violates the town zoning bylaw. Chimney fire sounds alarm Wingham firefighters were called . to the home of David Cameron on Angus Street, Wingham, Monday evening to douse a chimney, fire. Fire Chief Dave Crothers reported the blaze was in a chimney connected to a wood -burning stove and was extinguished without dam- age. suggested that others are being felled because of fear they might fall on someone's house someday, or because they interfere with wires. Cutting of the trees .falls under the jurisdiction of the public works department, and it has been left to the foreman to decide which ones should come down. Since the Public Utilities Commission, using its bucket trucks, is highly visible as a tree -cutter, it has been taking some of the heat for the cutting program. However Manager Ken Saxton explained the PUC does not decide which trees to cut, but simply follows the instructions of the town. It has from time to time been forced to cut down a tree which threatened its power lines, he said, but SOPHIE FORAN, a familiar face at the Wingham and District Hospital, was honored by co-workers at a retire- ment dinner held last Thursday evening at the Wingham Golf and Curling Club. Mrs. Foran, who graduated from nurses' training in Toronto in 1946, worked at the Wingham hospital for a total of 20 years. She was presented with tokens of esteem from Verna Steffler and Dr. Jack McKim. In addition to hospital staff, half of Mrs. Foran's 14 children also attended the dinner. Some complaints MVCA budget increases The Maitland Valley Conservation Authority's (MVCA) 1983 budget topped the $1 million mark when a 7.8 per cent increase was approved at the authority's annual meeting Feb. 23 in Wroxeter. The"32-member municipalities of MVCA will share about 15 per cent of the budget or $168,230 in general levies .and $18,320 in special levies. The remaining income will come in the form of grants from the provin- cial and federal governments, and donations and revenue from the conservation areas. Goderich Coun. Don Wheeler asked if it wouldn't be appropriate to limit the budget increase to five per cent., MVCA chairman Dave Gower of Goderich said in preparing the budget the executive considered the five and six guidelines, but "if we don't keep pace with the list of pro- jects, we'll not get sufficient funding in the future." He said a 7.8 per cent increase is "realis- tic". Mr. Gower noted municipalities are paying 15 per cent of the total budget. "Municipalities are getting a great dollar for 15 cents," commented MVCA vice-chair- man Vince Judge of Listowel. Palmerston's representative, Catherine Keleher, said she couldn't support the 1983 budget. "My municipality has aimed at a five per cent increase. if we have to pay more than five per cent, we'll have to cut back in other areas," said Ms. Keleher. "1n all good con- science ... i can't vote for this budget." The largest capital project to be undertak- en within the watershed in 1983 is the con- tinuation of the flood forecast system at an estimated cost of 871,500. This includes the purchase and installation of gauging stations above Wingham, in lower Wing - ham, at Ethel, Belgrave and Donnybrook. A total of $21,000 has been budgeted for property management at conservation areas within _the watershed. This includes forestry management. erosion control, maintenance and stream improvements at the conservation areas. 'LISTOWEL WORK Listowel will be the centre of much of the authority's activities in 1983. Under capital projects, $10,000 has been estimated for sod- ding and seeding of the river banks where channelization work was done last year. More studies will take place on the Listowel conduit. A pre -design report has been budgeted at $15,000 and will include the assessment of in- dividual properties over and adjacent to the conduit. Consideration will be given to the retention or removal of each structure. Options and costs of the conduit reconstruc- tion program will be part of the report. Another $34,000 has been set aside in the budget for phase five of the conduit work which includes design drawings and con- tract specifications for the properties noted above. A tender call for construction is hoped for in early 1984. Another $6,000 has been budgeted for a re- port which will outline the standards and al- ternatives for flood -proofing buildings in the special policy area of the floodplain in Lis- towel. Both the authority and town will use the findings of this report to protect new development from possible flood damage. Another major study to be undertaken by the authority is a shoreline, management plan involving contour mapping of the 18 miles of shoreline on Lake Huron within the watershed. A co-operative venture, this project will involve financial and technical support from both the Huron County planning department and the Wingham office of the Ministry of Natural Resources. The budget breakdown includes estimates of 8223.200 for administration (including salaries and expenses of both • staff and authority members). $118,800 for mainten- ance and operations of the conservation areas, $283,900 for program administration of water and related land management, $122.000 for surveys and studies, $102,500 for capital projects. $9.700 for conservation and recreation land management and 8158,677 for special (•mplovment programs. mostly it is content to trim around the lines. The problem the com- mission finds is, sometimes when it goes up to trim a tree it discovers it is just wasting its time. A tree which looks sound from the ground may be rotting and weakened 20 feet up. He said people get up in arms about what they feel is unnecessary cutting of trees, but even a tree expert can't tell you exactly whether or when a tree will fall. And there is nothing worse than having a fair-sized tree come down on power lines, he added. If you are lucky it will just break the wires; otherwise it may pull down a whole row of poles. Then you are looking at a small disaster, and the power won't be back on in a couple of hours. Plus the costs of ,repair force the utility to postpone its con- struction program. He said the PUC doesn't want to get involved in tree surgery. "For one thing, you're saving a tree for 10 years that's over -mature anyway." There is a limit to how long a tree will live, even under ideal conditions, he noted. In town, with so much pavement, the trees are being starved for food and water, and the salt from the streets in winter just adds to ,the prohiecn ''rtn iidin faVor of cutting ing down all the trees," he ad- ded. "I think there should be at least one planted for every one cut down." Perhaps surprisingly, a member of one of the groups that might be expected to oppose • tree cutting most strongly said he supports the cutting program. Roy Bennett, a long-time member of. the Wingham Horticultural Society, said that so far as he has been able to tell, every tree that has been cut so far this winter has needed cutting. He also opposes trying to save the trees through surgery, saying it would be just a waste of money on trees that are doomed anyway. A more productive solution is a vigorous replanting program to make sure trees which must be removed are replaced. He said the trees being cut were all marked last sum- mer when the leaves came off. If a tree loses its leaves in August or September, you know it has "dieback", and there is nothing you can do to save it. "I fully endorse every- thing they're doing, as long as they keep planting." They are not cuttingtrees just because they want to, he said. The trees being cut are all between 75 and 100 years old; they have been paved around and now they are starving for food and water. Nor is Wingham the only town with a tree -cutting program, he added. Other towns are in the same position. "They're being cut down all over." You can trim and patch trees, he agreed, but that is stop -gap. The most you can buy is a few years; then the tree will die anyway. "They're old and dying of starvation. A big tree takes a lot of moisture." Mr. Bennett said the horti- cultural society is primarily .-concerned with keeping the replanting program going. For many years no trees were planted un ll@ ' the society approached town to start, but for the past few years the replanting has pretty well been keeping pace with the cutting. "I don't see any point in bringing in a tree surgeon, he added. "it's too costly and not worth it. "1 would rather see them spend that money on replanting."