Friday, 15 July 2011

The Town Charged Westhill

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "If Things Go As They Should":

Whatever happened to the law suit that the former
council issued against West Hill when
Gallo ran to tell them the development company was
cutting down trees on their own property ?

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The town bylaw department charged Westhill for cutting trees on their own property.

Westhill paid a $10 thousand dollar fine.

The former Mayor got  a picture of herself in the middle of a freshly plowed field  wearing flip-flops without a tree in sight,  valiantly defending the universe from the marauders.

 Staff's advice  in March 2008, .on the basis of all  our planning requirements , was to approve   Westhill  in principle and continue  work to resolve  the outstanding issues.

The O.M.B. decision,   was to approve Westhill  and direct the parties to resolve the outstanding isssues.
within three months.

Three years , two lawyers  and $650.000 later ,the O.M.B. did what planning staff advised Council  from the beginning.

Notwithstanding the sheer lunacy and disgrace to the municipality,  a letter was sent on June 30th to the Honourable John Wilkinson ,Minister of the Environment from the new Aurora  Mayor's office requesting him  to deny a permit to take water. The obvious objective  being the development must be stopped.

The image of  Monty Python's Fish Dance comes to mind.

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The story about Councillor Gaertner's phone call to her idol and mentor has been flushed out a bit.
The phone  being used was  not a cell phone in the washroom. It was the town's phone at the reception desk. When the Councillor heard someone coming, she said to the person on the other end of the line;

  "Sshh.....someone's coming/"

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The Leisure Services Director , in response to a question, informed Council it would probably cost
$5 thousand  to remove the undulating monkey bars from Confederation Park  playground. .. including  concrete supports.

It would likely also cost that amount to replace it with something else.

Staff try to find something different and interesting  for each playground.

What would be the point?

The question is still pending.

11 comments:

  1. Yet another successfully completed round of
    Mormac Whack a Mole ! Isn't this fun ? Never
    thought we would see such a thing.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Evelyn, Since we have 2 weeks until the next
    council meeting and it's summer and the Aurora
    Citizen is in slumber, perhaps you could go right off
    topic and do summer reading ? I have a good one to
    start you off. The Best Laid Plans by Terry Fallis. It's
    about Canadian politics and it's actually funny !
    Try to get some down time, you've earned it.

    ReplyDelete
  3. It would appear that your sharing of the WG tidbit could put someone else in the hotseat. There can't have been many who were within earshot of the phone call.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Good God, she still hangs around like a bad smell courtesy of Ms. Gaertner. It still stinks around here over the same old, same old issues.
    Dog and bone comes to mind with respect to Westhill and OMB and the crusade to save the planet. I wish she would just disappear into a black hole and leave us all to get on with things. What is it about being trounced in an election that she does not understand?

    ReplyDelete
  5. Loved the Fallis book, especially the line "like
    Eeyore off his medication ".

    ReplyDelete
  6. Good line in that book, "There are many sheep
    fro Scotland but I am not one of them ". Sound
    like anyone you know ?

    ReplyDelete
  7. You should have seen the Queen at the farmers market.She was acting like her citizens were in adoration of her presence.
    I had to avoid lunch for fear of hurling.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Did you have a falling out with Chris Watts?
    He used to comment here.

    ReplyDelete
  9. "Did you have a falling out with Chris Watts?
    He used to comment here."

    He still does... anonymously.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Another fairly well known citizen comments here too.

    Anonymously.

    There are many more who do the same.

    Anonymously.

    It is called freedom of speech.

    A freedom that is not so free anymore,or free from potential harm.

    So anonymous it is, and anonymous it will be.

    ReplyDelete
  11. It is most amusing how one (or more) anonymous posters here wish to speak on my behalf, at the same time not wishing to own their words.

    Freedom of speech or freedom from themselves? You can decide.

    Suggesting some sort of falling-out is as childish and unfounded as suggesting I post here anonymously.

    I have never posted here anonymously and have ceased using a pseudonym for well over a year.

    As I post on my own personal blog on several of the topics discussed here throughout the week I haven't seen the need to double efforts. I assume that is also why Evelyn has not posted over on my blog for some time, I could be wrong.

    Being such a glorious summer so far I am spending the majority of it outdoors enjoying it with my family, which leaves less time to inject comments here as frequently.

    That's not to say Evelyn's blog is not a daily read, it is, and obviously for an impressively large and growing audience. Kudos to her.

    I wish everyone an enjoyable summer, and by all means drop by my blog for a visit when your curiosity gets the better of you: http://christopherwatts.posterous.com/

    ReplyDelete

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