| Nov 05, 2014


Township says goodbye to IT Coordinator

Evan Sepa, the IT/911 co-ordinator for North Frontenac who has put the township at the forefront of Global Information Systems (GIS) applications on its website, is leaving this week for a job in York Region. He said that he will be doing the same things that he has been doing in North Frontenac, “except on a larger scale”.

That is a bit of an under-statement since York Region has operating and capital budgets that are both over $1 billion and North Frontenac's total annual spending is under $10 million.

Before leaving the township this week, Sepa outlined for Council where the township now stands in regards to the goal that he has been working towards on their behalf as IT co-ordinator: open government.

In presenting a wide range of municipal information for public consumption, the website is the prime example of that project. The township was the first in Frontenac County to publish all agendas and supporting reports, with a full archive.

Frontenac County has an electronic agenda management system in place that is being offered to the townships under contract, but since North Frontenac has their own system that does not require a third party contract to maintain, they have turned down the offer.

Similarly, the township's website was re-designed in-house, in contrast to the $20,000 that South Frontenac spent last year to have their site commercially built.

Another aspect to Sepa's work on the website was the embedding of mapping data within the site. This effort was recognised by ESRI, the world's largest GIS mapping company, and was included in a presentation by the company at their annual users conference, which is attended by 15,000 people, in San Diego this year.

As well, Sepa launched a raw data initiative for the township. All of the data held by the township is not only available to the public, it is available to be downloaded in usable form by researchers, developers, or anyone with a use for it from the township's raw data site – http://data.nftwp.opendata.arcgis.com/.

In his final presentation to Council before leaving, Sepa said that the township “can take pride in being a leader in its open government initiative, as it is far ahead of most small municipalities. These kinds of initiatives have been led, for the most part, by large cities like Toronto and Ottawa.”

With Sepa leaving just before a new council is sworn in, township CAO Cheryl Robson said he will not be replaced in the short term. The township will make use of support offered by the Frontenac County IT department and will be exploring ways of working with neighbouring municipalities and the county before deciding how to proceed.

Evan Sepa has worked with the County IT department on some of his mapping initiatives, making use of the resources of Frontenacmaps.ca.

No solution at Norcan Lake

Public Works Manager Jim Phillips presented a report on a meeting he held with landowners within the ill-fated Norcan Lake subdivision at the north-western corner of the township. The subdivision ran into difficulties when the developer did not live up to his commitment to build a road linking back lots in the subdivision with a commonly owned water access lot.

The developer now says he cannot afford to put the road in as planned, and the township has made an alternate proposal that is cheaper, but in the view of Mr. Phillips, still accomplishes the goals of the residents.

Phillips said in his report that after hearing him out, “The group said they would meet again soon to discuss the matter, but several in the group expressed their opinion that the township’s proposal would not be acceptable to them,” for a number of reasons.

Faced with this reality, Phillips proposed a motion to Council that puts “the developer on notice with respect to his obligations” and proposes that a mediator be hired to try and iron out the dispute.

Council approved the motion.

Council balks at air compressor

A proposal to purchase a 5,000 pounds per square inch compressor with ancillary equipment for the fire department, at a cost of $31,000, was deferred until the fire chief is available to explain why it is necessary.

Even though the item was budgeted for, Councilor Inglis said his understanding is that a smaller compressor would be suitable and fit with current equipment better. Until now the fire department has used a 2,500 pounds per square inch unit.

“I did not think this would be an issue because it was budgeted, but since the fire chief is on vacation for two weeks, we can defer this until the 24th of November when he can explain,” said Cheryl Robson.

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