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in si de ha lto n. co m O ak vi lle B ea ve r | T hu rs da y, D ec em be r 2, 20 21 | 6 ABOUT US This newspaper, published every Thursday, is a division of the Metroland Media Group Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Torstar Corporation. The Metroland family of newspapers is comprised of more than 70 community publications across Ontario. This newspaper is a member of the National NewsMedia Council. Complainants are urged to bring their concerns to the attention of the newspaper and, if not satisfied, write The National NewsMedia Council, Suite 200, 890 Yonge St., Toronto, ON M4W 2H2. Phone: 416-340-1981 Web: www.mediacouncil.ca insidehalton@metroland.com facebook.com/OakvilleBeav @OakvilleBeaver WHO WE ARE VP, Regional Publisher Kelly Montague Regional General Manager Jason Pehora Director of Content Lee Ann Waterman Regional Managing Editor Catherine O'Hara Managing Editor Karen Miceli Director of Distribution Charlene Hall Circulation Manager Kim Mossman Directors of Advertising Cindi Campbell and Graeme MacIntosh CONTACT US Oakville Beaver 901 Guelph Line Burlington, ON L7R 3N8 Phone: 905-845-3824 Classifieds: 1-800-263-6480 Advertising: 289-293-0620 Delivery For all delivery inquiries, please e-mail kmossman@metroland.com or call 905-631-6095. Letters to the editor Send letters to insidehalton@metroland.com. All letters must be fewer than 320 words and include your name and telephone number for verification purposes. We reserve the right to edit, condense or reject letters. Published letters will appear in print and/or online at insidehalton.com OPINION TO LEARN HOW TO SUBMIT YOUR OWN CONTENT VISIT INSIDEHALTON.COM Reducing community waste and protecting the natural environment have always been top priorities for Halton Region, and for our residents. For decades, we have worked together to up- grade services, enhance programs and deliver on new technologies that re- duce our community im- pact on the environment. In fact, through your par- ticipation in our waste di- version programs -- includ- ing curbside collection of Blue Box, Green Cart, yard waste and bulk waste mate- rials -- we have extended the life of our landfill by more than 30 years. But there's still more we can do. As the region grows and our community changes, we are continuing to find new ways to improve our waste management pro- grams and services for you. I'm pleased to share that we are developing a proposed Solid Waste Management Strategy, which builds on our collective successes and identifies new ways we can deliver waste manage- ment services and how we can all make a difference. The proposed strategy includes medium (four to 10 years) and long-term (11+ years) initiatives that will help the region: • increase our waste di- version rate; • further extend the life of the Halton Waste Man- agement Site (landfill); and • reduce carbon emis- sions. Public consultations are now underway, and we want to hear from you. To share your feedback, com- plete our short online sur- vey at halton.ca/waste by Dec. 10. You can also visit our website to view record- ings of our recent PICs on the proposed strategy. To request the survey in an alternate format, please email accesshalton@hal- ton.ca or call 311. I encourage you to read the proposed Solid Waste Management Strategy and provide your input on this important initiative. Com- munity feedback will be used to inform the final Solid Waste Management Strategy, which will be pre- sented to regional council in spring 2022. Thank you in advance for your participation and helping to shape the future of waste management in Halton -- from single-fami- ly and multi-residence households to businesses, community-wide pro- grams and our regional waste system. Your input is valuable and will help keep Halton a great place to live, work, raise a family and retire. Gary Carr is the region- al chair of Halton Region. To contact him, email gary.carr@halton.ca. HELP SHAPE THE FUTURE OF HALTON'S WASTE MANAGEMENT FEEDBACK VITAL TO OUR PLANS, WRITES GARY CARR My suggestion is to change your perspective on investing. Don't focus on which companies to invest. Expand your focus to be much broader. Consider having a glob- ally diversified portfolio that could have many dif- ferent companies. In effect, you are buying the market; you are investing in capi- talism. Stock markets around the world allow investors to own a significant num- ber of companies. There are well over 10,000 public- ly traded shares that you can choose from. Administratively, to do this by purchasing shares in each company on your own is not feasible. There are investment vehicles, including mutual funds and ETFs (exchange trad- ed fund), that provide the opportunity to own many thousands of companies. Stock markets have a long history of providing extremely attractive re- turns. That should be your focus. Yes, you could hit a home run by investing in the next big tech stock, but there are significant exam- ples that investing in single companies that have been disappointing. Having a strongly diver- sified portfolio helps you manage the risk. Some companies falter, others go out of business. For exam- ple, in a portfolio of just 10 stocks, if one or two of them perform poorly that will drag down the total portfo- lio. Diversification is your friend. There is safety in numbers. Peter Watson is regis- tered with Aligned Capital Partners Inc. (ACPI) to provide investment advice. Investment products are provided by ACPI. ACPI is a member of the Invest- ment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada. The opinions expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of ACPI. Watson provides wealth management services through Watson Invest- ments. He can be reached at www.watsoninvestment- s.com. WHAT COMPANIES SHOULD YOU INVEST IN? OWNING MANY STOCKS MAY BE A GOOD STRATEGY, WRITES PETER WATSON PETER WATSON Column GARY CARR Column SIGN UP FOR OUR WEEKLY NEWSLETTER AT INSIDEHALTON.COM