No many people know that one of the  pre-eminent biological field stations in Canada is located in our own back yard. The Elbow Lake Environmental Education Centre (ELEEC), located in South Frontenac on the shores of Elbow Lake, was established in June 2011 in an agreement between the Queens University Biological Station (QUBS) and the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC).

The center sits on a 400 hectare parcel of land in the richly diverse Frontenac Arch. It was purchased by the NCC in 2006 from computer giant Hewlett Packard (HP), who ran the property as a recreational retreat for its employees. However, because the NCC purchases properties solely for the purpose of preserving natural bio-diversity and is not in the business of managing buildings, Queens University entered into the agreement.

Queens envisioned the buildings on the property as serving as a major center for environmental and educational outreach and signed the agreement to co-manage the centre with the NCC in 2011. In June 2013 Queens University bought a share of the property and now currently co-owns and manages the 18 hectares on which the center sits.

Nestled on the shore of Elbow Lake, the rustic and picturesque center is a nature lover’s paradise. It includes a main pavilion with kitchen/dining and meeting rooms, a day lodge equipped with a kitchen, meeting rooms and washrooms, plus 10 heated sleeping cabins. There is also a beach/waterfront area equipped with canoes, and numerous hiking trails wind throughout the property. The center offers a wide range of activities including school field trips, field courses, club meetings, as well as individual and group retreats, and conferences. Staff at the center welcome visits from educators, academics and conservation partners.

Carolyn Bonta manages the ELEEC and heads up the educational programming. She spoke of what makes this facility special. “The way we distinguish ourselves from similar facilities and groups is by the fact that we are part of Queens University and therefore are able to offer educational programming with a unique academic research slant. So groups who visit the center will not only learn about biodiversity and all the different animals and plants found here, but they will also learn how to sample biodiversity and how to scientifically count and measure what they find.”

A recent Bio-Blitz at the center identified over 600 species of plants and animals. Many of the ELEEC programs aim to promote citizen science and the center offers different research-oriented programs with a scientific edge that show visitors how to count birds, aquatic life and other species found on the property. There are also numerous research projects taking place that include lake water chemistry, plus a wide variety of monitoring studies of birds, frogs, climate, weather and the forest community. The center's programming targets local high school students in grades 9-12 and the programs aim to match the requirements of the current high school curriculum. ELEEC also accepts students from outside the area.

In the summer months the center offers an Eco-Adventure camp to children ages 10-14. ELEEC programming also includes activities for adult groups and organizations and overnight programs are also available.

Bonta said her goal is to keep fees at the center as low as possible. On the day that I visited, a group of 20 graduate students from Queens University's geography department were busy preparing breakfast in the main pavilion. Sinead Earley, a 4th year PHD student in the geography department at Queens, was leading a special social event for the group, who were also gearing up for a snow shoeing expedition. Earley said that every fall new graduate students in the geography department at Queens spend time at the center in an annual welcoming event. She said the ELEEC is able to “add a balance to the lives of students who often get cooped up in offices doing work” and that it is a great benefit to Queens geography students, who will often visit it numerous times during the school year.

The ELEEC will be holding an Open House on Sunday May 25 from 10am-3pm and the general public is invited. Staff and volunteers will be offering guided hikes and paddles and numerous games and other activities. Representatives from the NCC will also be present at the event and there are plans that the center’s new logo will be unveiled at that time. For more information visit elbowlakecentre.ca

Editorial by Jeff Green

Normally I thank our staff, readers, and advertisers on this, our last issue of 2013, and I would like to do so this year as well.

As I look back on the stories we covered this past year, a few stories, it seems to me, have been left hanging. The saga of Frontenac County Council is one of them.

On one hand, the politicians recognise that the townships need to work together, but on the other there is resistance to giving the county any role in bringing that about. We have an article on an organizational review that was just presented to county council, which explicitly points to this dilemma.

One item that was not part of the report's recommendations but was in the narrative, refers to something I have thought about in the past but have never seen anyone take up. It says the County should consider selling or renting out its current office space adjacent to Fairmount Home in rural Kingston and coming home to the county by building a new office. If the county used some of its reserves to build an office, perhaps in Verona, it might change everything.

Other stories this year were more serious than the sometimes comical shenaningans at Frontenac County.

It has been five months since a troubled man was killed by police on the Arden Road in late July, and the Special Investigations Unit has yet to file a report. Other cases that took place at around the same time have been cleared up by the SIU and we await the report in this case.

Finally, in October, 500 members of the Shabot Obaadjiwan received form letters informing them that they are no longer electors for the Algonquin Land Claim, and while they may have Aboriginal heritage, there is not credible evidence they are descended from Algonquins.

These people are descendants of Francis and Mary Sharbot, the founders of Sharbot Lake. Until the land claim came along, the Sharbots had been considered as Mohawks, but they were recruited by the Algonquin Land Claim and their Algonquin status was verified by the same genealogist who now says they are not Algonquin.

There will be more to this story coming up as the Shabot Obaadjiwan seek to bring two-thirds of their members back into the land claim fold. I can’t help but think that this entire episode is reminiscent of how Canadian governments stole the identities of Aboriginal peoples in the 19th and 20th Centuries. Restoring identity and dignity is one of the major goals of the land claims process, but in the case of families like the the Badours. Hollywoods, and Cotas, the opposite is taking place. The only scant comfort in this lies in the fact that these families are resilient, and they will certainly persevere.

Happy Christmas.

Draft Frontenac County budget calls for 1.34% levy increase

At their final meeting of 2011, members of Frontenac County Council received the 2012 draft budget from the County Finance Department.

The county expects to spend just over $42 million in 2012, which is a drop of almost $1.8 million from the 2011 total of $43.8 million. This decrease is due mainly to the fact that in 2011 the cost of a new ambulance base and library in Sydenham were included in the county budget, and no large construction projects are planned for 2012.

The two major services that the county provides are the Fairmount Home for the Aged and the Frontenac Land Ambulance Service. Both are cost shared with the City of Kingston and the Province of Ontario.

The proposed increase in operating costs for Fairmount Home is $53,000, a 2.49% increase, which will edge the home’s budget over $10 million. Of that, the draft budget calls for $735,400 to come from Frontenac County taxpayers, an increase of $18,000 from 2011.

The total cost of the Frontenac Land ambulance is projected to rise above $15 million in 2012, an increase of over $500,000, but the province will be increasing their subsidy to the service by over $300,000 and the net increase to Frontenac County taxpayers will be just under $50,000, or 3.31%.

All told the draft budget calls for a levy of $8,510,000 to taxpayers, an increase of $112,182 (1.34%) from 2011.

While members of county council simply received the draft budget for information and will be conducting their budget debate at their January meeting, they did debate one item that is connected to the budget, a proposed pay increase for non-unionized staff.

A human resources report recommends increasing pay for non-unionized staff (which includes members of county council) by 2.9% in 2012. This reflects a cost of living increase plus some extra to bring the pay for professional staff more in line with the average costs in other municipalities.

“I can’t agree with that,” said Warden Gary Davison (the budget discussion took place before Davison tendered his resignation as warden). “We are going into contract negotiations with unionized staff in 2012 and this is not the kind of example we should be setting. We are looking at 2% as a kind of limit and I think we should stick to that for our non-unionized staff and members of council.”

The item was ultimately deferred to the next meeting.

Garrison Shores –

Without fanfare, the plan of condominium to create individual and shared lots on Garrison Lake near Arden was approved by council. Two members of the Garrison Shores Association were on hand to witness the end of a 30-year planning and legal quagmire.

County agendas publicly available. The county agenda packages are now available online for the public at the county website by clicking on the council tab. All agendas and reports and minutes from previous meetings will be uploaded and archived using the FilePro document management system. The archives will be searchable as well.

Gutowski wins the draw and becomes Frontenac County warden

For the past 13 years the annual election of the Frontenac County warden has been an election in name only. Each year the warden has tendered his or her resignation and the next in line, the deputy warden, has been the only nominee and has been acclaimed to the post.

After an election, if the incumbent warden has been re-elected in their township, they usually stay on as warden for the first year in order to provide continuity.

That was what happened in 2011 when South Frontenac’s returning mayor, Gary Davison, stayed on as county warden. Janet Gutowski, also a returning mayor, who had served as warden in 2009, took on the deputy warden role. It was understood that the two other mayors, first timers Dennis Doyle from the Frontenac Islands, and Bud Clayton from North Frontenac would take their turns in the third and fourth years of the county council mandate.

That was the way Gary Davison thought things were going at the December 14 meeting of Frontenac County Council.

He announced his resignation and then called for nominations. Councilor John McDougall from South Frontenac nominated Janet Gutowski and John Purdon from Central Frontenac seconded the nomination.

Just as Gary Davison was about to declare Gutowski elected, another hand shot up.

“I nominate Bud Clayton,” said Councilor John Inglis from North Frontenac, and Councilor David Jones from Frontenac Islands seconded the nomination.

Janet Gutowski looked surprised, and County CAO Liz Savill said she had to confer with Deputy Clerk Susan Beckel about preparing ballots for the unexpected vote.

Gary Davison gave each candidate an opportunity to say a few words.

“As you know, in the last term council decided to expand in an effort to bring changes to the county. I feel it is time for the new council to step forward and bring in someone that will do what the previous council expected us to do,” said Clayton.

“I feel my experience speaks for itself and I have a track record of collaboration,” said Gutowski. “I feel we have a good staff in Frontenac County. It does take a lot of time to be the warden. I can assure council that I will make my best efforts to work diligently on their behalf.”

Susan Beckel then handed each council member a piece of paper and said they should write the name of their preferred candidate on the paper. Once that was done, she gathered up all the pieces of paper.

A minute later CAO Savill came to the head of the council table and said, “There has been an equality of votes”.

Now it appeared as if all eight members of council were surprised.

When Frontenac County Council expanded from four to eight members at the beginning of this term, it was decided that whoever was the mayor of South Frontenac would have two votes, to give council nine votes. That was in order to give South Frontenac, which includes almost 60% of the population, some extra clout and it would also avoid deadlocked votes.

So why the tie vote?

“Each council only has one vote for the election of officers,” said Susan Beckel. She later explained that that was one of the stipulations in the procedural bylaw that council passed in 2010.

Liz Savill then said, “We’ll have to draw for a winner.”

She wrote the two names on two pieces of paper, folded them and put them in a hat.

Gary Davison pulled one and handed it to Savill.

“Janet Gutowski is the new warden,” Savill said.

With that, the deputy warden position came open.

Once again there were two nominees, Bud Clayton and Dennis Doyle. Another vote was taken and Dennis Doyle was declared the winner.

Afterwards Warden Gutowski said that the split on council that the vote for warden revealed was “just part of the growing pains of the new makeup of council. To me it is all water under the bridge and we will now move forward.”

She also said that one of her major goals for 2012 will be to get work on a County Official Plan off to a good start, to engage the City of Kingston in more meaningful discussions about shared issues, and to start addressing the infrastructure needs of the member townships in the County.

(Note – At this time only the four mayors are eligible for election as warden or deputy warden. In order to be eligible, a member on county council must have been elected by all the electors in his/her township, and not just by electors in one ward.)

Even though a climate of acrimony and mistrust has become entrenched at Frontenac County Council in recent months, the decision that council made last week to defer their budget deliberations until May 2 is hard to understand.

The budget was on the agenda last week, but before the agenda was approved, Councilor Jones from Frontenac Islands put forward a motion of censure against Warden Janet Gutowski and CAO Liz Savill for not calling a special meeting regarding the budget and for filling up the council agenda with “fluff and bubble” delegations.

The County Deputy Clerk Jeanette Amini, did not see how the motion of censure fit with the rules of the Ontario Municipal Act. A motion was put to Council to remove the budget from the meeting's agenda and send it to a special meeting.

David Jones seemed to be saying that the budget was the number one priority of the County. Treasurer Marian VanBruinessen had pointed out in a report to Council that the local townships as well as the City of Kingston need the budget as soon as possible to finalise their spending plans for the year. The Municipal Act requires upper tier municipalities to have a budget in place by the end of March. Why then would anyone vote to put the whole off for another two weeks?

Instead, virtually everything else on the agenda could have been deferred. Sure enough, with the budget off the agenda, Council proceeded to spend several hours last Wednesday debating the fine points of proposed amendments to their procedural bylaw.

The procedural bylaw may not be fluff and bubble, but neither is it a pressing matter.

The upshot of all this is that by the time Frontenac County Council sits down on May 2, six weeks will have passed from the time they rejected, without explanation, a budget that called for a decrease of 0.34 per cent in the amount of money to be levied from ratepayers.

When the budget was rejected back in March, two things did not happen. Council did not give any instructions to staff regarding changes they needed to see in the budget in order to support it, and they also did not ask for a special budget meeting. This was a failing of the council, not of the warden or the CAO.

The document they will see on May 2 is the identical document they rejected.

I have spoken to three of the five members of council who voted against the budget in March. They each had their own reasons. One was concerned about the cost of running Fairmount Home; one was concerned about county reserve funds;, and one was concerned that the county overspends on everything that it does.

These are all legitimate concerns. However it is hard to see how they will be addressed on May 2.

It is more likely that council will simply cut some of the budget lines on that day without considering the financial and operational implications.

But that would not be a demonstration of good governance.

It would be better, in the time between now and May 2, if members of council did some homework, asked for clarification about the budget numbers from the treasurer in advance of the meeting, and came in with something to offer to the process.

Frontenac County Council had poked and prodded at their 2013 budget for a couple of months, and they had managed to get it to the point where county ratepayers would be paying no more than they did last year. The requisition to the townships was down by 0.34%.

To get to this point, both Chief Administrative Officer Liz Savill and Treasurer Marian VanBruinessen had been told they could not hire extra staff to run their offices, as they had been requesting.

So, in a sense it is not surprising that Warden Gutowski asked Council to pass the budget last week. The County needs to tell all of its funders, which include the City of Kingston and the Government of Ontario, as well as the four Frontenac townships, how much money to send in this year.

But the vote was lost, soundly, 6-3.

What does that mean?

At the very least it means that the Council must meet again, sooner rather than later, and must find some way to decide which budget items need to be reviewed, and what changes need to be made in order for at least two votes to switch from no to yes. The clock is ticking and we are already into the second quarter of the year.

What happened last week was, in part, another demonstration of the disconnect between the warden and the majority of Council. Only two of the other seven council members (as mayor of South Frontenac, Gary Davison has 2 votes) were willing to stand with her and support the budget.

More significant however, is the fact that in comments throughout the budget process and in the vote as well, council demonstrated a lack of faith in the material presented to them by the county treasurer. In particular, Councilor Jones from Frontenac Islands talked repeatedly about staff “squirreling away funds to reserves” and at one point last week Mayor Davison commented “Are they telling us we should just be quiet and sign the cheque?”

Marion VanBruinessen has been the County Treasurer since municipal amalgamation in 1998, and CAO Liz Savill has also been in place since then. For members of council to feel comfortable making these kinds of statements in open council meetings, in front of all of the county managers and the media as well, is more than a breach of decorum.

When a Council openly questions the motives of their most senior staff, you have to start wondering where this is all going. Council has to know that they do not have a complete understanding of the numbers, and if at the same time they do not trust the people who are providing them with those numbers, what are they going to base their decisions upon?

I have never sat on a municipal council, but I have been on a number of boards for not-for-profit corporations that receive public funding. I know that as a board member, as long as I have a basic faith in the integrity and the competence of the senior people in the organisation, the burden of responsibility for spending public funds rests lightly on my shoulders. If that faith wavers, that burden becomes a heavy one.

In spite of all the rhetoric, as extreme as it has been, I'm not sure that Frontenac County is quite at that point

Early this week, I interviewed Dennis Doyle, the mayor of Frontenac Islands and one of the major voices of dissent on County Council. I asked him what he is looking for in the county budget. I asked him how much of a cut he wanted to see in county taxes. Was it 3%? 5%?

He said his concern was not so much with taxes but with the overall operating costs of the County, whether those costs are covered by local taxes or by other levels of government. In particular he is concerned about the increases in operating costs at Fairmount Home, the land ambulance service, and county administration. He also said there is an urgency to address this in 2013 because it is the third year of this council's mandate, and next year will be an election year.

After two years of attempting to make some real change in the direction of county finances, Doyle feels that this is the year that this council will either make its mark or will fail to do so.

That explains, at least from his point of view, why the majority of council are willing to confront the warden, the CAO and the treasurer. Doyle feels, rightly or wrongly, that it costs more to do things in Frontenac County than it does elsewhere, and he wants that addressed, both in the budget and in a subsequent debate about the size and uses of reserve funds by Frontenac County.

The question is, are there any real savings to be found in county operations, and if so, where are they?

But given the state of relations between the players at the county table, there is a more basic problem to be solved. An equilibrium must be found, respect must be re-established; there must be a level of trust between the Council as a whole and the senior staff.

Once lost, trust can be harder to find than savings.

Council Slams County Official Plan

In a five-page report that was received by South Frontenac Council on Tuesday night, Sept. 17, Mills praised the general layout of the County OP, which was authored by Joe Gallivan, the Manager of Sustainability Planning with Frontenac County. “The draft plan is well laid out … each section and subsection includes an introduction that explains the intent of each policy that flows from it … Also the document explains at the start that its policies are structured on the basis of six sustainability themes, namely: economic sustainability, growth management, community building, housing and social services, heritage and culture, and environmental sustainability. These six themes appear to be logical as a general basis on which to accommodate future growth and needs of residents … Joe Gallivan should be commended for his work on the Plan." Once he had finished praising Joe Gallivan, Mills set out a series of concerns he had with the plan. Mills said that while the County OP explains that it is intended to be a “high-level” regional plan, “in reality, under the present wording, the document is exactly the opposite.” He said that the policies in the OP are much too “intrusive into the decision-making authority of the municipalities.” He uses the example of the definition of agricultural land in the document. Regarding agricultural land, it lists every possible use that may be permitted on the lands. Secondary uses such as carpentry, welding, machine and small engine repair shops are listed. Mills says this level of detail has no place in the document. “The Plan should provide the introduction that explains the intent of the section and then simply state that ‘municipalities shall ensure that agriculture and the farming community are supported and protected’ or wording with a similar intent,” Mills wrote. Mills also expressed concerns over language used in the Daft OP, words such as "shall", "will", "permitted", etc., words that cause Mills to be concerned “that the County will be involved in every aspect of any planning approval”. While he says that he is not sure that is the intent of the document, Mill says that to make sure the County does not get involved in local matters, the “wording needs to be tightened up”. He also expressed concerns about the sections in the plan about forestry, regional roads, and regional community improvement plans. Lindsay Mills concluded his report by saying the draft County Official Plan “attempts to involve the County in all development. This too much intrusion into the affairs of local municipalities.” Although he says that the problem may be more one of wording than intent in many cases, he is concerned that the OP “has huge negative implications for the local townships and the Plan should be substantially revised accordingly” Mills recommended that South Frontenac Council endorse his report and forward it to the County as a township position regarding the OP. Before members of South Frontenac Council had their chance to comment on Lindsay Mills' report at their meeting on Tuesday night (September 17th) Mills told them that he has already had a discussion with Joe Gallivan about his concerns, and Gallivan has assured him “that he plans to reduce the second draft of the County OP by one half." This did not stop members of South Frontenac Council from attacking the County OP, and the County itself as well. “I don’t agree with where they seem to be going with it,” said Councilor Del Stowe, “they should stay out of it and let us do our own job. This degree of involvement in planning adds another tier, increases waiting time and costs: there is no benefit to it that I can see.” Councilor Ron Vandewal said he is concerned that the approach the County is taking “could choke off development”, and Councilor Larry York said “the County is too removed from the reality of the individual townships.” Even Public Works Manager Mark Segsworth had something to say about Frontenac County's role. “When it comes to roads we have shown that we don’t need an upper tier - we are demonstrating there is another way: collaboration between the townships. In my opinion, our future is in collaboration,” he said. Mayor Gary Davison said “The octopus gets bigger; they’ll have to pay extra staff to administer this. It’s all part of the issue at County council: there’s a hostile, divided environment.” Council unanimously passed a motion opposing the County’s first draft, and sent the full text of L. Mills’ notes back to County, and to all the other townships. Lindsay Mills assured Council that the County will make no decision about the Official Plan until they have circulated a second draft to the townships.

Guiderail Installation Tender

Public Works Manager Segsworth reported on the tender results for installation of roadside protection (formerly guardrails, now guiderails,) on Harrowsmith, Clarke, Perth and Latimer Roads, as well as extensive repairs to a recently-damaged section of Moreland Dixon Road. Council approved the $77,862 bid provided by McIvor Enterprises. Inclusion of the unanticipated repairs which resulted from an auto accident raised costs above the budgeted $50,000. The overage will be funded from contingency, and the township will seek remuneration from insurance claims.

Road 38 Corridor in Verona

Five proposals were submitted for a Multi-modal Transportation Study and Improvement Plan for the Road 38 Corridor through Verona. This was awarded to Stantec Engineering, for $22,487. Multi-modal refers to the need to accommodate several very different uses of the relatively narrow corridor: private and commercial vehicles, pedestrians, bicycles, motorcycles, and atvs.

It has been almost 10 months since Frontenac County Warden Janet Gutowski defied the rest of her council and refused to relinquish her position as warden. At the time she argued she was the only one on council with the requisite knowledge and experience necessary to carry out the role properly. She made use of a loophole, which has since been plugged, which allowed her to remain in the post for a second year without seeking re-election.

At that time I wrote that her decision to insist on remaining in the post of warden would lead to unyielding acrimony and political stagnation at Frontenac County.

It is safe to say that prediction has come through, in spades.

Rather than take action to deal with issues of concern to county residents, the county is now conducting two navel-gazing exercises, a service delivery review and a strategic planning exercise. An ill-informed Kingston City Councilor, noting that the county is poorly run, has even felt justified in calling for Frontenac Paramedic Services to be dismantled and turned over to the City.

And now, to top it off, the warden is suing four members of county council for defamation, and is asking for a million dollars in damages.

To a great extent, all of the controversy surrounding Janet Gutowski can be traced back to her unwise decision to hang on to the warden’s position, including the remarks that are the subject of the lawsuit, and to that extent, the responsibility for the entire mess lies on her shoulders.

That being said, I think it is about time that the four members of council named in Gutowski's defamation suit show some leadership of their own and rescind the motion that precipitated the suit. And yes, they need to apologize as well.

The fact is that Councilor David Jones, in putting forward the motion that led to the suit back in May, did not have any solid backing for his allegation of “influence peddling”.

In levelling the accusation, Jones did not even claim he had been offered anything to change his vote on the county budget, he only referred to an email he received from “another member of council” which, he said, contained an allegation that the other member had been offered an inducement in exchange for changing his vote. The e-mail in question was written to Jones by North Frontenac mayor, Bud Clayton, and the alleged inducement was a cut in the Fairmount Home budget. Clayton acknowledged sending the email, but in an interview with the News he denied that the e-mail contained an allegation that any kind of firm offer had been made to him in return for his change of vote on the budget.

The key fact in all this is that the Fairmount Home budget figures that were passed in May were the same as they had been when the budget was rejected in April. Bud Clayton knew the Fairmount budget was the same and he voted for the budget. If the Fairmount cut was going to be the pay-off for Clayton’s vote, there was no pay-off.

As to Jones' further allegation that Gutowski told Clayton she would resign as warden if he supported the budget, there is no substantive proof of that happening either.

So, why did the majority of county council support Jones' motion?

All I can figure is that the four who supported the motion did so in order to demonstrate they were still opposed to Gutowski remaining in the position of warden, and not because they really believed in the “influence peddling” nonsense.

The motion that was passed had no effect. Council had no authority to strip Gutowski of her position as either a member of the council or the warden, and a call to Linda Jeffrey, Minister of Municipal Affairs, to investigate the matter was deftly sidestepped by ministry staff

The ministry said Council should consider adopting a code of conduct for its members, and as far as any claim of wrongdoing was concerned, “If Council is of the opinion that something illegal may have occurred, they may wish to consult with the local police services to determine if an investigation is warranted,” wrote Minister Jeffrey.

Instead of letting the matter slide, Janet Gutowski hired a lawyer. The lawyer sent a letter to the councilors asking them to rescind the motion and apologize, upon threat of a lawsuit. They ignored the letter. Gutowski proceeded with the suit.

Now the councilors are faced with a choice. They can stand their ground, claiming that everything that was said and done by them is protected under the “limited privilege” that exists for statements made within the confines of a municipal council chamber. To make this argument, they need to pay lawyers, and this will either cost them money (that would not be good for them) or cost the county money because since they were working for the county at the time they may seek to have the county cover some or all of their legal costs (that would not be good for the rest of us).

Or they could acknowledge that David Jones' motion was foolhardy. The fact that it was passed was a mistake they made in the heat of the moment. Someone has to end this, in the interest of the county and its ratepayers.

To rescind the motion would be easy. To apologize to Janet Gutowski would be a hard thing to do. It would be a spectacle, perhaps even a bit of a humiliation.

But it would put an end to this foolishness. It might even create an opening for Janet Gutowski to finally do the right thing and resign as Frontenac County warden this fall rather than hanging on until the bitter end of the council’s term a year from now.