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LO yg' FS 5% an NAR APE TA BY SCR 9S AA TEAM IY SATE LVL RAL SAT YN » ATA VM LN eT TN AY a TANT TY 27 Ya A Se yo NT AL Se Lr EN 5 1 a ER Ge A SP AR EEA SAE AY SiS a BR SN Sra I XNA DAC ATURE ARNIS TEA / SLA E LLB SEA BAY SOL Za Sat A TY Sv IAN Did AIR SAT PT By bl ! iN wi 'e 15 | 34 a editorial poge Somebody is going to die There is a disaster in the making on the Port Perry waterfront and unless some action is taken quickly, the result could very easily be fatal. On Sunday afternoon, the stretch of ice along the waterfront was alive with activity as skaters, pedestrians, snowmobilers and motorcyclists all competed dangerously close to each other. Motorcyclists and snowmobilers were racing their machines back and forth in the area in front of the public pier no more than 50 or 60 feet from a small open air rink. There is absolutely no need for either the bikers or the snowmobilers to be operating so close to crowds of people, many of them very young children. There is more than enough ice further out in the bay, away from the pedestrian traffic, where the bikes and snowmobiles can be raced with at least some degree of safety. Compounding the problem and adding to a dangerous situation were the drivers of several cars who also found it necessary to race back and forth almost within spitting distance of the pier, on occasion spinning wildly out of control. A couple of individuals courted disaster by hanging on the rear bumper of one of the cars, and by riding a sleigh towed behind a car. If these foolish individuals want to take their lives in their own hands, that is their problem, but as is usually the case when disaster strikes, the victim will probably be an innocent by- stander. Durham Region Police are expected to have their snowmobile patrol in operation in the very near future, and officers have the jurisdiction to lay charges for negligence, unsafe operation of a vehicle and other infractions under the Criminal Code and Highway Safety Act. While it may be unfortunate for the police to have to put the collar on people engaged in so-called leisure activity on a Sunday afternoon, it is obvious that some of those on the lake simply have no concern for the safety of others. Police are also going to be issuing warnings to drivers who insist on parking their vehicles on public property in the area of the baseball diamond. With the lack of snow the cars and trucks are doing damage to the grass, and this was especially evident in the area of Palmer Park where drivers just drove their vehicles across the grass to get to the lake. There has already been one serious accident on the lake so far this winter, and a couple that could have been serious. But judging from the sheer foolishness of a few people on the waterfront on Sunday, we are fortunate that nobody has lost his life, yet. A meeting this week between representatives of the Central Seven Association and property owners from Gerrow's Beach is a positive development. Central Seven is proposing to set up a group home for mentally retarded adults in a house located on Gerrow's Beach and the initial reaction from some property owners in the area has been negative. The issue of group homes in residential neigh- bourhoods is an extremely sensitive one and private, informai meetings are the best forum for all concerned to put forward their points of view. Three weeks ago at an open session of Scugog council, property owners expressed grave concerns over the proposal to set up the group home. Part of the problem lay in the fact that the property owners felt they had not had an adequate amount of time to study the proposal and hear the arguments why both the provincial government and social agencies working with the retarded feel that group homes are so crucial in letting the retarded be Dialogue essential active members of their community. Yet there is no escaping the fact that property owners who live nearby have legitimate concerns that must be addressed openly and honestly. If a group home goes into a neighbourhood and there is hostility and fear directed towards it by residents living nearby, at least a part of the purpose of the group home has already been defeated. Frank communication between both sides is needed at this time so as to prevent initial reactions from hardening and to give both Central Seven and the Gerrow's Beach residents some breathing space. What is somehow mystifying in this issue is that fact that Central Seven learned only last November that the provincial government had granted finan- cial approval for a group home in this area. Yet that financial support may run out by the end of March, before any proposal even gets off the ground. Knowing that setting up a group home in less than six months is almost an impossibility, just why the government would put such a restricted time frame on the project is a mystery. Hopefully, the provincial government will yield to the request by Central Seven to have this deadline extended beyond the end of March. . ~ bill SIM POLITICAL TURKEYS It's a wonder there aren't more people in politics. All it requires basically is a strong stomach, a thick hide, and an abso- lute lack of scruples about giving away other people's money. There will be only one real loser in this mid-winter election - the Canadian people. After eight months of non-government, they have to pay 60-65 million dollars for the privilege of choosing between two flocks of turkeys. Let's start with an a priori. Ed Broad- bent and the NDP don't have a hope of forming a government. All they can play is the role of spoilers. So we have a choice between a party that practically put us into eternal bank- ruptcy, the Liberals, and a party that showed an incredible naivete in its first chance to govern in more than a decade, the Tories. There's something desperately wrong with our system when we have two choices only: the mediocre and the mediocre. My gut instinct about this election is ley disgust, and I'm sure it is widely shared. But it's the only system we have, at the moment, and a man can't just lie down on his face, cry, and kick his heels in frustra- tion, as he would love to do. As I write, the Liberals, after being soundly rejected by the voters last spring, ~ are 20 points ahead of the Tories in the polls. What an incredible electorate we have! Canadians tend to think of themselves as rather dour, solid, gray people, fairly unemotional, quite stable. The truth is that we are more volatile, politically, than the Balkans. After several decades of good, gray prime ministers, whom we could count on to never let the left hand know what the right hand was doing, we embraced, with an almost religious fervour, a fiery, flaming, evangelical prophet out of the mid-west, who had a Vision - and not much else. Rapidly becoming uncomfortable with this, we backed right up to a good, solid Canadian, who liked sports, had an infec- tious chuckle, and didn't know how to chop off the hands of his friends when they got them into the till. Mike Pearson. What I'd really like to see is a massive rejection of both by the Canadian voter. Everybody staying home on election day. Three hundred votes cast in the whole of Canada. All of them for the Rhinoceros Party. But that couldn't happen. We're too sincere, too earnest. We still believe in the so-called democratic system, which gives you a vote for one of two or three guys, none of whom you think should lead the country. So we go into the polling booth, starting to write an X, shaking our heads, start to write an X in another place, shake our heads, and wind up feeling as though we'd like to kick the sides out of the booth, and go off and get drunk. And that's about the way the vote will go, regardless of polls. We might vote for the local candidate, if he or she seems a good person, regardless of our party affilia- tions. We might cast a negative vote, against one party rather than for the other. Personally, I hope the Liberals lose, for several reasons. They are in complete disarray. They did little to attack inflation, except steal Bob Stanfield's prices and wage controls. They let the national debt become infamous. They showed little politi- cal conscience in forcing an election. The Tories were on the right track, with their tough budget. But they went too far on their so-called energy policy, in a land of long distances, and eight months of cold weather. Canadians give up their mis tresses before they'll give up their oil and gas. Soured on him, we clasped to, our breasts a brilliant, arrogant man with a flower in his button-hole and a flower-child in his kitchen. It was as disastrous as an honest, homely man who had never made the team marrying the chief cheer-leader. We became envious, and finally, embaras- sed. We listened to his maunderings and his ponderings. We were at first proud, then baffled, then suspicious. He seemed to have the knack of saying the wrong thing at the right time. There was nowhere to go but down, so we happily went back to a nonentity, a fellow whom most of his own party did not want, a scrambling, ambitious, and colour- less man. We'd had enough of that colour and charisma. We wanted someone like Mackenzie King, only not so crafty. Joe. As I write, we are witnessing the Second Coming of Pierre and the Second Chance of Joe. His Brilliance and His Ordinariness. And you can't tell them apart. The first is trying to hide all his faults by acting like a clam. The second is multiplying his faults by opening his mouth. Both are promising the moon, with our money. They have cancelled each other out. Prediction? Another minority govern- ment, worse than the last one.