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4 - Orono Weekly Times Wednesday, September 23, 2009 The Visual Arts Centre of Clarington Politically Speaking by Bill Stockwell We all remember the handwringing Council meeting of August 31st, in which Council was forced to rework the 2009 Operating Budget because they blew it back at the start of the year. They set the budget, forgetting about the looming recession, and were faced with a number of recommendations from municipal staff that identified program cuts to help the budget shortfall. One of those recommendations was the cutting of the Fall publication of Clarington.net, a propaganda piece that is sent to every home in the municipality to remind them of all the wonderful things Council is doing with their tax dollar. Well, that cut didn`t survive Council scrutiny because, to paraphrase the Mayor, "this is a great way to keep the public informed of what we`re doing". Volume 2, Issue 3 arrived in Yours Truly`s mail box this week and I had a chance to "be informed of what council is doing". The eight pages of newsprint was just chock-ablock full of informational nuggets that couldn`t be found anywhere else in this universe. Like any newspaper, page one was covered by two leading columns. The left side of the page was a hot-off-the-press news story entitled, Clarington Council Agrees to Host Energy From Waste (EFW) Facility. Now, when I read that I nearly fell off the chesterfield. Imagine, Council approving an incinerator to burn garbage and produce energy at the same time. Wow....what an idea, and we didn`t know anything about it until Clarington.net found it`s way to our humble abodes. The column starts off by telling us that the approval process for this facility has taken place over the past three years at a cost of approximately twelve million dollars, paid for by the Region of Durham. If you`re not sure what the Region of Durham is, go to your most recent tax bill and you`ll find that you not only live in the Region of Durham, you also pay taxes to the Region of Durham so that they can do things like spending twelve million dollars to pay for an assessment process for this type of a facility. ( I can`t believe that I never heard of this thing until I received Clarington.net. ). Later on in the story we find that during a Council meeting in June of this year Mayor Jim Abernethy asked a group of consultants, hired by the Region of Durham, to assess the concept of such a proposal, " Do you believe that a modern day EFW facility constructed with all the appropriate air emission controls is environmentally and operationally safe enough to operate in a local community?" Each consultant responded "YES". Now, if you don`t believe that, the story says you can go to the municipal website and see for yourself in the official minutes of that meeting. Well...that makes me feel a lot better. There is a whole paragraph on the economic benefits of the project. It says that Clarington council negotiated a Host Community Agreement with the Region of Durham that provides , among other things, a revenue stream of property tax in the neighbourhood of $650,000 annually. Now, that`s a pretty fancy neighbourhood. Just think what could be done with that amount of money. For one thing, every three or four years Council could afford to build and operate another Total Hockey facility in our fair municipality. Wow.... that`s another great idea. Maybe Clarington.net could give us a front page story in some future issue spinning that one for the taxpayers of Clarington. The story wraps up by telling us that if, by chance, approval of the facility is denied, the Region of Durham will need to look for a landfill site to handle the 120,000 tons of garbage that is created within the Region every year. With our luck, they would probably locate it in Clarington. That`s only the left column of page one. The right front page is also information hot off the press. It is a list of Community Events taking place in Clarington in September and October. The problem is that of the twenty-two events listed, twenty one of them have already been highlighted in the Fall edition of Recreation and Leisure, or The 2009 Clarington Visitor`s Guide. Two other pieces produced and distributed by the municipality and paid for by our tax dollar. Brilliant. The twenty-ninth annual jured show of fine arts call for entry The Visual Arts Centre of Clarington is offering an opportunity for artists to enter our annual juried exhibition. This exhibition continues the tradition of showcasing the work of local, regional and national emerging artists. The exhibition starts on Sunday October 24 and continues until November 15. There will be an opening reception Sunday, October 25 from 2-4pm. Jurors Sean McQuay and Maralynn Cherry will be awarding cash prizes to the winning entries. Each artist may submit a total of two works. All entries will be received under one classification and may include: paintings in any media, drawing and prints in any media, sculpture in any media, mixedmedia and photography. Entries must be delivered to the Visual Arts Centre by October 14 at 5:00 pm. The entry fee for members of the VAC is $11.; $22. for non-members. For more information on membership or to download an entry form visit our website www.vac.ca. The Visual Arts Centre is located at 143 Simpson Avenue, Bowmanville. Direc- tions: Hwy 401 to Liberty Street in Bowmanville; Liberty Street to Baseline, east on Baseline to Simpson; north on Simpson to Soper Creek Park. For further information call 905-623-5831. Are you in an abusive relationship? Call Bethesda House 905-623-6050 1-800-338-3397 (For women with or without children.)