South Frontenac Council - Apr. 3

Wilma Kenny | Apr 05, 2012

Councillor walks away from Verona dump job to counter perceptions of bias

Perhaps it was only a matter of time.

The future of the Verona waste site is in doubt as the township attempts to satisfy concerns expressed by the Ministry of the Environment. The fact that the site’s manager, Bill Robinson, is also a sitting member of Council, now threatens to become an issue and he has responded by stepping away from the job.

“For the first time in the eleven years I’ve been on Council, there’ve been rumours going around, so right now I want to put them to rest,” declared Councillor Bill Robinson at the beginning of a meeting of South Frontenac Council on Tuesday night (April 3).

He went on to say that as the result of having consulted a lawyer, he has resigned as the manager of D&B (the company contracted to operate the Portland waste disposal site), and will have “no hand in the operation of D&B now, or in the future.”

The new manager is Doug Kelly.

New Financial System

Township Treasurer Louise Fragnito is looking forward to upgrading the township’s outdated DOS based financial software system. Council approved her recommendation to accept Diamond Municipal Systems’ bid of $181,257, and an additional $16,250 for the supporting server and database system. These amounts fall within the $200,000 set aside for financial upgrading in the 20112 capital budget, and include all necessary implementation, system conversion and staff training. Fragnito and the Deputy Treasurer have visited two neighboring municipalities who are currently using this system: both recommended it.

Official Plan Amendment

Planning Coordinator Lindsay Mills presented recommendations for four amendments to the Official Plan: 1) to strengthen and clarify the regulations re required setbacks from water, 2) to set general policies for plans of condominium (vacant land with common elements), 3) to introduce a ‘holding’ symbol as a planning tool, and 4) to include the entire township for site plan control, by adding “institutional and multi-residential development” to the present wording. Council received the report and will forward it, along with all comments and discussion from the public meeting, to the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing for their review.

Portland Waste Disposal Site Plan

In a letter dated March 21, C. Raffael, of the Ministry of the Environment, acknowledges receipt and acceptance of Public Works Manager Segsworth’s letter outlining the proposed next steps toward addressing the Ministry’s environmental concerns at the Portland waste site. These include investigating and ranking five possible options by June 30, then choosing one alternative and drafting an implementation plan on or before September 30. The environmental concerns at the Portland site became acute when the MOE recently and changed the site’s certificate of approval from requiring measurement of contamination at the property line (where water tests have come up clean) to measuring the water quality at the base of the waste slope (where they have not)

Environmental Committee Seeks Broader Mandate

Del Stowe said that the Environmental Committee does not have enough volunteers to be able to do tree sales this year. He asked that the Committee of the Whole consider giving the Environmental Committee a broader mandate, perhaps including some ‘green initiatives’, in order to attract more volunteers. Meanwhile, residents interested in buying trees this year should contact the Cataraqui Conservation Authority, which will have some for sale.

Two Concerns

In reference to a decision made at the previous meeting to do more work on Bellrock Road this year, and cut a project on Perth Road, using the logic that a large project is already scheduled for Perth Road next year, Councillor Vandewal said he had looked at both Bellrock Road and Perth Road, and in his opinion, Perth Road was in much worse condition than any part of Bellrock Road. There was no comment.

Makes a Dog Tag Look Like a Bargain!

Dogs caught running at large which cannot be returned to their owner because they aren’t wearing a dog tag are taken to the pound. By renewing their 2012 contract with the Kingston Humane Society for the provision of pound services, Council has agreed to pay $55 per dog for the approximately 50 dogs that are impounded annually. Additional cost to the owner to retrieve an untagged dog from the pound is $100. The good news is that dog tags are still available from the township for $12 until the end of April.

Dogs caught running at large which cannot be returned to their owner because they aren’t wearing a dog tag are taken to the pound. By renewing their 2012 contract with the Kingston Humane Society for the provision of pound services, Council has agreed to pay $55 per dog for the approximately 50 dogs that are impounded annually. Additional cost to the owner to retrieve an untagged dog from the pound is $100. The good news is that dog tags are still available from the township for $12 until the end of April.