"Cowardice asks the question...is it safe? Expediency asks the question...is it politic? Vanity asks the question...is it popular? But conscience asks the question...is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but one must take it because it is right." ~Dr. Martin Luther King

Wednesday 6 June 2012

About Trees And Other STuff

The trees on Wellington Street are suffering transplant stress.They will be fine. 
They are in  new raised beds of good planting soil,  replacing  the sparse pockets provided  in other areas of regional planting. 
They're getting plenty of water and are under the safe and nurturung  care of  the town's  parks manager, Jim Tree.
No better husbandry is available elsewhere.
A tree nursery can't be planted just anywhere. Soil has to be right. Location can't be in a populated area. As I mentioned already,
the impulse to jump up and grab a tree branch and snap it off  is endemic. It just is.
The search is on. There's more than enough idle property in town. Not everything you see belongs to the town. Some  government agencies have nothing but their own sense of self-importance to sustain themselves. 
For a urban municipality  our size, we have an inordinate area of land that will not be developed.We have woodlots and five golf courses and another on the way, parks,dedicated properties but not to us,and ravines,flood plains and the Oak Ridges Moraine.
Houses on averages of two acre lots are not really urban density.
From an environmental standpoint, I would say we are in surplus.
It's a good living environment.
From financial sustainability perspective,unimproved lands are a  liability not an asset.
We have an inventory of bits and pieces of property throughout the town. It was created in the 2003/2006 term of council. 
Weeks of work went in to assembling the inventory and describing locations and sizes.  The work was done with a view to realizing assets where they  were.
Selling land  that could be developed. As opposed to keeping serviced property  sitting vacant and idle, producing no revenue or alternate  benefit whatsoever. 
The night the report was to be received and  further council direction given , the entire  management team was in attendance to provide whatever input was needed to get the job done. 
 Only three members of Council showed up. No quorum. No business conducted. No action taken since.  
So much to be done. So little being accomplished.

No comments: