PAGE 4, WEDNI--SDAY, SLlyVEMBLR 4,1I985, Wil ItiY FEE PES whitby Volce of the County Town Michael Ian Burgess, Publisher- Managing.Editor hb NI B.M.l>ublishîng auid Photography mnc. The F ree IPrssBuilding, 1:11 l1rosQk Street North, P.O. Box 206, Whithy, Ont. publishe eMICHAEL KNELL Community Editor VALERIE COWEN Advrtlslng Maniagr Registation No 5351 th.t"-r- n,.---.....- ;iAd.nndentiv nwned and operated bN' whithy esidents for Whitby residents. The politicians must listen to you AtteFnd toni.«ht's public meeting if you want to make U*jq qL -.m 0 - L%_ o your views known on sidewalk snow clearing policy Whitby Town Council wlil hoid Its long awaited withln 24 hours of a snow storm. If they fail to do that provide this service for the senior citizen. public meeting tomorrow evening concerning the so, the town's byiaw enforcement off icer Is em, However, ail of these programs have a waltlng list. municipal sidewalk snow clearing poiicy. powered to issue them a notice requiring that it be It lsn't that simple to get heip. This policy was the sublect of a brief debate done wthln a further 24 hours. If It Is stili not A town-wide service wouid eliminate this during the closlng weeks of iast wlnter which was done, then the town's public works department probiemn once and for ahl. Furthermore, the one of the worst on record. The unseasonably wiii perform the work and the homeowner wlll be municlpaiity wouid no longer have to contend high snow faîl caused quite a stir. Many local charged 80 cents a foot for the work. For a home wlth.a few score of angry residents every winter residents complained to their elected represen- with a 50-foot frontage that works out to $40. demandlng their probiems recelve speclal atten- tatîves that the town's current snow clearing If the bill isn't paid withln a specified perlod of tion. *More than once iast wlnter, council heard policy was unfair and unworkabie. time, the charge wili be assessed against the from residents who protested the policy because Under the town's current poiicy, a resident must homeowner's propety tax bill the foilowing year. the newly constructed sidewalk ln front of their clear the sldewaiks abutting his or her home Earlier this year, this newspappr was critical of home was there against their will and better the town's poiicy for several reasons, the most judgement. They fought against It ln the first fundamental of which is we belleve that the place and see no reason to be punished further for a woody nm oomam«Yfet, town's poiicy is contrary to the spirit of the new their dissention. cm f mudals aaia osiuto.Udr the town's poiicy, Council also heard from residents n areas such the homeowner doesn't have the right of appeal. as Garrard Rd. Some homeowners have not only <f'~2 There is no impartial tribunal to establish that the unusualiy long frontages to clear but equaiiy long homeowner was in violation of the byiaws. Any flankages as well. citizen who gets a simple parking ticket can ap- There is one other thing that's worth men- peai that ticket and fine to a court of competant tioning. It wouid appear that havlng the jurisdlction, as iawyers are fond of saying. municipality provide this service wouid cost the UYII IVDThere is no appeai. Under the town's policy, a average homeowner about $5 a year. Some scep- civil servant can charge, convict and punish a tics say this could be as much as $15 a year. That TJE EIV A Nhomeowner without redress. That offends this ain't a bad deal. Sure, the service won't aiways be lsnewspaper. as fast and as good as we wouid like and expect. ,LNHORA~JO~GLOALBut, to put the legal niceitieS aside, this But for $5 to $15 a year, there shouidn't be all that newspaper stili belleves that there are several much to complain about. Like most mlddie-aged pepe, i suppose, 1 worry other valid reasons that would justify the As we said earlier, council wiii be holding Its about what the world Is comning to. I was further un- mnunicipality assumlng responsibility for clearing leng awalted public hearings on thls Issue settled recently by a Canadian Press story I read ail sidewaiks ln the town of snow and ice during tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. in the council chambers. from Edmonton. Jay Blshop Is a chiId psychoioglst the wlnter months. This newspaper wouid ike to encourage every ln- who Is Involved ln a research project at the Univer- . Perhaps the flrst is that there would be a terested resident of Whitby to attend the meeting sity of Aberta ln which 90 Edmonton chldren are uniform ievei of service provlded to all areas of the te present hi s or her views. belng studied to determine whether the way they munlcipality. Senior citzens, the disabled and This is a public meeting and the politiclans wil iearn to watch television has an effect of the way others would be assured of a service the attend for one pu rpose - to 1 isten to you, no matter they learn to do other things. munlcipaIity demands be provided. Many of these how you feei about this situation. According to Mr. Bishop, chlldren who can watch people cannot perform this sort of manuai labor We aiso have to impress upon council that they televIsion, listen to records and snack whiie dolng themseives. They need to rely on others. There have to make this decision quickiy. After ail, the their homework are the kind of people who wlll make are, admittedly, programs operated by many flrst snow falof the season Is but a few weeks -.-iirtrloQi th fwun <including the town itself) away. it in today's world. He adds that the chlld who capitalizes on the kind of fragmented concentrations that TV courages, wil1 be the leader ln the 2lst Cen- tury. But what kind of ordinary adults will the under-ten generation turn Into? Wili they ever be able to give their undivided attention to anythlng? Will they ever sit down and listen to good music, Intently, be swept away by a Mozart or even a Glenn Miller? Will they ever.get lost ln a good book, a world created by an author's experlence or Imagination. Will'a single flower Interest them, the shape of a cloud, a spider's web, or will their audio-visuai Ian- dscapes have to be busy and cluttered before they regîster? WiII they ever be really alone with their thoughts and their memories? Wl,, they ever know reai peace? Or wlll the people and things around them become a kind of five-senses Muzak, haif- noticed and one-quarter perceived? 1 suppose every generation of aduits has maun- dered away like this about the probable effects of social and technoiogical change. The advent of bronze tools, cultivated crops, the arch, the wheel, the steam engine, must have triggered a lot of mid- dle*aged muttering. The gay nineties must have been a hell of a shock to the adult veterans of the 1880's. 'm sure that my father worried about the impact of radio in the 30's, because he didn't buy one until 1942. But has anything ever changed every aspect of our lives, including our thought processes, in the way that television has? Fragmented concentration represents such a contradiction in terms that it gives me a headache. INM -111-Illif ll"rýv nonruc .c agencies in mu tuvvil