The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

^ 2 - Orono Weekly Tiroes, Wednesday, February 2,2000 ^ Weekly Times Serving East Clarington and beyond since 1937 Subscriptions $23.36 + $1.64 G.S.T. = $25.00/year Publications Mail Registration No. 09301 Publishing 50 Issues Annually at the Office of Publication 5310 Main Street, P.O. Box 209, Orono, Ontario LOB 1M0 E-Mail Address: oronotimes@speedline.ca Phone/Fax (905) 983-5301 Publisher/Editor Marg Zwart Courtice - the land of opportunity Council is once again trying to grapple with the controlling development in the Courtice area. To that end, councillors approved the Planning Department's recommendation to conduct conduct a two year study on the Courtice Highway 2 corridor. The south west corner of Highway 2 and Trulls Rd. has been identified as 'Courtice Main Central Area'. The Clarington Official Plan Envisions that area to be developed as the centre of commercial, cultural and community activity. The Planning Department feels a secondary study is needed to ensure that the vision for this area is realized. They also have to come up with a plan to transform the Highway to a "Main St." character in Courtice. "Courtice needs a downtown," said Councillor Rowe, at Monday's meeting. "We need a place you can hang a poster, and it will be seen," she said. Transforming a rural community into an urban one is not an easy task. Courtice, for those that don't live there, is mostly just somewhere you have to drive through to get to Oshawa. Presently it has no identity as a community. Along the Highway 2 corridor you have active farms, plazas, offices, pockets of large older and newer homes. The Official Plan does allow for limited office use in areas along the Highway 2 corridor, but who defines 'limited'. At Monday's council meeting, Planning Director David Crome said everybody thinks the'limited' applies to their property. In December council heard from a delegation who operates an insurance business in what used to be a home in Courtice. You are permitted to operate an in-home business, as long as it does not occupy more than 25% of the home, and you have to live in that home. This delegation was applying for rezoning so in future the business could occupy the entire building. At that same meeting council heard from a delegation who lives in this vicinity, on Highway 2, stating they bought in a residential area, and objected to the properties around them being converted to commercial uses. Meanwhile, half her neighbours are hanging on to their properties till they can cash in on a more lucrative zoning. This week council had before it a rezoning application from ' an applicant who bought a home in Courtice, and converted the ' entire building to professional office use eight years ago, with a paved parking lot in the back. That applicant is now looking to legalize the existing professional use of the property. ' The new study will help define a plan for development in Courtice, but council has to take control now. Under constant development pressure, the character of the entire area could be changed before the study is completed. Solution (continued from page 1) After each councillor in attendance had the opportunity opportunity to speak, Chair Anderson stated, "if you pass this today, unanimously, you will have taken another major step. The made in Durham solution is the best solution you can have." Council unanimously passed the the action plan. Councillor Drumm later removed his motion, tabled at the December 15, 1999 meeting. meeting. That motion proposed councillors be elected directly to Regional Council in the November 2000 elections. • Drumm's motion went on to propose that in the 200? Municipal elections Regional council be reduced to 11 members, down from the 28 currently serving. Subsequent motions by Mayor Ham re, and Councillor Nicholson were also withdrawn. art Throughout February the Clarington Gallery is featuring featuring acrylic paintings by students students from the Foundations in Art & Design Program at Durham College.. Letter to the Editor Rants and Raves Part II Dear Marg. Today was earmarked for some ranting about Mr. Mike and the sad state of health care in Ontario e.g. how much worse can it get? I'm sure well find out. But after reading last week's O.W.T. and the raves from Alex Shepherd over HIS government's government's popular decision not to dole out any money to Canadian based NHL teams, it called for a change in plans. Even John O'Toole chimed in to back the fed's financial restraint. Let's face it. these are a couple guys who, despite being on different different teams, know a thing or two about government cutbacks! cutbacks! In reality, Chretien's reversal on this NHL thing saved taxpayers in the neighbourhood neighbourhood of $20 million. And, it was a GOOD decision. Coincidentally, or maybe not so coincidentally, it was mentioned mentioned at pretty much the same time by Jane Stewart, Federal Minister of Human Resources & Development, that her department had mishandled (?) up to 3 BILLION BILLION taxpayers dollars, three billion....not three million! I'm not sure what "mishandled" means, and the term "misappropriated" "misappropriated" has also been used but, likely we didn't get enough bang for our buck. Now, this isn't anything new. When I worked in trans portation some years ago, we used to get a monthly print out from our Ottawa manager manager showing all government grants, which we sometimes could use as sales leads, regarding > movement of goods, equipment, etc. It likely likely was under a different branch of government name at that time, but you get the idea. Now, if you think the NHL handout was going to be a waste, you should see some of the stuff our money is wasted on. I'm sure Alex would be glad to supply any of his constituents with a copy of a current list. But, for years it has gone on pretty pretty much unnoticed arid unchallenged, because, unlike the NHL, it is not the stuff of headlines. And we just don't get as worked up about scientific studies, explorations, etc. as we do about the Leafs and Canadiens. I guess maybe we should!! Firstly, if this happened in the priyate sector, Jane Stewart, the Minister of Mishandling, wouldn't have a job anymore. Neither would a lot of people in her department. department. Hey, we ARE talking about up to 3 billion dollars here! It was reported that 87% of the 457 grants surveyed surveyed weren't financially monitored. And, 15% didn't even apply for their money!! There is something very wrong with that. I really think your readers should ask Alex for a print out on just WHERE this money goes, and WHO is getting how much? It would no doubt evoke a good laugh....or a good ciy...either of which might help us cope with how Chretien Liberals spend/save our money. It's a damned disgrace and the Liberals should be held accountable; since we can't fire them yet. Then again, Ms. Stewart will probably probably "resign" before the O.W.T. hits the newsstands next Wednesday, and Alex will be extolling the virtues of his party, and telling us what a fine job they're doing. Yeah, right! Regards, Bob Rotz, New logo for nature area In last week's story about the new logo for the Samuel Wilmot Nature Area, we forgot forgot to print the logo. This new logo was designed by Grant Benham, who lives in the neighbouring Wilmot Adult Community. The bottom portion of the logo is blue, representing Lake Ontario with the cattails depicting the marshland. The dark area around the tree outline outline is green, representing meadowlands and the tree represents represents the forest. WOW, A POUTiCAL PARTY THAT IS * ADWTTiWa WHAT IT IS REALLY ALL 1)1. I'M wm.. smm liuliiiliijrti'gfld.aim