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Adjala–Tosorontio news

June 6, 2013   ·   0 Comments

Former Adjala-Tosorontio Deputy Mayor  Passes

Former Adjala-Tosorontio deputy mayor Terry O’Brien has passed away.

O’Brien died last Thursday at Stevenson Memorial Hospital in Alliston.

O’Brien served as an Adjala councillor in the 1980’s before her election to deputy mayor in 1988. After amalgamation with Tosorontio, she was a deputy mayor of the municipally until 1997.

She was predeceased by her husband Jim and is survived by her children, Karen and Keith, daughter-in law Kelly O’Brien and  her four grandchildren Edward, Shawntel, Renee, and Josh. She was also predeceased  her son-in-law late Edward Cournoyea.

A Memorial Mass will be held in St. James Church Colgan, on Saturday June 8, 2013 at 3 p.m., with visiting from 2 p.m. until time of  service.

Everett plan passage 

deferred until August

Adjala-Tosorontio council didn’t vote as expected on the proposed Everett Secondary Plan Monday night.

Instead, a vote on the plan may not come for several months.

Council held a special meeting on the plan on Monday morning which started at 9 a.m. and lasted for three hours.

The proposal, which could see Everett grow to upwards of a maximum of 10,000 people over the coming decades, has been ongoing for the past year and saw one of the largest turnouts of township residents in recent years to a public meeting on the issue in April.

Council did agree Monday night to commission a study on the proposed sewer system which will be needed to take care of sewage in the community. The $287,000 study plus HST will be conducted by Greenland Consulting Engineers over the next year.

The study will be paid for by developers is expected to take a year to complete and may allow ongoing development by R. and M. Homes to be done without using subsurface development beds.

The report noted that the Secondary Plan will be heading to Simcoe County for approval if it is approved by council.

Councillor Doug Little told council that he wanted the municipality that the township was not putting in a sewage system in the near future.

“This may be years or longer down the road,” he said.

Township mayor Tom Walsh also  emphasized this point. “Existing residents will pay to hook up and that will be their only cost. They won’t be paying for the building of the system.”

Adjala-Tosorontio moves ahead with paving

Adjala-Tosorontio council has decided to move ahead with paving the lower parking lot at the Warden’s Park at the municipal offices despite the objections from one members of council.

Lisle area councillor Scott Anderson said that he had issues spending almost $12,000 plus HST for the project when access for   individuals with accessibility issues was available at the main parking lot.

“Its a lot of money that might be used for paving elsewhere,” he said. Anderson suggested paving the area around the parking spots dedicated for accessibility difficulties and leaving the rest of the parking area as gravel.

Deputy mayor Mary Small Brett said that there might not be much of a saving between paving part and all of the parking lot.

Councillor Floyd Pinto said that the recommendation had come from the township’s accessibility committee and that from his personal experience as a support worker for disabled individuals that paving an area was a positive.

“Its not very easy to move a wheelchair in a gravel parking lot,” he said.

Council eventually voted to accept the quote from Coco Paving to do the project.

Lowest bid not always the best, council learns

The lowest bid to cut the township’s parks and other open areas didn’t work out too well for Adjala-Tosorontio.

A Barrie firm hired to cut the township’s 27 properties earlier this year at a cost of $855 plus GST decided to cancel the contract after doing the first cut and realizing that it could do the work at that price. It used a cancellation clause in the contract.

Public Works superintendent Jim Moss said that the township was left scrambling at this late date to find a new contractor but was able to get Shamrock Property Maintenance who submitted the next lowest tender at $1,125 plus GST to undertake the contract. Shamrock cut grass for the township last year.

Councillor Scott Anderson reminded council that he had expressed concerns about the low bid when it was submitted.

“I hate to say that I told you so,” he said.

He said that he hoped that the new contractor would be able to met the township’s requirements.

Council split over 

increasing fees for 

baseball diamonds

Adjala-Tosorontio council was split once again over charging user fees for public sports facilities and other township spaces.

Council reviewed an update of the Fees and Charges Bylaw which will see some baseball teams paying twice the current rate for space at the current fields.

David Anderson, brother of councillor Scott Anderson, made a presentation earlier in the meeting and asked that council rethink the fee increase which would discourage current users from using the parks and from donating to the park’s improvement projects.

In the debate that followed, councillor Floyd Pinto said that he felt, even with the proposed increases, that the rates were still very reasonable.

“We’re talking about $10 per person. $1 per person. Its not very much. In my ward, people seem more interested in riding horses but we don’t see any subsidies for that,” he said. ‘My residents are subsidizing baseball in the rest of the township.”

Councillor Doug Little made similar concerns about the affordability of the township’s facilities.

“We’re looking at $100,00 for us to use recreation facilities in New Tecumseth. We have groups from other municipalities using our facilities because they’re so reasonable. $10 per game for 20 people is not a lot of money,” he said.

Scott Anderson argued that he saw the increased fees as detrimental to the continuing use of the park.

Council eventually approved the new rate schedule with Anderson the only member of council opposed to the increase.

By Richard Blanchard

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