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www.independentfreepress.com Ted Arnott ............... 7 Sports .................... 10 Directory ............... 13 Calendar ............... 14 Classifieds ............ 15 50 Cents (+ GST) Circulation: 22,800 TRAILBLAZER GONE The Town's first female councillor, Anne Currie, has died at 90 PAGE 4 HOME, LAWN & GARDEN Spring is coming and it will soon be time to hit the garden 4-PAGE SECTION 32 Pages Halton Hills' award-winning newspaper Provincial regulation forces bakery layoffs Shop is considered a meat plant for selling pies wholesale By LISA TALLYN Staff Writer The owners of a Georgetown bakery have had to lay off several employees because a provincial regulation they hadn't heard about requires them to do extensive costly renovations or stop wholesaling their meat pies. The renovations could cost at least $50,000-- money Miller's Scottish Bakery doesn't have-- so, for now, they've had to stop wholesaling the pies and cut back staff. The Guelph St. bakery has been making and selling the popular meat pies for more than 20 years-- selling them retail in the shop and wholesale to customers. But in December the bakery's owners-- Phil and Wendy Miller-- had a visit from an Ontario Ministry of Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA) enforcement officer who said he had received a complaint about the bakery wholesaling meat pies. Phil Miller said they told him they have been selling the pies, both wholesale and retail, for several years and had the green light from the Public Health department to do so. But Miller said the OMAFRA enforcement officer told him there was a meat regulation under the Food Safety and Quality Act in place that applied to them. Under that regulation (implemented in Phil Miller of Miller's Scottish Bakery on Guelph Street in Georgetown is not happy with a provincial regulation that considers his bakery a meat plant because he sells meat pies wholesale. Photo by Ted Brown THE INDEPENDENT & FREE PRESS TUESDAY, March 15, 2011 2008), due to the fact they wholesale some meat pies, the bakery is deemed a free standing meat plant, which is just mindboggling to the owners, who had never heard of the regulation. Miller said he's also baffled that they can't continue to wholesale their Scotch meat pies without the renovations, but they can sell them retail from the bakery. Their wholesale trade is about 25 per cent of their less than a 1,000 a week meat pie business, money they use to "top up our sales." "It's the difference of paying a bill or not," said Miller. So without that business, they had to lay off eight part-time workers, but they have been able to bring two of them back. "When they (government inspectors) suddenly walk in through your door and cut off part of your business....it's like drowning, you don't drown a little bit," said Miller, who is frustrated by the situation and has contacted the Ontario ombudsman for help. He doesn't understand how the bakery See BAKERY, pg. 4 Vi s i t o u r s h o w r o o m · your window & door professionals · 341 Guelph St., Unit 3 Georgetown 905.873.0236 www.buy-wise.ca info@buy-wise.ca · awarded readers choice 16 times · 33 MOUNTAINVIEW RD. N., GEORGETOWN 905-877-6944 7e HANDLE ALL INSURANCE work. sTruck Accessories s5PHOLSTEry s(Eavy %QUIPMENT 'LASS s7INDow 4INTING 354 Guelph Street, Georgetown (905) 873-1655