Winter Hours To Remain At Waste Sites In North Frontenac

Craig Bakay | Nov 24, 2021

There won’t be any Tuesday hours at the Mississippi Waste Site this winter, North Frontenac Council decided at its regular online meeting Nov. 19, despite Coun. Fred Fowler’s best efforts to reinstate them.

At this year’s May 7 meeting, Council passed a resolution cancelled the Tuesday hours in an effort to save about $2,800. This left only the 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday hours of operation.

However, Fowler said that he’s received several complaints about the Tuesday closure and requested a notice of motion to re-visit the issue.

“A lot of people responded negatively,” Fowler said. “A lot of people in our area are seniors and essentially full-time residents since covid hit (and) some of these people have personal waste that needs to be disposed of regularlly.

“Local businesses can’t use the waste site on Saturday either because they are closed on Saturday or they must be open on Saturdays for business purposed and so rely on the Tuesday day to drop their waste off.”

The Township received two emails asking the Tuesday hours be reinstated and Fowler presented Council with a 56-signature petition asking the same thing.

Coun. Vernon Hermer supported Fowler, saying “I think we made a mistake when we changed it in the first place.

But the rest of Council did not.

“All of the waste sites have winter and summer hours,” said Coun. Wayne Good.

In a recorded vote, Hermer and Fowler voted against leaving the site closed on Tuesdays.

Not only did Mayor Ron Higgins vote to keep the site closed, he issued a stern reprimand to Fowler for bringing it up and for the petition.

“Once we make a decision, it’s supposed to be supported by all of Council, whether you agree with it or not,” Higgins said. “Doing a petition was wrong.

“We had two people who had an issue with it but now we have a lot more.”

Noise bylaw

Council will continue to be the approval authority for noise bylaw exemptions rather than pass the authority to the CAO, Council decided.

There were only three such requests in 2021.

Council did, however, decide to extend hours pertaining to parties (3.3 (g)) to the hours of midnight to 7 a.m. instead of 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. as the exemption requests were for a one-hour extension.

“I have a generator that comes on automatically when the power goes out,” said Coun. Vern Hermer. “What am I to do?”

“That’s covered under 3.4 (measures undertaken during an emergency to ensure the immediate health, safety or welfare of the inhabitants of the Township or other persons or is necessary to preserve property,” said CAO Cheryl Robson.

Vaxx policy still a work in progress

Council received the Township’s Draft Vaccination Policy for information with the final version coming back for approval at the Dec. 10 meeting.

“Reading this, it’s a lot like chess,” said Coun. John Inglis. “There’s a lot of ‘if this happens, then . . .’

“I can still declare that I don’t want to get it as long as I get the test and still come in to work.

“It doesn’t seem to be a mandatory vaccination.”

“The word ‘mandatory’ is not in the policy,” said Mayor Ron Higgins. “We can revisit it.”

“I’m glad to see this is a living document and can be changed,” said Coun. Vern Hermer.

“Does this mean that if somebody tests positive, will we have to shut down like last year?” said Dep. Mayor Gerry Martin. “I don’t see any incentive to getting vaccinated.”

“If someone tests positive, the KFL&A Health Unit will come in and tell us what to do,” said CAO Cheryl Robson.

“If we have an outbreak, could we ask those not vaccinated to not come into work?” said Inglis.

“Some people view working from home as a reward,” said Higgins.

“I’m not talking about working from home, I’m talking about laying people off,” said Inglis.

Short term rentals

Mayor Ron Higgins reported that he’s reaching out to South Frontenac to join the working group looking into short-term rentals in order to create a consistent approach with North Frontenac, Central Frontenac and Addington Highlands.

Coun. John Inglis pointed out an irony with placing restrictions as “we’ve had accommodation issues for years.”

Dep. Mayor Gerry Martin said: “Yes, there are a few bad apples but where I live in Ardoch, we have a couple of rental properties and they’ve been cleaned up quite a bit.”