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6- PORT PERRY STAR - Tuesday, November 30, 1999 "Scugog's Community Newspaper of Choice" PUBLISHER - J. Peter Hvidsten GENERAL MGR. - Don MacLeod MANAGING EDITOR - Jeff Mitchell REPORTER - Chris Hall OFFICE MANAGER - Gayle Stapley ADVERTISING MGR. - Deb McEachern PHONE (905) 985-7383 FAX (905) 985-3708 E-MAIL: port.perry.star@ sympatico.ca Member Ontario Community Newspaper Assoc. AXels tI js 650i) 3 SOE le 1 Year - $37.45 (includes GST) Publications Mail Registration No. 07881 Published every Tuesday by the Port Perry Star Company Limited, 188 Mary Street - Port Perry, Ontario - LOL 1B7 Six Months - $19.79 (includes GST) Foreign 1 Year - $96.30 (includes GST) EDITORIAL POLICY: Opinions expressed by columnists, contributors and letter writers are not necessarily those of The Port Penty Star. Letters must be signed and the telephone number (which will not be published) included. Requests that a name be withheld will be honoured only if there is a compelling reason to do so. Errors wil be corrected if brought to the editor's attention. We reserve the right to edit or refuse publication of any material submitted. ADVERTISING POLICY: The publisher is not able for sight changes or typographical errors that do not lessen the value of an advertisement. The publisher is not liable for other erTors or omissions in connection with any advertisement in any subsequent issue or the refund of any monies paid for the advertisement. All claims of error in publication must be made by Wednesday, noon, prior to the next eels publication, and, if not made, will not be considered. No claim wil be allowed for more than one insertion. Sonia BUSINESS OFFICE: Judy Ashby, Kathy Community a CNA Dudley, Janet Rankin, Lesley West. Newspaper ADVERTISING: Ginni Todd, Cindy Jobin, Association Gail Morse, Heather Mack, Linda Clarke, Janet Archer, Malcolm Lennox PRODUCTION: Trudy Empringham, Pam Hickey, Daryle Wright, Robert Taylor, SUBSCRIPTION RATES Richard Drew, Scott Ashby, Editorial comment Creating a fairer tax-system It's more than a little bit ironic that so much seeming unfairness had to be dealt out to bring about a more equitable tax system. But that's essentially what's happened here and across Ontario over the past year, as new assessments for businesses have been imple- mented. When the results of the exercise emerged last year, the results were shocking, for many people. Some who had been paying taxes based on outdated assessments saw their bills go through the roof; many wondered how they'd manage to survive. So the provincial government backed off, capping increases at 10 per cent. But they left the details -- as is typical of the Tories -- to the municipalities. Thus, townships like Scugog have been scrambling to deal with an ever- changing set of rules. The result is that, this time around, some businesses are receiving refunds, while others face clawbacks. The good news is that more than twice as many refunds were sent out than clawbacks; the bad news is that those clawbacks were a real bite to some of the businesses that received them. In the end, however, we should have a tax system that's a lot more fair than the one that preceded it. It should have been fixed long ago, but the political will, courage, or maybe even know-how to make it happen was never present at Queen's Park until now. The situation was definitely made worse and more complicated because it was allowed to go unchecked for so long. But now it's been done. Now all we can hope for is some stability, and diligence at Queen's Park; reassessments done more frequently could save much pain and anger in the future. APPARENTLY SOMEBODY AROUND HERE GOT A REFUND!- Jpn Thanks for an excellent evening To the Editor: ding dinner. On behalf of Scugog Community Care, It was wonderful to see the students I would like to thank the Business OAC who worked so hard and with such enthu- class of Dave Robinson at Port Perry siasm and humour, pull off an"excellent High School for the excellent dinner and evening of dining and entertainment. evening of entertainment at the They bridged the gap between the dis- Dysfunctional Wedding on Wednesday, parate generations - teenagers and November 24, 1999. ~ seniors. All proceeds from their event We are indebted to Everlasting were donated to Scugog Community Care Memories of Port Perry, who provided to continue our work to assist the elderly, not only the wedding attire, decorations, disabled and those with special needs table centerpieces, and door prizes but live at home with a network of support in also their professional advice. a caring community. Thanks go to the other sponsors and to Jeff, chef of Hobby Horse Restaurant, Uxbridge, who was in charge of the wed- Anne Wannikhof, Scugog Community Care-Local Advisory Committee. by J. Peter Hvidsten REF®® | YES, THAT TREMBLING BB © | WAS AN EARTHQUAKE! fill conjures up visions of mass SE mg destruction, death and fire, but . there are hundreds of less violent quakes that shake the globe each year. "centered 20 miles off shore of Oshawa nudged its way through Durham, the first time an earth "shake" has been registered in this area for a few years, Our family was among those who noticed a slight shaking felt and sounded much like a bulldozer as it 'rumbled over the ground a distance away. My. | The word "earthquake" generally ~ Last Friday, just about supper time, an earthqugke trembling while at the dinner table that night. The weak 'Random Jottings - A couple members of our family didn't even notice the brief trembling sensation, which lasted about five seconds, but it was enough to make me stop and ask, "What was that?" News reports since the incident suggest the earth- | quake registered 3.9 on the Richter scale, and was the stored on the computers and external hard drives. strongest quake to ever hit southern Ontario. It's ironic, that while thousands of people die, and damage in the billions of dollars is inflicted each year from the effects of earthquakes around the globe, only in Ontario would a quake of this minor magnitude become a a major lead story and the topic of so much conversation on the streets and in the media. But, | guess since one of Canada's favourite topics of conversation is the weather, we shouldn't be sur- prised at the attention th own back yard received. Almost every w | and vandalism appear in the pages per and most others around the country. ~~ A Last week, we had to report on a break-inat The. JB Port Perry Star, in which thieves made off with © 4 more than $10,000 worth of computer and photo- . graphic equipment. This type of incident happens Bg: ~ daily in our lives, but it isn't until it happens to you, or someone close to you, that it reall Of In the case of the theft from Tha Star, the loss of our production computers is secondary to the loss of the valuable information contained within their hard drives, Literally hundreds of hours of production was The hard drive taken from my office contained hun- dreds of old photographs, maps and researched infor- mation accumulated over the past year. The equipment can be replaced... much of the infor- mation can not, unless the hard drives are returned. I'm going to take the liberty of outlining here some of the items stolen last Tuesday night, so if any of our readers come across them, or hear of someone who might have some information, can give us a call. The he minor earth tremor in our listincludes:* ~~ | ; > fille. - One Mcintosh G3 Computer and ~ TO CATCH A THIEF = 2M screen (has a clear blue ahd white plastic ry week, reports of break-ins, theft i. casing), = | jt - Two LaCie external Hard Drives (grey), - One LaCie external CD Writer (blue), - One Nikon camera and three lenses, % - A variety of computer programs, discs, WAR - A collection of unique Norwegian Troll. PRA | figurines, similar to the character at left, 4 Which are primarily of sentimental value. kY"We would approciate any Information. ¥ our readers might have in recovering. 0 f this newspa- "Ne re y strikes home. r, the loss of P theseitems. hr man SE a i ts TNE OE N 4 SEE <ul ot on