Craig Bakay | Jun 03, 2020


The vast majority of Addington Highlands Council’s online Tuesday meeting was given over to all the things that have cropped up due to the coronavirus pandemic but they did devote considerable discussion to an older issue — cannabis growing.

Dep. Clerk/Planning Secretary Patricia Gray told Council “in recent weeks, there have been numerous complaints/concerns raised by residents with respect to cannabis production near their properties.

“These have been in both the north and south ends of the municipality.”

Gray said that as was the case in 2018, the cannabis being grown or potentially being grown is for medical purposes by individuals or designated persons as permitted by the Access to Cannabis for Medical Purposes Regulations.

“Staff have submitted an inquiry to the OPP to confirm that the one location has a valid licence to grow medicinal cannabis while the owners of the second location have supplied a copy of the licence,” she said. She said that after the OPP have confirmed licences are in place, they “step away” from the situation as it then becomes a Health Canada matter.

She said residents can raise their concerns with Health Canada, which may be considered at licence renewal time, which comes up on a yearly basis.

She said a location can have up to four registrations on it as medical cannabis users can designate someone to grow it for them.

She said staff is in the process of creating a document outline the Township’s policy on cannabis growing but they are waiting on legal advice as to what a municipality can and cannot do.

“We don’t currently have any requests for commercial growing operations,” she said. “But it could happen and we’d like to have some guidelines in place if we do get interest.

“At the very least, it would likely require a Zoning Bylaw amendment.”

“I think we should have something in place sooner rather than later,” said Dep. Reeve Tony Fritsch. “Because someday somebody’s going to come along.”

Roads setttling in for summer

“Things are cleaning up nice,” Roads and waste management Supervisor Brett Reavie told Council. “The sweeping’s all done and we had a little sinkhole on Hartsmere Road but we fixed that.

“That’s been an ongoing problem I hear from the guys.”

He said the new garbage and recycling measures “seem to be going well — recycling’s been coming in better now that people are handling sorting themselves.”

He said his budget is “in decent shape right now, but that can change quickly if there’s a major issue that crops up.”

He said there have been some “water problems” on Fifth Concession Street.

Tax revenue dropping

And speaking budgets and finances, CAO/ Clerk-Treasurer Christine Reed told Council that they’ve seen a 15 per cent decrease in tax revenue coming in since the March and May deadlines.

“It’s fairly significant,” she said. “But we’re in good shape and haven’t had to dip into our savings.

“Hopefully, we’ll be in a better position in July and people will start paying their taxes.”

County to take over more roads

Council approved an agreement whereby Lennox & Addington County will take over the Flinton Road, the Bridgewater Road (now known as the Flinton Road) and the Buckshot Lake Road as part of the County Road system.

Flinton Road will be known as County Road No. 29 and Buckshot Lake Road will be known as County Road No. 30.

The agreement calls for the County to be responsible for construction and maintenance of said roads.

Meeting dates changed

At meeting time, it was expected that Premier Doug Ford would extend the state of emergency until June 30, meaning that Townships would have to continue meeting online.

With that in mind, Council decided to cancel its second regular meeting of the month, to be replaced by a committee of adjustment meeting at 12:30 and a Special Council Meeting at 1 p.m. to address the potential tax penalty July 1 and anything else that might come up on June 16.

CAO/Clerk-Treasurer Christine Reed reminded Council that they don’t generally have a second meeting in July and August.

Pine Meadow window visits

Coun. David Miles reported that he’d had conversations with Pine Meadows Seniors Home and while initial “windows family visits had had some hiccups, they think they’ve got it all worked out.

“There was some issues related to ‘what window’ and what were people seeing but they’ve created a special place for windows visits and even had some outside with appropriate physical distancing,” Miles said. “And they’ve still had no covid cases.”

“That’s a great credit to them,” said Reeve Henry Hogg.

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