Hopes councils, planning board, have eyes wide open and a strong strategic plan
To the Expositor:
Where to start? Items of news both within and outside of The Expositor/Recorder have potential impact on Manitoulin’s planning horizon—and should be hot items for the Manitoulin Planning Board and incumbent councils as the municipal elections loom.
Four articles in The Expositor and Recorder caught my eye. Blue Goose has decided to terminate their beef operations on the Island after only about two years. The question I have is: why does a former family farming operation which has been doing this successfully for several decades and should know the business inside out make what appears to be such a major business miscalculation? One reason might be that the original business was bought out by a Bay Street billionaire with deep pockets several years ago, and maybe this “land banking” (reminiscent of how the DeGasperis Condrain business seized such a powerful hold on land on the outskirts of the GTA) has another purpose? I hope our local councils and the planning board have their eyes wide open and are ensuring that the strategic plan that we the citizens want and have supported has no loopholes that a determined developer can drive a bus through!
The second article concerned the Split Rail Brewery proposal. Apparently, FedNor, the province and Billings council are enthusiastic about this venture for Kagawong! I have several questions 1) Have any of these enthusiasts been downwind of a brewery? 2) Breweries have large inflows of potable water and produce large wastewater outflow that also has its “fragrance.” Are they planning to place it close to residences? (Billings has no industrial zoning that I am aware of.) Does council have some plan to develop a wastewater management system (sewage facility) for just the waterfront (and now this new bright shiny object) or do they have in their plans a serious attempt to service the whole community? We know what a hot potato the water filtration plant turned out to be—hold on to your hats, Billings taxpayers!
Third was Councillor Brian Parker’s motion in council about Hydro costs “…If the province wants to open the cauldron, maybe we could get the Federation of Northern Ontario Municipalities (FONOM) and the Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO) to request the province look at equalization billing for the police, hydro, gas prices and fuel prices,” stated Mr. Parker.
Maybe a different approach makes more sense. We now have generation capability on the Island (whether we like them or not they are a fact), yet Hydro currently charges us approximately 50 percent of our monthly bills for “distribution” from fossil fuel generation plants like Nanticoke on Lake Ontario. Maybe we should say ‘Okay Hydro, you stuck us with these wind turbines—one electron is like any other—we’ll take the ones generated on the Island even at the higher rates. You drop the distribution charges and we’ll call it a wash!’
Finally, two big pieces of news that threaten to have an adverse effect on boating tourism on the Island. LCYC is dropping the MacMan Race. At the same time, this weekend several very big developers announced a new 1,000 slip marina (with condo development integrated) at Innisfil on Lake Simcoe. I’ve seen other attempts like this fail, but these are big players with deep pockets. I’d say any plans on the Island for expansion of marinas or waterfronts better go back to the drawing board and update their business viability studies.
Paul Darlaston
Kagawong
