Perry Finds $100,000 Savings for Township

Feb 08, 2017

Deputy Mayor Fred Perry made a suggestion at last month's special budget meeting regarding borrowing money from the Federal Gas Tax Reserve to help pay for the new municipal complex as opposed to taking out a loan on the full amount. This idea could save the Municipality over $100,000 over the course of the loan but would deplete the Townships reserve funds.

“I don't, personally, want to be depleting our reserves,” Councillor Wayne Good said. “If we start doing that here on this we'll have to start playing catch up.”

“As the Federal Gas Tax Reserve builds up at $186,000 a year is the plan to use that if there is a bridge failure?” Councillor John Inglis asked.

CAO Cheryl Robson explained that it could be used for bridges, road repairs, or other unforeseen expenses related to that infrastructure.

“It was an excellent suggestion by the Deputy Mayor,” Mayor Higgins said.

Council voted to transfer $250,000 from the Federal Gas Tax Reserve which lowers the total amount of the loan application to $704,244. They also opted for the 25-year serialized loan at 3.5% interest.

The construction on the complex is set to begin in April.

Council Composition Changes
Council voted to hold a public meeting regarding changing the composition of the council to reflect the population disparity between the current wards.

Currently, the Mayor is elected at large and 6 councillors are elected, 2 from each ward. The Deputy Mayor is then appointed by Council.

The proposal includes keeping Ward 1 as it is but combining Ward 2 and Ward 3 and having two Councillors represent that new amalgamated Ward. The Deputy Mayor would then be chosen by popular vote.

This proposal came out of a conversation started back in November of 2016 when Council was discussing how Wards 2 and 3 have almost the same amount of people as Ward 1.

If, following the public meeting, Council decided to move forward with the ward amalgamation then it would be effective for the 2018 election.

Insurance Coverage
Debra Murphy, a representative from the Frank Cowan Insurance Company, made a brief presentation to Council on Friday to explain some of the important parts of North Frontenac's insurance policy.

The Frank Cowan Insurance Company, a small, specialized firm, has a team that works only in municipal insurance.

“We are all about managing risks and keeping your claims under control,” Murphy said. “We are very well-versed in what's important in municipalities.”

The total limit of liability for the policy is set at $50,000,000 and the total annual premium is $72,633.

Mayor Ron Higgins asked whether Frank Cowan does risk management seminars for social media citing Donald Trump's tweets as an example.

“The more this (social media) gets used by municipalities the more risk there is,” Higgins said.

Murphy was unsure but was going to look into it.

Salvation Army Disaster Services
Mark Evans, a representative from the Salvation Army (SA), made a presentation to Council regarding their Emergency Disaster Services (EDS) and the 4 core functions the SA can provide in an emergency situation.

The EDS program is a modified version of what the SA does day to day but in an emergency context.

The program, funded primarily through unspecified general donations to the SA offers clothing and furniture vouchers at their stores, emotional and spiritual care, donation management, and a mass food service via their fleet of custom canteen vehicles when needed in an emergency situation. These services, excluding the canteen trucks, are free of charge to municipalities.

“We do endeavour to keep costs at a minimum when we're dealing with municipalities,” Evans said.

Evans would work with the Fire Chief to create a memorandum of understanding between the Salvation Army and the Municipality so costs of using the food truck would be known in advance.

The canteen truck, which has a kitchen and washroom on-board, can be used to keep emergency workers fed during an emergency response. Approximately 500 burgers were cooked up for emergency workers during the Parliament Hill shooting in 2014.