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Town, Region vow to fight province's growth plan CYNTHIA GAMBLE Staff Writer Halton Region and its municipalities are sending a message to Premier Dalton McGuinty-- don't send Halton any more people unless you send some money too. Halton Hills council unanimously passed a resolution at Monday's meeting telling the Province, the Town, Region, and the three other Halton municipalities: "cannot accommodate the growth targets-- 312,000 more people by 2031-- in the Province's Places to Grow Plan" unless changes are made in provincial funding programs to help build more schools, hospitals, fire halls, police stations, roads and transit systems-- among other things. Dubbed Fairness for Halton, it came about after Halton Hills Mayor Rick Bonnette urged Halton Region Chair Gary Carr and his mayoral counterparts in Milton, Oakville and Burlington to send a strong message to the Province. "It's time we pushed back. It's fine and dandy to have the bureaucrats in downtown Toronto coming up with plans like Places to Grow but there's a cost to it. Maybe it should be called the `Places to Spend'," said Bonnette. He added that "we owe it to ourselves to question this, and not roll over and accept it" as the October provincial election approaches. The councils of Milton, Oakville and Burlington will vote on the same resolution at their meetings while Halton Regional Council will endorse it at its March 7 meeting. Bonnette is also hoping that other GTA regions will follow Halton's lead. There are no Oliver pretenders here: the Region and its four municipalities are backing up their "Please sir, we want more" with a well-laid out argument. Keeping the beat Paula Lizewski was among the many students at St. Brigid Catholic School who enjoyed learning the finer points of African drumming from instructor Mutadhi, who visited the school Friday. Photo by Ted Brown