Mayor Bennington notes finding of needles around town is a “great concern”

May 17, 2018 · 0 Comments

Written By PETER RICHARDSON

Council met Monday evening facing a full agenda to consider, with the first item being a Question Period query from Kimberley Sher regarding the recent findings of used needles in Greenwood Park. The Mayor responded that needles have been found all over Town, including along the Railway Trails and that this is an issue of great concern to the Town. Police are currently investigating and Staff are doing everything they can to ensure the safety of residents, Despite these efforts, an 8 year old boy did find an uncapped syringe in Simon St.Park and pricked one of his fingers. The boy was treated at Headwaters Hospital and is reported to be OK at this time. Public Works staff later found four more needles in the same area.

CAO Denyse Morrissey reported that an overview of this problem is being prepared for Council and that Staff are receiving training in handling used syringes, referred to as “Sharps” in the medical jargon. The Mayor urged all residents not to touch the needles that are found, but to call police immediately and to await their arrival. This will allow the needles to be collected as evidence in the ongoing investigation and to ensure public safety. At this time there is no indication of what the needles have been used for although speculation would point to drug use.

UGDSB long-term accomodation plan
Councillor Mills spoke to an item in the Consent Agenda, concerning a letter from the Upper Grand District School Board outlining their Long-Term Accommodation Plan for Shelburne. At this time, the Board does not force building a new Secondary School in town, although another Primary School is scheduled. Councillor Mills questioned the viability of this plan indicating that with the rapidly growing population, the current High School will not be able to handle the increase in student bodies.

Councillor Benotto agreed, stating that the existing enrolment is already at capacity. The two Councillors then brought forth a Motion that Council request that Jennifer Passy, from the UGDSB be invited to attend Council and discuss the reasoning behind the Boards decision.

Development in Shelburne
Next up, Steve Wever, the Town Planner brought forth two item concerning the Town’s latest residential developments and their proposed fill requirements. The first concerned the Fieldgate Development , officially known as Shelburne 89 Developments Limited. This is the site to the North and West of Hwy 89 and CR 124, where the MTO has required a large amount of fill to level the grade and bring the land up to Provincial standards prior to building. to accomplish this, the developer plans to build a left turn lane from 124, so as not to impede traffic flow and also will not allow any queuing of the trucks along 124. This is of primary importance due to the fact that for roughly 12 hours a day, there will be one truck every five minutes turning into the site.

Councillor Samples asked if anything would be done to keep 124 clean during the fill process and was answered that a road sweeper would be on hand throughout the day to prevent debris from accumulating. Council approved the request to amend the site alteration permit for the site.

The second request was for the same type of permission, from the new Hyland development at 401 Main St, West. However this issue presented a problem for Council.

The haulage route for Hyland required that the trucks would potentially use CR 124 and that the timing would coincide with Fieldgate’s proposed operation. This was caused by a refusal by the Township of Amaranth to allow the trucks to use 30 Sideroad in Amaranth.

Having all of these trucks using 124 simultaneously, would be a potential nightmare for traffic flow, as the trucks would be travelling in both directions and the Hyland trucks would have to also come through the intersection of Hwy. 89 and 124. Council could foresee this as both, a dangerous and congestive issue, with the potential of 400 trucks a day using the route.

Compounding this problem was the potential for trucks to pull over on 124 to get coffee at the Tim Horton’s, a problem that already exists. Mayor Bennington addressed this issue by noting that the County had recently put up no parking signs along 124 and that police now had the authority to ticket violations. Councillor Anderson questioned the safety of pedestrian walking along 124 and enquired about the installation of portable concrete barriers to offer some protection there.

Mayor Ken Bennington suggested that the Town reproach Amaranth in regards an alternate route, while Councillor Walter Benotto opined that as Shelburne and Melancthon shared ownership of 4th Line, that an alternate route using that road might be possible. The request was approved, but with a route to be determined.

Heritage Music Festival
Councillor Samples reported to Council that the Heritage Music festival Committee would be dissolving, over conflicts with the Rotary Club. Originally formed to co-ordinate all parties participating in the event organization, Councillor Samples explained that the Rotary Club generally overruled the Committee and proceeded along their own lines. Consequently, the members felt it best to simply leave the organizing to Rotary. All members would still be participating in the event, just not actively taking part in the organization. Councillor Samples would still sit on the Rotary Committee so as to keep Council appraised of developments.

Councillor Samples also informed Council that this years Fiddle Parade route had been changed. Due to insurance cost issues, the parade would no longer form up in the school yard, but would start and end at the fairgrounds. The new route would proceed past the Curling Club, turn south on Owen Sound Street, proceed to Main Street, then East to William and turn left back up William to the Fairgrounds.

Commendation
In other business, Councillor Benotto commended the Works Department for their efforts in highlighting areas of raised joints in the Town sidewalks, stating that this was of a great benefit to those using canes or walkers or who otherwise had walking difficulties.

Councillor Chambers ask s as to the progress of the OPP Costing and was told by the CAO that some delay might be expected due to the Provincial Election, but that the OPP would inform the town of a date later in the week or early next week.