Saturday, January 25, 2014

Saturday January 25, 2014

Ladies and Gentlemen

As the song says – Baby, its cold outside. But if you step outside there are all sorts of things going on in our wonderful Town. Coffee shops are busy; lots of hockey at the NSSRC; the Cultural Center has just expanded its Saturday “open mike” due to increased demand; and this morning I walked with some 100 area residents in the Alzheimer’s Walk for Memory. If you want to beat the cold - get active.

Lots of meetings on Monday January 27th.  At 11:00 am a special Police Service Board meeting will take place at the Town to discuss its response to the Town’s 0% and 2% budget request. Later that afternoon I will meet with representatives from the MSS Parent’s Group. Our area is well into an “ARC review” process that will decide the future of our public high schools. There are a lot of factors at play – the over-riding factor being the quality of our children’s education. I will present the results of these discussions and our position to the ARC meeting on February 4th at 7:00 pm at MSS.

At 6:00 pm at the Town there will be a closed meeting to discuss a number of personal issues. Then at 7:00 pm is the Town Council meeting. An interesting agenda including:
-       Presentation recognizing 25 years of service for volunteer fire fighter D. Dahmer
-       Deputation by the Midland Bay Sailing Club
-       A Public Meeting (you are invited to speak) covering three topics:
o    Sale of public lands at 349 Lakewood Dr., 1037 Ingram Cres., 1041 Ingram Cres., and 347 Estate Court
o    Council communication policy regarding contentious correspondence
o    The new Town web-site
-       Decision on school safety zone signage for Monseigneur Castex and Huron Park
-       Our 2014 budget – coming in at a Town tax rate of 1.7%
-       Approval of decisions on zoning changes for 422 King St (the Moranis property) and 845 Yonge Street (the Watts Funeral Home)

Tuesday January 28th starts at the County. The most interesting items on the agenda are a staff presentation on a central composting facility for Simcoe County and the approval of the economic development funding for North Simcoe. That evening Council will meet in closed session to discuss what we would like to see in the agreement with Hydro One for the MPUC facility.

Wednesday will feature a couple of interesting internal discussions. Bell Canada will visit Town Hall to map out the high speed telecommunications that we have in Midland for business and residents. Modern communications infrastructure is essential to our future. Later that day we will have our first meeting with the Small Business Enterprise Center (based in Barrie) to discuss how they can help our business community.

On Thursday the 30th the meetings continue with internal discussions with SSEA (financial arrangements) and the Georgian Bay Land Trust (preserving tracts of land for future generations). At 5:30 pm Karianne Copeland will continue her “downtown discussion’ series at the ShopMidland location. You are welcome to participate and bring your ideas about how we make our downtown better for all.

Friday is the start of the Midland Winterfest weekend. For all the details click:


Weekend
Saturday
Start of Novice and Atom league hockey tournaments at the NSSRC.  Go Midland!

Sunday
The annual Gateway Spelling Bee at the NSSRC. It runs from 11 am to 4 pm

Stay warm.

Gord McKay


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