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

Page 8 THE HERALD Wednesday January 9 Get it right In a democracy laws are enacted by legislators for what is termed the common good It is expected that society as a whole will benefit from the laws voted into being by the elected representatives of the people All well and good in theory Occasionally however illconceived or even poor pieces of legislation either slip through cracks in the system or are thrust on an unsuspecting public by a government that holds a majority of seats in the respec tive Houses of Parliament Regardless in both scenarios the public must wallow through the mess while the politicos pat themselves on the back for a job welldone Federally we need look no further than the recently- implemented Goods and Services Tax as anexample At the provincial level the new Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act which became law Jan 1 is causing equal amounts of conster nation The law was introduced by the provincial Liberal par ty when it was in power and now cries are being heard from members of all three major provincial political partys to either rescind the law or alter it drastically The original intent of the law was to protect an in dividuals privacy by prohibiting the release of personal information about the individual except in special cir cumstances While the intent of the law was laudable its wording was so imprecise as to leave the legislation open to all sorts of interpretation or even misinterpretation Municipal police forces already handcuffed by countless directives could find themselves in litigation if the law is interpreted a certain way Metropolitan Toronto Police are limiting the informa tion given to the media for just this reason A number of other Ontario municipal forces are adopting the same stance To its credit Halton Region Police under the guidance of Chief James Harding are proceeding as they have always done when it comes to releasing information Chief Harding was quoted as saying I abide by the old commonlaw principle that when a crime is committed it is not just against an individual but against society as a whole The whole of society has the right to redress and protection Another original intention of the law was to further openup the lines of communication between the police and the community in effect the reverse could occur For the most part police forces use discretion when releasing information to the media This is as it should be In the same way that the media should use discretion as well But a community also has the right to know about the criminal activities in its environs and certain inter pretations of this law would deny a community this in formation To legislators both and federally a sug gestion get it right the first time Editorial- Letter of the Week Police propaganda To the Editor The Police Propaganda Machine has again successfully nailed down front page coverage in Its ongoing program to dupe the media and mislead the public I refer to the Concealed Weapon story on Page Wed Jan 291 of the Herald A little technical knowledge reveals the item carried by the youngster to be an air pistol or pellet gun which is the only such item produced in 177 inch calibre It is not a handgun not a firearm and not a weapon it is an air pistol What have here is a youngster playing with an air pistol while both parents were away from home This is certain ly not a desirable situation but it is far from the serious threat to society that the Police Propagan da Machine would have us all believe with phrases like Re mained in Police custody and Charges are pending The headline could just as easily have read police Harass Acton Youth Playing in Yard While this may seem petty to criticize this story I am tired of groups pursuing their hidden agendas by misrepresenting the facts in order to mislead the public Unchallenged this inci dent would go down in the record books as a Concealed Weapon incident for police to drag out at budget time as one of the alarm ing statistics rather than a situation handled sensibly Lets all get back to our own business For the Police this means solving criminal cases not exaggerating and manipulating stories through the media For the newspapers it means simply reporting the news and not creating it- Name withheld In fear of reprisals from the Police Editors Note In the incident referred to by this letter writer an Acton youth was spotted by police at l am hiding in a walkway between a house and a garage It subsequently discovered by police that the youth had a 177 calibre handgun tucked down the front of his pants with Just the handle portion ex posed The Halton Hills HERALD Home Newspaper of Hills Established A Division of Canadian Newspaper Company Limited 45 Street Georgetown Ontario 3Z6 K ROBERT Publisher and General Manager 8772201 CLASSIFIED Joan Mannall CIRCULATION I ACCOUNTING SUBSCRIPTION RATES 2S- all month Canada 16000 fail 14100 all month month go all claim copyright on all original now and malarial era lad by It ampIOfH and In thla nawaoapor National SI W Toronto IMS 0 or MO Calhcart Monutal Tho adnrliiar agnaa publlihar ahall not lor damage arlilng out of anora In ma amount paid lor actually by hat portion M ha In which no liability lor In art ton an Peoples Forum Duignan challenged by Chamber Editors Note The following letter was released to The HOIsHeraldforpubllcatlon To The Editor of The Halton Hills Herald Open letter to Noel Duignan ML A Re Jumping to Conclusions I was most interested in reading the published interview you gave Ben as it ap peared in the December 22 Herald I have determined that the reporter stands by the ac curacy of the quotes attributed to you and I have seen no retraction or modification of what was at tributed to you This letter is writ ten on the assumption that the Herald interview accurately reflected your views I was particularly interested in reading your comments with respect to your meeting with the Issues Committee of the Halton Hills Chamber of Commerce as they relate to two issues The first of those issues is the Silver Creek Trunk Sewer I can see where you might have jumped to the conclusion that the Chamber was opposed to an En vironmental Assessment for Silver Creek But that was not our position Our position was that before there is an EA or even a request for one the starting point is a review of ail of the studies that have been done in the past to first of all determine whether or not there is a need for a full No should be under taken without good reason not on ly for the cost but because of the inevitable time delays which may prevent a resolution of the sewage problems in the old part of Georgetown but also further delay development in Georgetown West You met with the Issues Com mittee of the Chamber several weeks ago Every member of that committee like the vast ma- of our members both work in Hills and live here We do not want to seeSilver Creek or any other area destroyed by foolish development The business community however is keenly aware of the need to solve both the sewage problem and for the need for sustainable growth for the maintenance of the stan dard of living we now enjoy If there is a demonstrated need for a full EA neither the Chamber of Commerce or the business com munity will oppose We simply oppose unwarranted studies designed to impede growth I think you jumped to the wrong conclusion The second issue is the Maple Avenue Apartment proposal You said that we agreed to disagree on a number of development issues including the Maple Avenue Apartment Develop ment The fact is that the Chamber of Commerce has never taken a position on that development The directors have never dealt with the issue and our members have never been canvassed as to their position on that issue I must therefore conclude that you are disagreing with the position taken by the majority of those on the Issues Committee with whom you met I should set out that position As a committee we do not have a position Of the five people on the committee you met with four of those people to my knowledge do not support that particular proposal and the fifth person has never taken a public position If you disagree with the majority of the Issues Committee on that proposal you must sup port that development because we do not If I had not read your words I believe its the wrong develop ment in the wrong place I would have thought that you supported the development because you disagreed with us I could easily have jumped to the wrong conclu sion In passing I fail to see how we could agree to disagree on an item that was only mentioned in passing The Maple Avenue pro ject was only mentioned in a passing reference to another issue You jumped to the conclu sion that the Chamber of Com merce supported the proposal for highrise condominiums on Maple Avenue the good Lord alone knows how you did that The subject was not discussed We hope that we can work with you as we have worked with your predecessors We look forward to discussing development issues pay equity Sunday shopping and a host of other issues which are important to our membership We only ask that you listen to us and make sure you understand our position before you misrepre sent it through the press or elsewhere David B Page President Hills Chamber of Commerce