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OAKVILLE BEAVER Wednesday, August 5, 2009 · 6 OPINION & LETTERS The Oakville Beaver 467 Speers Rd., Oakville Ont. L6K 3S4 (905) 845-3824 Fax: 337-5571 Classified Advertising: 632-4440 Circulation: 845-9742 Editorial and advertising content of the Oakville Beaver is protected by copyright. Unauthorized use is prohibited. THE OAKVILLE BEAVER IS PROUD OFFICIAL MEDIA SPONSOR FOR: NEIL OLIVER Vice ­ President and Group Publisher of Metroland West The Oakville Beaver is a division of Media Group Ltd. DAVID HARVEY General Manager JILL DAVIS Editor in Chief ROD JERRED Managing Editor DANIEL BAIRD Advertising Director RIZIERO VERTOLLI Photography Director SANDY PARE Business Manager MARK DILLS Director of Production MANUEL GARCIA Production Manager CHARLENE HALL Director of Distribution SARAH MCSWEENEY Circ. Manager Lobbying openly We support the concept of a registry that would keep track of any back room lobbying that might go on at Halton Region. The idea, recently put forward by Oakville Regional Councillor Alan Johnston, is to have Halton create an online, searchable registry similar to those already available at the provincial and federal levels of government and the City of Toronto. Back in 2007, the Province granted municipalities the right to set up such registries when it revamped the Municipal Act. Johnston says he sees nothing wrong with lobbying, but believes the public has a right to know what may be going on behind closed doors, outside the context of public meetings. "Lobbying has gone on forever and it's always going to go on. It should just be above board and open." We agree. While a certain amount of lobbying occurs openly at public council meetings, Halton residents have a right to know about any meetings that go on in private. If a development consultant has lunch with a councillor to discuss an upcoming proposal or a technology company representative meets with senior staff to discuss how its product might benefit Halton, a public record of those meetings should be kept and made accessible to anyone who might want to know. Not only could such a registry prove invaluable to the public, it could also help those in the private sector know when their competitors are courting the Region. While the proposed registry would not disclose specific content of private meetings, it would at least give the public a better sense of the individuals, groups and companies that may be trying to influence council decisions. Some members of regional council, including Burlington Mayor Cam Jackson and Halton Hills Regional Councillor Clark Somerville, questioned whether the registry would extend to include meetings with non-profit organizations and even constituents. Johnston countered the registry could include only true lobbyists, who are paid to represent a position. Paul Sutherland, a former Toronto councillorturned-lobbyist believes registries protect the public against any public official who might seek to abuse the system. Again, we agree and remain hopeful that council will embrace this idea -- at least at a pilot project level when staff return with a report this fall. The Oakville Beaver is a member of the Ontario Press Council. The council is located at 80 Gould St., Suite 206, Toronto, Ont., M5B 2M7. Phone 416-340-1981. Advertising is accepted on the condition that, in the event of a typographical error, that portion of advertising space occupied by the erroneous item, together with a reasonable allowance for signature, will not be charged for, but the balance of the advertisement will be paid for at the applicable rate. The publisher reserves the right to categorize advertisements or decline. Rep by number MPP Ted Chudleigh (column, the Beaver, July 30) argues the strength (and weakness) of the Canadian parliamentary system is it allows a party with a majority of seats to sweep away opposition and implement rapid change. He looks forward, if the Conservatives ever come to power in Ontario, to changing "a lot." He wants to pull out all the bricks from "the edifice of the socialist state." Building towers and knocking them down is something most of us learned to stop doing in kindergarten. Instead of warring factions intent on destroying each other's work, we need governments to accurately reflect views of all voters, with members who work together to build on previous legislation. One important change therefore, must be electoral reform. The supporters of all political parties should be fairly represented in proportion to the votes they cast. Parties should have no more and no fewer seats than their popular support warrants. There should be no phony majority governments. Our voting system should give us governance which is stable but responsive, flexible, but principled, which reflects the will of the majority, but which respects the rights of all. TINA AGRELL Letters to the editor The Oakville Beaver welcomes letters from its readers. Letters will be edited for clarity, length, legal considerations and grammar. In order to be published all letters must contain the name, address and phone number of the author. Letters should be addressed to The Editor, Oakville Beaver, 467 Speers Rd., Oakville, ON, L6K 3S4, or via e-mail to editor@oakvillebeaver.com. The Beaver reserves the right to refuse to publish a letter. Taking power responsibility seriously When I first came to Oakville, Trafalgar Road, north of QEW was a country lane. I remember a large billboard in a field of corn on the east side that announced This property scheduled for Development. That was a lie; that land was developed more than a century ago by our forefathers. The billboard heralded its destruction. Oakville has changed, but that does not make me a NIMBY. (NIMBY = Not In My Back Yard). It makes good business sense to position your product close to the point-of-sale. In this case, the product is power and we are the point of sale. Oakville is now festooned with countless, 5,000 cubic ft. concretecoloured cookie-cutter castles. Each of these monstrous mansions (including now even a Buckingham palace knockoff) is a colossal power guzzler. That demand for power attracts power plants. Therefore the most effective way of combating the power plant proposal is to stop using power, but even the most dedicated NIMBY must kick the air conditioning up a couple of notches to pump OUT all the heat that the dishwashers, ovens, wallto-wall plasma TVs, laundry dryers and sundry machines are pumping IN to his house. If enough protesters were serious about substantially reducing their addiction to power, the power plant would melt away. It's gotten so bad we can't even open a door or brush our teeth without electricity. Question: How many power plant protesters use clotheslines? (For those who don't know -- the clothesline is the cheapest cleanest form of energy). And the pollution! Oh my god the pollution. First of all, if you must burn fossil (or nuclear) fuel to get power, natural gas is the least polluting. Second of all, you could move that plant to Hamilton and we would still be breathing those awful fumes -- along with the fog from making the steel we need to make cars. Plus, we would then have those horrid incoming power transmission cables casting their mysterious evil spirits on the poor peasants underneath. We are all greedy for power, but none want to assume one sniff of responsibility for the pollution creating power creates. That belongs to somebody Somewhere Else. Never fear. Use those power plant millions to build arrays of wind turbines all along our lovely Lake Ontario shoreline, and up on the Iroquois ridge. Plentiful power without pollution. I wonder what the NIMBYs would have to say about that? JAMES CLARK