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4 - Orono Weekly Times Wednesday, January 27, 2010 ELECTION Continued from front page at large was the fact that the Chair earns a base salary of over $150,000 per year plus benefits, which he said, is approximately equal to the base salary of the Premier of Ontario. At the January 16, 2006 meeting of Clarington Council, the vote to not change the way the Regional chair is elected was unanimous. In February 2007, Clarington council approved a motion put forward by Councillor Adrian Foster, to advise the Minister of Municipal Affairs that the Municipality of Clarington "vehemently" opposed the passage of a Bill to change the way the Chair of the Region of Durham is selected. Prior to the vote Monday night, Councillor Charlie Trim introduced a motion asking for a staff report on the pros and cons of electing the Chair at large by the electorate of the Region or by the 28 Regional councillors. That motion did not get a seconder. In a recorded vote, all councillors except for Trim voted to place a referendum question on the October 2010 municipal election ballot, on how the Regional chair should be selected. Councillor Mary Novak was absent; she has not attended a council meeting this year. Before the method of selecting the Chair for the Region can change, it must receive triple majority support. That triple majority is the majority of Regional Councillor votes, the majority of lower-tier municipalities (5 of the 8), and the total number of electors in the supporting lower-tier municipalities, which must represent more than 50 percent of the Region's electorate. If the system is to change, it won't be before the 2014 municipal election. Municipal ballots to be counted manually Ballots in the October 25th municipal election will be counted manually at Clarington polling stations. In October of last year, Clarington councillors voted to return to a method of voting, similar to that used by the Federal and Provincial governments. Since 2000, Clarington has used a mail-in ballot system for municipal elections, in conjunction with electronic vote-counting machines. Municipal Clerk Patti Barrie recommended Clarington use a combination of internet voting and traditional style voting, using paper ballots at a polling station for the October 25th municipal election. She also highly recommended the use of electronic vote-counting machines for the next election. At the October 26, 2009 meeting, Council opted to use the traditional style of voting for the next election, but asked Barrie to prepare a report comparing electronic vote-counting mach-ines to manual counting. Councillor Willie Woo introduced a motion two weeks ago, asking council to re-consider its decision not to use electronic votecounting machines. The matter was on the agenda for Monday night's council meeting; however, it did not get the two-thirds majority support from councillors for reconsideration of the previous motion. Woo said at Monday's meeting, he tried to reintroduce the use of votetabulating machines because the issue was not debated when Barrie presented her report on the use of the machines to Council. The cost of renting vote- counting machines for the 2010 election would have been $63,000. Do you think you have a drinking problem? We can help! ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS 905-728-1020 www.aaoshawa.org