North Frontenac Council - Feb 18/10

North Frontenac wades into two-hour debate

Ompah library branch users Marily Seitz and Paige Cousineau made a short presentation to North Frontenac Council last week, asking the township to support them in their quest to have two hours a week added to the library schedule.

In the past the Ompah Library has been open six hours a week, but with the opening of a new branch in Plevna, the Kingston Frontenac Public Library has decided to increase Plevna hours from 8 to 10 each week, and reduce Ompah’s hours from 6 to 4 each week.

“We are very happy that Plevna has a library back,” said Marily Seitz, “because we love having our library and we know the people of Plevna missed their library. But as to our library hours, we think it is unfair to reduce our branch to 4 hours, and we know that the library has a consultant’s report which calls for the Ompah library to close.”

“I did mention this to Mayor VandenHoek at our county council meeting this week. He is the county rep on the library board and he will bring it to their attention,” said Mayor Maguire.

“I feel I sort of dropped the ball on this,” said Deputy Mayor Jim Beam. “It was included in an email that circulated in December. I don’t know why it did not jump out at me that they were dropping the hours, which should not be happening. They are suggesting that people go to Plevna or Sharbot Lake, but that’s not the way people from Ompah travel. It’s like telling people from Wolf Island to go to Howe Island.”

“That’s my other question,” said Marily Seitz. “Everybody on council knew about this in December, and nothing was done.”

Mayor Maguire said that there was no council strategy to delay. “We are going to move forward on this now,” he said.

Council passed a motion supporting bringing back two hours to the Ompah branch and sent it to the county and the library board.

“We will follow up on this,” Maguire said.

New Deputy Chief in Clar-Mill: Under the recommendation of Fire Chief Steve Riddell, Council appointed Randy Schonauer as Deputy Fire Chief for the Clar-Mill district. Schonauer was selected after an internal hiring process took place.

Wheel chair lift to make meeting room accessible- The township has received a grant to put in a wheel chair lift for the meeting room that is located on the mezzanine of the Clar-Mill fire hall, which is adjacent to the township office. The township holds most of their council meetings at that location.