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6- The Oakville Beaver, Friday December 21, 2007 www.oakvillebeaver.com OPINION & LETTERS The Oakville Beaver 467 Speers Rd., Oakville Ont. L6K 3S4 (905) 845-3824 Fax: 337-5567 Classified Advertising: 845-3824, ext. 224 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: The Oakville Beaver is a division of IAN OLIVER Group Publisher Media Group Ltd. NEIL OLIVER Publisher 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 ALEXANDRIA ANCOR Circ. Manager Stop tinkering, start thinking On Wednesday, Halton Regional Council unanimously supported a motion by Ward 4 Councillor Allan Elgar asking staff to determine exactly how many more people and houses Halton can accommodate without "degradation of air quality, human health and growing threats to the ecological fabric of our landscape." This motion was universally applauded by the many environmental delegations appearing before council to plead for a more ecologically-sound future. The Region is appealing to the Ontario government to rethink its Places to Grow Plan which currently demands Halton double in size over 30 years. Under the plan Halton would be expected to accommodate 780,000 people and 390,000 jobs by 2031. Understandably, the numbers are shocking. How can we grow so fast and protect our health and surrounding environment? No one seems to be answering the flip side of the coin, however. If Halton doesn't accommodate this future growth where will these people go? Will the people looking for housing simply not exist? The population projections in the Ontario government's Places to Grow document represent real people. They are your children, your neighbour's children, perhaps even your children's children, and newcomers to Ontario and Canada, who will all be looking for a place to live. We can't simply turn our backs on them and tell them to go elsewhere. This same scenario is being played out in many communities all across the Golden Horseshoe. It's unlikely that any of the communities mentioned in the Places to Grow document want to accommodate the population projections dictated to them by the province. Every one of these communities is surrounded by valuable farmland, forests and wildlife reserves. We are currently at a crossroads for planning the future of Ontario. Simply telling the province we don't want to grow is not acceptable. Rather than asking the province to tinker with its numbers, we should be planning now to accommodate this growth in a manner that won't be detrimental to our health or environment. 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. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Mystery snowplow operator deserves thanks This morning (Dec. 17) I woke to find the end of my driveway plugged again with snow. The plows had been by and the snow bank was huge. I was looking at a good two hours of heavy shoveling. What a rude thing to have to do at 5:30 in the morning. As I was making my first assault, the plow came round again adding yet more packed snow to my already colossal snow mound. I was resigned to the fact that I'd be here all morning breaking my back lifting and flinging snow. As I was digging in so to speak, I heard the plow turn and come back. My heart sank. This guy was thorough to say the least. I had an instant flash of how my whole day would go. I was seriously thinking of heading back to bed. To my surprise he stopped at the end of my driveway, rolled down his window and made my day. He offered to clear away some of the snow. It took him all of 10 seconds to clear the end of my driveway. My little pathetic wave of thanks in no way conveyed the gratitude I felt at that moment. Thank you, thank you, thank you, my mystery snowplow operator knight in shining armor! Your little act of kindness on a cold, dark, lonely morning will carry me for a long time. MONIQUE WOOD People are rude People are so rude. On a recent Friday night parents of students at Ecole Sainte Marie completely took over the parking lot of my building at 320 Maurice Dr. They even went so far as to block the driveway, effectively blocking access to the street and to emergency vehicles if there was an emergency. I understand that the school's parking lot is drastically undersized, but come on. Add to that the arrogance I received from some of the offenders when asked about their infractions. Just shameful. I would like to hear what Ecole Sainte Marie intends to do to address this problem. I have noticed a problem with their vehicles in our lot before, but never to this magnitude. It's funny, I thought people were supposed to be more generous at this time of year. By the way "Merry Christmas." SEAN MAYOR Pud BY STEVE NEASE snease@haltonsearch.com 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.