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the HERALD Wednesday November 27 Opinion Local interest groups should be heeded Local pressure groups have recently come under considerable criticism for supposedly doing nothing for the own except creating unnecessary headaches especially for those in power However it s because of this vocal minority that action is being taken to protect such im natural features as the Niagara ft was local environmental groups Protect Our Water vironmenta Resources POWER and Ecology Awareness Group I andscape and Environment EAGLE who first banded together and urged the Niagara Escarpment Commission in 1988 to consider banning landfills on the Escarpment The result was NEC Amendment This amendment prevents com panies in principle from establishing dumps on the Escarp ment That means companies wan tint l establish a landfill on the must first go through the long and difficult procedure of obtaining an amendment to the Niagara Escarpment Plan Much to the delight of POWER and EAGLE members a provincial Hearing Officer s report released T fully endorses the amend Amendment now goes before the Ontario Cabinet to be con for final approval The Ontario Cabinet may reject the amendment but it s unlikely According to NEC Senior Planner Marion Cabinet has never rejected any previous NEC amend ments that have received a provm cial Hearing en dorsement Not only did local environmental groups initiate Amendment 52 they by Ben Dummell also spent approximately in legal fees to defend the amendment during the provincial hearing held earlier this year A financial committment of this size shows me the groups out to waste peoples time instead they are committed to protecting the en and as such should be listened to This conclusion brings me to the ongoing problems between local ratepayer group Furiously Op posed to Acton Dumping and Hills Mayor Miller A D members are requesting Mayor Miller issue a public apology to the group with reference to comments Mayor Miller made to the Herald on elec night a post victory interview with the Herald Mayor Miller said in reference to A I don t plan to listen to them anymore f recognize the bad blood between members of A D and Mayor Miller means they are unlikely ever to become fishing buddies but that shouldn prevent the Mayor from listening to the group As the Mayor said following the election I will continue to be Mayor for alt of the people That being true Mayor Miller is at least morally obligated to listen to A D members since they are residents of Hills Aside from the moral obligation Mayor Miller should also listen to them because of their expertise on the Acton dump issue After all Mayor Miller and decided earlier this fall to en dorse a 0 A resolution to fight the Acton dump proposal on the basis of the Third Line being recon structed through the Acton quarry The local interest groups whether they represent the vocal minority or the silent should be listened to because their commitment to the issues makes them a valuable information resource for both the public and politicians alike The common weal should be the main concern The most heard complaint from the lips of government of ficials is that we do not have the money to provide needed ser vices According to them we are caught between the need to reduce expenditures and an in creasing demand from the public A similar bromide is uttered by the many who continue to see the world as a place where conflic ting ideologies are vying for power There is certainly some truth in this second statement but the im of ideologies in our social life is modest at best By oversimplifying we can say that the only difference is that some people the Right believe that the individual has the right to keep most of the money makes while some other people the Left believe that most of what the citizens makes should be given to the state From this point both Right and Left believe that citizens should be receiving all of services from the state In other words the difference between the two is one of methods not of objectives There is also a dif ference of levels of generosity but it is minor and apt to disap pear at election time Much more important and real is the difference between bad and good management of the public weal Let us look at two situations Case No We have two systems of school busing the public and the catholic one Seen within the perspective of each Board there is no money for ex panding or even keeping the system going Right but why not unify the two systems At the intersection of the boundary and the 8th Line the number of buses around eight in the morning is a small replica of rush hour in downtown Toronto There are buses going West East South North There are buses going to Georgetown Acton Georgetown again and these buses are far from full As we are all familiar with a normal public transport system why not design a system of Another View connecting buses regardless of religion to bring our kids to their destination As our area is rather small and our road net work rather simple such a system is not overly difficult to design and the cost saving is vious What is difficult is to get dif ferent agencies to remember that whichever money they use comes only from one source Joe Citizen Case No 2 We do not have money in Halton Hills to provide facilities for the young and the seniors We do not have facilities for adults to meet and indulge in their own pursuit say photography carpentry film making We have however many under utilized public facilities and quite a few private one as well The Council Chamber is us ed a few hours a week and some meeting rooms are not used that much either Schools close down at four leaving cafeterias labs workshops waiting for the next day The beautiful theatre at our library is utilized a few hours a week Why not open these spaces to the public for use as the people deem fit The answer is only too obvious you dumbhead what about damages theft Who will control the use of the facilities Within the perspective of a school board or of a municipality the concern is valid But again we forget that damage done to a school lab is not paid by the school board but by poor Joe Citizen Wear and tear on the municipal council chamber is paid not by the municipality but by Joe Citizen A new seniors centre will be paid by yes Joe Citizen We have created over the course of time all kind of discreet agencies with their own purse And they did serve us well The do not serve us well now is enormous waste in of services there is also enormous poverty of life in the segregation of func tions and people Seniors have a wealth of knowledge to transfer to the youth Seniors can be patient and competent teachers Seniors can perform useful function in public administration Adults from all walks of life can be excellent teachers By building barriers between ages between professions by segregating activities and tion we not only wasting money we are creating a very sterile life for ourselves A final thought while the school sits empty our kids hang around some gas station Do we really believe that the social and monetary cost of an unstruc tured aimless activity is less than the cost of fixing the tial damage to a building Peoples Forum Water supply described as liquid gold Dear Sir I can believe it It s happened again Our over year old well decided not to supply its liquid gold This is the second time this has happened to us different well different house We called the well expert Guess what He is run off his feet digging deeper wells Farmers are running out Rural people are running out Wells that have never dry before are going dry Apparently we are in the eighth year of a fifteen year cycle and it will get worse before it gets better For the life of me I cannot understand why water is not a top Support appreciated Dear Sir We would like to thank everyone who supported our re cent Christmas Bazaar We are once again able to con tribute to many Georgetown organizations because of your generosity The winners of our Cash Draw were K Braymore of Washago J Reynolds of Georgetown and Quittenton of Brampton Thank you and may you have a blessed Christmas Holy Cross Parish Bazaar Committee priority with our Council If it were a p priority the expansion of the would not be con sidered I he Acton Dump would not be Why can t our be the first to rise up and say No No The Quarry Expansion might make more jobs but what about us guvs out here in the country who need that water the Quarries use The stream around our property used to run so fast you hear it gushing out of the pipe under the road Now it just dribbles out Snowless winters rimless sum What rain we do get is ab sorbed by the dry earth and does not get down to the Aquifir where the water is stored Good grief If the dump went in the little dnbbles coming out of our taps would be unfit to drink What about all new houses going in I m not against new houses Has their w iter sup ply been studied Will Ihere be enough for them Where do peo ple think water comes from will it come from the earth forever pure and clean Mankind is such an abuser Destroy first and fix later What a bukward philosophy Prevent Prevent Prevent disaster If you have never turned on the tap and had no water come out then it is ficult to understand what I am saying Our well shall be deepen ed by Christmas time As for now we are on the long list of the out of water people Did you know two rivers in England have already dried up that hive never been dry before Please Council have mercy on our witer suppl Do all you can to protect it Sup port POWER and their galliant efforts They have other things to do but they consider this tial to fight for and so do we the on again off again water people who are frightened that the day may come that going deeper won t help because there won t be any water down there and if there is a quart or two it will be poisoned by the dump David and Shirley Deaville Georgetown Hewitt offers some final thoughts Dear Sir I would like to thank all those people who over the past six years believed in and supported me Your words of encourage ment and advice were an inspira tion through the long hours of reading and attending meetings on behalf of the Town of Halton Hills Council to me was never ap preached lightly It was a serious business dealing with many com issues that there are no easy answers to If I was pro development then those applicants that I led to defeat those that I helped modify would seriously disagree For those applications that I supported I did so because they met the test on a sociaf Compensation denied Dear Editor In a recent case a woman who was inseminated with an HIV in fected egg was awarded a large compensation by the courts It seems unfair that Ontario s hemophiliacs who contracted the same virus through the blood sup ply in the mid 1980s have been denied compensation Wasn t the government supposed to be fair compassionate and concern ed about AIDS victims Are they concerned only if the victims are homosexuals The Ontario Ministry of Health was responsible years ago for the decision not to test the blood sup ply for HIV infection and con tinues to be negligent by not in stituting mandatory testing and contact tracing to stop the spread of AIDS Of course prevention is the less expensive measure and most importantly can save lives Now the government must com the victims or face the prospect of being sued by all HIV infected hemophiliacs There are of them and that would be even more expensive Sincerely Giuseppe Gori Deputy Leader Family Coalition Party of Ontario economic and physical basis They were applications that did not pollute such as the s Corner Group would suggest they did not deplete water resources as the Hickory Falls Group would imply or they were within legislation under cial Control that the members of FOAD EAGLE or ICE should know or chose to ignore If I do have a fault it is that I care about the persona rights that are slowly slipping away and about the economic reality that this town province and coun try face We are a spoiled lot that have forgotten some of our baste principles of friendship and understanding Strange thoughts of the sixties keep popping up in my head such as Some see things and say why and I see things and say why not 1 I congratulate all new members of council and those that entered the race you have my respect It is your turn to carry the burden of political of with all the cynicism of the public Thanks again Joe Hewitt