 By Staff
June 17, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Won’t be long now.
The paving of New Street between Guelph and Walkers Line and then on to Appleby Line is well underway – and the markings that indicate where the lane lines are going to go are in place.
 The white paint dots are where the bike lane line is going to go. Then it will be safe to drive a bike along New Street – right?  The paving of New Street is well underway – when done the bike lanes without safety barriers will get really serious. The painting machines will be putting the lines in place really soon – next week perhaps?
Don’t expect an official opening event – the lanes will just be there for people to use and the transportation department will begin their traffic flow measurements while the two sides of what has become a very contentious difference of opinion can get back at in an even bigger way.
Hard to see how a positive result is going to come out of the pilot program.
This things was a mess right from the beginning – reflecting the significantly different opinions within the city.
Not much in the way of leadership from city council on this one.
Transit and transportation needs and policy direction have to be worked out before the city can become whatever it is going to become.
There is a solution out there – the city has to find it and then be resolute in implementing a policy – and then funding it properly.
For the immediate future New Street will open and the arguments can rise to a new level.
 By Staff
June 17, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Another Sound of Music weekend.
While the event continually gets awards for being one of the best festivals in the province for the people of Burlington it is their weekend event.
They flow into Spencer Smith Park in a steady stream of people – every shape, size, and gender.
The Gazette positioned a photographer at the base of the Pier and watched people flow into the park.
This is Burlington and this is what we look like.
 It has always been this way – the boys looks – the girls ignore them.
 Night settles in – there is a 10 pm curfew for the bands.  The Pier gets visitors – a parachute glider attracts attention.  The evening was about listening to the music
 The girls are checking things out.  Many make it a family event.  He is just loving life
 Mom and her team.  You know who he likes.
 She is just really happy to be where she is!
 By Pepper Parr
June 17th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
It has to be the most impressive effort this city has seen, made by a bunch of people who just did not know how to take no for an answer.
The Freeman railway station – that was really just a small spur on the railway line that went through Burlington – took on a life of its own when those “concerned citizens” fought hard to keep the station alive.
 They still need donations and volunteers are always welcome – the big day will be July 1st. When your city council couldn’t find a home for the station, they did their best to try and sell it – even if it was just for kindling. No takers.
 The Freeman station got moved around a number of times while the city figured out what it wanted to do with the thing. When city council failed to come up with a solution citizens helped by Councillors Meed Ward and Lancaster found a solution. A group was formed and they managed to find some support on city council – Councillors Meed Ward and Lancaster – joined forces to hold off the willingness of the rest of city council to see the thing meet a swift death – and end the ongoing embarrassment.
The tearing up of the rail line on what is now a magnificent pathway along the edge of the lake was the end of old time rail transportation.
Now GO trains, Via Rail and freight trains snake through the city but they don’t have the colour and the character that those old railway station waiting rooms had.
 They had every reason to be smiling. Councillors Meed Ward and Lancaster pose with five members of the Friends of Freeman Station after the Council meeting that approved the entering into of a Joint Venture that would have the Friends moving the station and taking on the task of renovating the building. July 1 – the Freeman Station will get its Official Opening – the Mayor will cut the ceremonial ribbon. It should be Meed Ward and Lancaster doing that job – they earned it.
 These are some of the group that pushed their city council to working with them to save the Freeman Junction railway station. The group that runs the Friends of Freeman station have this thing about the role of the Mayor – he didn’t do all that much to keep it alive in the early days. He did, to his credit, work to get them some of the funding they desperately needed to do all the work that was needed.
The story of the hundreds of hours those guys put in – and it was mostly a male effort, should not go unrecorded.
 Hardly a weekend went by during the last year and a half without at least some people working on the renovation of th station. With the official opening day close close at hand there is a drive to get as much done as possible.
The Regions Heritage Services group has climbed aboard the effort and will be mounting a small exhibition in the space referred to as the Baggage Room.
Sarah Rolko who works for Halton Heritage Services as an assistant curator said the Friends of Freeman approached the Regional Heritage people initially for fundraising, collections management and exhibition development in April 2016.
 The station was taken off the blocks it was sitting on for a number of years and settled into their new home beside the Fire Station on Fairview. “The reconstruction process then got very busy and we were unable to reconnect with them until January 2017”, she said
“We were able to start up conversations again after meeting in January 2017 at the “Making Heritage Happen Conference” hosted by Region.
From there, we made a plan to develop an exhibit for the July 1st opening.
 Sitting on some “cribbing” with a sign badly in need of several coats of paint, the Freeman Station gets ready for its big move. The exhibit focuses on the hard work of the Friends of Freeman and other involved members of the community so far as well as the importance of the station within the community in the past, especially the major role the railway played in developing the city of Burlington.
The existence of the Freeman Station just might be the biggest thing Burlington has to celebrate and make note of as the County celebrates its first 150 years as a country.
By Pepper Parr
June 16th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Greg Woodruff ran for the Office of Chair of Halton Region in the 2014 election.
He got 12,000 votes of which 5,800 came from Burlington.
Garry Carr, trounced Woodruff.
 Greg Woodruff – Aldershot resisdent It was never certain what Woodruff was setting out to do – create a profile for some other race? He had zero political experience at the municipal level other than being a regular delegator at city hall in Burlington.
Woodruff certainly has an appetite for things political. A resident of Aldershot who works as an independent software development consultant and has a strong skill set in the technology field.
He points out that in the 2014 municipal election the candidate results were:
Rick GOLDRING 36,237
Anne MARSDEN 3,043
Peter RUSIN 2,942
Of the 42,222 votes cast Goldring took 36,237
He points out that only 42,000 people voted in election and 36,000 voted for Rick Goldring.
 Meed Ward with Mayor Goldring – both want their names on the ballot At the Council seat level Meed Ward got 4,600 votes which gave her the ward 2 seat.
Here is where it gets interesting.
Woodruff has run the numbers and according to him all it takes to win the race for the office of Mayor is 12,000 votes – in a four way race.
The four candidates?
Rick Golding, Marianne Meed Ward, Mike Wallace and Greg Woodruff.
It is pretty clear that both Meed Ward and Goldring are going to run for the office of Mayor. Howeer there are those who say they are close to Goldring and that he might decide to hang his hat up.
Meed Ward is believed to still be planning on a run for the office of Mayor
Mike Wallace is busy selling Real Estate, doing deals and running Jane McKenna’s attempt to get herself elected to the provincial legislature again.
 Mike Wallace looks closely at a piece of art at the Art Centre. There was more than enough evidence to suggest that Wallace was going to run for the office of Mayor. He was been both a school board trustee and a city Council member before he was elected as the Member of Parliament for Burlington.
He was defeated by Karina Gould for that job.
Woodruff seems to feel that the 5800 Burlington votes he got as a candidate for Regional Chair could be grown to the 12.000 he needs to be elected the Mayor.
It would be foolish to see the 2018 voter turn out as low as that in 2014 – the turn out could double. There will be some interesting dynamics if all four run for the office of Mayor.
Woodruff doesn’t appear to want to put in any time as a municipal Councillor – he wants to go straight to the top.
October 2018 might be an interesting month.
 By Ray Rivers
June 16, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Ray Rivers and his wife Jean spent a few weeks in Ukraine where they taught English as volunteers in a not for profit school and visited a Canadian army base while there, This is part 2 of that adventure
Donald Trump, in his short time in office has at least one accomplishment under his belt. He has shamed NATO participants into boosting their defence spending. The Canadian government has just announced a 70% increase in the defence budget over the next ten years. But even that will only get us to 1.4%, still well below the 2% NATO target.
 The Canadian ice breaker Sir Wilfred Laurier The critics of enhanced defence spending will point out that the only nation which ever invaded Canada is now our closest ally, protecting us under its nuclear umbrella, and all the while peacefully sharing this country’s only land border. But climate change is opening up the vast arctic to development potential, and across the divide lies an expansionist Russia. And while there is no truth to the rumour that Vladimir Putin plans to invade Santa’s workshop in the North Pole and put St. Nicholas in charge, a rapidly militarizing Russia with a despotic leader in command does pose a concern.
After all, it wasn’t that long ago that Ukrainians believed they were safe in friendship with their former occupier and Soviet partner. In fact, that peace loving nation wanted nothing more than to transform its proverbial cold war swords into plowshares. It surrendered the third largest nuclear arsenal for a piece of paper signed by the US, UK and Russia, promising Ukrainian territorial integrity. And look at how well that worked out for them.
I visited a former Soviet base in north-western Ukraine which had been virtually boarded-up until they were attacked and the war started in 2014. Today 200 Canadian and an equivalent number of American troops, are helping Ukrainians reacquaint themselves with the lost art of war, including field medicine, strategy, tactics and weapons. It was a slow Saturday afternoon when I was driven to the base but I did get to observe a dozen or so snipers firing their 50’s era soviet Dragunov rifles – still a highly rated weapon despite its age. Having been a good shot in my youth, I would have liked someone to invite me to fire a round – but shooting is serious business for these professional killers.
Training is helpful but what Ukraine really needs are modern defensive weapons and weapon systems to stem the toll in human life inflicted on a daily basis by Russia and its proxies. After three years of aggression in the east, not a single NATO partner, including Canada, has offered up much more than helmets and night goggles. On the other hand this country seems to have no difficulty sending advanced armoured equipment to places like Saudi Arabia, a nation with a troubling record of human rights violations.
 Turning swords into plowshares – a statute that sits outside the United Nations building in New York city. And the plowshares thing – how has that worked out? Imagine if the Canadian government had nationalized all of our farm land 70 years ago and then suddenly tried to privatize it back again. Picture how that would happen in a world without real estate agents, registry offices or estate lawyers, and a bureaucracy with virtually no experience in land transfer. It is a miracle that land reform wasn’t total chaos instead of just a slow agonizing process. But today, the collectives are gone and 40% of all farmland is in private hands, including some owned by foreign corporations. And those private farms now produce 70% of the nation’s agricultural output.
One of the teachers at the school I was teaching at had studied economics in the old days – Karl Marx, of course – and complained that life had really been better under communism – at least people had jobs. But then she couldn’t explain why the Soviet Union had collapsed, nor could she offer a suggested pathway to improving the current economy. And going back to the USSR is not an option, even if the other Lennon’s fellow Beatle thought it made a good song.
Curiously I have yet to encounter someone who has anything good to say about the country’s president, Mr. Poroshenko. They complain about him being one of the well-heeled oligarchs, with money invested overseas, and question whether he has really closed down his Russian chocolate factories as he had promised to do.
Yet to this observer he seems to have delivered a good amount in his three years as president – halting and reversing the advance of the Russians/separatists in the south east of the country, restoring the economic balance in the economy, delivering an association agreement and a visa-free travel arrangement with the EU, and starting the process of routing-out corruption.
But perhaps that’s part of the problem. Ukrainians are too critical, expect too much of their leaders, and perhaps not enough of themselves. Some dislike having lost the security of life in the old socialist world and would turn the page back if they could. And others are perhaps uncertain or insecure about plunging into the risky world of market-oriented capitalism, even after a quarter century of so-called freedom. But everyone believes that corruption is at he heart of the country’s economic problems. And no doubt the oligarchs, with their vast wealth and positions of power, have much to answer for.
 Significant disparity in the distribution of wealth in Ukraine. From all appearances the big cities with their modern supermarkets, trendy shops, restaurants and bars, filled with well dressed, with-it, Ukrainians are just like those in the rest of Europe. Though underneath that modern facade lies an economy, still bound in the past, struggling to survive and hoping to take off into the future. And Ukraine has much to offer, particularly for tourists. It is one of the best bargain destinations anywhere given its current exchange rate. I treated nine people to dinner and drinks in one of the best Georgian restaurants here for a little over $100 the other night.
But they have got to get the tourists to come here in the first place. And that would include finishing that pointless war in the east, regardless that there are virtually no signs of conflict anywhere in the rest of the county. And that would also entail more effort to make tourists feel at home in their own language or at least one they feel comfortable using – one of the reasons I’m here teaching English.
In that vein, Ukrainians have mulled the possibility of dropping the difficult (for us) Cyrillic alphabet in favour of the Latin script, like the one we use. Poland did this years ago, and former Soviet republics Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan are now making that change. Although Latin lettering can already be seen on some Ukrainian street signs, such a move towards complete replacement would threaten Russian cultural dominance even further. And that might be the best reason of all.
 Ray Rivers writes weekly on both federal and provincial politics, applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was a candidate for provincial office in Burlington in 1995. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Tweet @rayzrivers
Background links:
Part 1
Military Spending – Ukraine Military Mission –
Trudeau Visting Ukraine Base – Dragonuv Sniper –
Land Reform Issues – Language Matters – More Language –
 By Staff
June 15th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Those mobility hubs – all four of them.
What are they again?
A place identified as an opportunity for new growth and development over the next 20 years
 There were charts all over the room that people could use to visualize what they thought a mobility hub could be. City staff held breakout questions where questions could be asked and detailed notes taken – it is those notes that have been formulated into concept that people can learn more about in the weeks ahead. The city held a public meeting at which people could put some ideas on paper. All the ideas were then gone over by the planning staff – they now want to share their feedback on land-use concepts that came out of the meeting on the Downtown Mobility Hub
These concepts will be available for public feedback starting Wednesday, June 21.
 Study area and the different land uses in the different precincts. Wednesday, June 21
Art Gallery of Burlington (Shoreline/Rotary Room), 1333 Lakeshore Rd.
7 to 9 p.m.
Those who are unable to attend the public meeting can share their feedback about the concepts at one of the following public open houses:
Wednesday, June 28
Burlington City Hall (room 247), 426 Brant St.
6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
Thursday, July 6
Art Gallery of Burlington (Shoreline Room), 1333 Lakeshore Rd.
6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
Monday, July 10
Burlington Public Library, Central branch (Centennial Hall), 2331 New St.
2 to 4 p.m.
Thursday, July 13
Burlington City Hall (room 247), 426 Brant St.
2 to 4 p.m.
 Checking out what the city means by a mobility hub. The input gathered will be used to help develop a shared vision for the downtown Mobility Hub, to be released in September 2017.
Rosa Bustamante, Manager of Policy – Mobility Hubs explains that “This is the next step in planning our city’s downtown Mobility Hub. This spring, we heard from residents who told us what they love and value about downtown Burlington. We’ve taken that input, along with the information that has been gathered through technical studies, to create some draft land-use concepts that will show us, at a high level, where and how the downtown could grow over the next 20 years.”
Mobility Hubs are the areas around the city’s three GO stations—Aldershot, Appleby and Burlington—and the downtown that have been identified as opportunities for new growth and development over the next 20 years and beyond.
The city is developing area-specific plans for all four of its Mobility Hubs, which will eventually be part of the city’s new Official Plan.
Someone within city hall has to be given credit for the lengths they are going to to get public input – five different meetings is a record – it is usually one meeting downtown – another north of the QEW somewhere and that’s it. Kudos belong on someone’s desk. It would have been more inclusive if some of the meetings had been held out of the downtown core.
In Halton Region, it is anticipated the population will grow from 530,000 to one million people by 2041. The Province of Ontario’s provincial growth plan, Places to Grow, mandates that the City of Burlington plan for a population of 193,000 by 2031.
Related articles:
Part 1 – Mobility hubs – what are they and why are we doing this?
Part 2 – Closer look at the mobility hub vision
 By Staff
June 15th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
The Ontario Legislature has adjourned until September 11, 2017.
Burlington MPP Eleanor McMahon set out what the government has done and the direction they expect to go during the balance of their term.
 McMahon talking to seniors during her annual Tea. McMahon is the Minister of Tourism Culture and Sport and a member of the Treasury Board – she is part of that group that determines policy and the direction the government wants to go in – they measure the risks that are both financial and political.
Governments do what they believe is best for the public that elected and what they feel they have to do to stay in power – it is always a very delicate balance.
In her report to Burlington citizens McMahon said:
 McMahon at a community event just after the August 2014 flood. she was instrumental in getting provincial funds into the hands of those whose homes were seriously flooded. Ontario is creating opportunity and security for the people of Burlington and across the province through a series of comprehensive measures introduced during the spring legislative sitting. These measures support good jobs, fair workplaces and better wages, prepare our workforce for the new innovation economy and make life more affordable for workers, students, seniors and families.
Ontario’s economy is in a relatively strong position. However, many people are not feeling that growth in their everyday lives. To help more Burlington residents get ahead and stay ahead in a changing economy, the government has announced actions that will make a positive difference in people’s lives. These are possible because Ontario has balanced the budget. These actions include:
• Raising the minimum wage and creating more security for employees through landmark changes to employment and labour laws
• Making prescription medications free for everyone 24 years of age and younger through OHIP+: Children and Youth Pharmacare — the biggest expansion of universal Medicare in Ontario in a generation
• Launching a pilot project to assess whether a basic income can better support workers and improve health and education outcomes for people on low incomes
• Making it more affordable to buy or rent a home, expanding rent control and bringing stability to the real estate market through Ontario’s Fair Housing Plan
• Lowering electricity bills by 25 per cent, on average, for all residential customers and as many as half a million small businesses and farms
• Providing access to affordable, quality licensed child care for 100,000 more children, including 24,000 in 2017–18
• Making it easier for Ontario businesses to grow and create more jobs by cutting red tape and reducing regulatory burdens
• Creating tomorrow’s jobs today, and attracting talent and investment by funding transformative technologies such as artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles and 5G (fifth-generation) wireless networks
• Continuing to stand up for Ontario workers and businesses by actively defending the province’s trade and investment interests with U.S. legislators and businesses.
 Burlington MPP Eleanor|McMahon with a constituent. “Actions introduced this legislative sitting are part of our plan to create jobs, grow our economy and help people in their everyday lives” said McMahon
The province goes to the polls on June 7th, 2018 when the government will have to defend this record which includes selling off a significant part of Hydro One and cutting hydro rates by 25% knowing that those rates are going to have to rise – but not until after the provincial election.
The provincial government finally eliminated its deficit, but its debt is rising to new heights.
 The 2008 recession forced the province to borrow – that borrowing has slowed down – but they are now selling off highly valued assets – Hydro One – to raise funds. The deficit is the financial shortfall during any one fiscal year – we spent more money on providing services and paying interest on the debt than was brought in as tax revenue
The debt is the money we borrowed when there was a deficit and we didn’t have the money to pay our bills.
One of the things Ontario did was sell a portion of Hydro One to the public. That raised a tonne of money which the province is using to pay for large infrastructure projects that we would normally have had to borrow money to pay for,
The province’s first balanced budget in a decade gets rid of a deficit that had at one point reached about $20 billion, and the government is projecting that balance will continue through to 2020.
The debt, however, is another matter. It is projected to be $312 billion this year, or roughly $22,000 for every Ontarian. It is projected to grow to $336 billion in 2019-2020.
The province’s net debt has tripled since the provincial Liberals came to power. In the last budget presented by Ontario’s Progressive Conservatives before the 2003 election, the debt was about $110 billion.
The overall size of the budget, meanwhile, has roughly doubled – from $71 billion in 2003 to $141 billion this year – the government is spending more money which is fine just as long as tax revenue covers all the spending – and that the tax rate is something the voters will live with.
Interest on debt is the fourth largest spending area, at $11.6 billion. It is also projected to be the fastest-growing spending area, at an average 3.6 per cent a year from 2015 to 2020, compared to an annual 3.3-per-cent increase in health and 2.8 per cent in education.
Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown maintains : “There is no plan in the Liberal budget to get the debt under control.”
 Progressive Conservative Leader Patrick Brown maintains : “There is no plan in the Liberal budget to get the debt under control.” “We are spending more servicing the debt each year than we’re spending on all transit and provincial highways, more than we’re spending on the Ministry of Children and Youth Services…more than on care for seniors, more than investments in our post-secondary education, more than supporting northern communities,” he said.
Ontario Finance Minister Charles Sousa said debt is in fact being managed. “A first step to managing debt is coming to balance,” he said.
 We have gotten into a borrowing habit – is this the way to run an economy? There are different views and different political philosophies. It is complex – but we are paying the interest on this debt. “The debt-to-GDP ratio is improving”, Sousa said, “and the percentage of the budget that goes toward servicing the debt is considerably smaller than it has been in years.
“We’ve locked in those rates over long periods of time to minimize volatility and risk,” he said.
 The choices if you don’t like the Liberal government: NDP leader Andrea Horvath and Progressive Conservative leader of the opposition Patrick Brown. The net-debt-to-GDP ratio is down to about 37.5 per cent from a high of roughly 40 per cent in recent years, but the government hopes to wrestle it down to pre-recession levels of 27 per cent by 2029-30. In the interim, the government has set a target of reducing that number to 35 per cent by 2023-24.
That’s the big picture – you get to decide if you can continue to live with it or if you want to get somebody else in the legislature and see if they can do a better job. They do work for you – never let them forget that.
 By Staff
June 15th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Due to road closures, there will be temporary detours in place as follows:
Routes 3 and 5 from Friday, June 16 – Sunday, June 18:
 Some of the buses will not be on the streets they are normally running on. Beginning Friday, June 16 at 3 p.m. through to Sunday, June 18, 2017, Brant Street will be closed from Lakeshore Road to Caroline Street.
Routes 3 and 5 will use John Street up to Caroline Street. For service, please move to stops north of Caroline or to the downtown Transit Terminal (430 John St.).
Routes 4 and 10 on Saturday, June 17:
For the Sound of Music Parade on Saturday, June 17, portions of Drury Lane and James Street will be closed between 10:30 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. resulting in detours to Routes 4 and 10 during this time.
For service to Route 4, please move to New Street or north of Woodward Avenue on Drury Lane. Route 10 passengers can still board their buses at the downtown Transit Terminal (430 John St.).
 By Staff
June 15th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
This should be interesting.
Tom Muir and Greg Woodruff, both Aldershot residents want to publicly debate Rick Craven the city Councillor for Ward 1.
Muir has been a thorn in Craven’s side since he first got elected to office. Woodruff, who ran for the office of Regional Chair in 2010, is no less determined than Muir to make his point – just not as prolific.
There is a potential development on Plains Road on the property that currently is home to a bingo hall and a Home hardware.
 Location of the property on Plains Road that a developer has expressed an interest in developing. A developer, National Homes, hasn’t filed anything with the city – so it is just talk at this point but then that is the way things work in some wards.
A developer will get cozy with the ward Councillor and learn as much as he can from the politician. Developers don’t want to go to the Planning department without some assurance that they are going to get more than a fair hearing.
When the developer has done as much as they can to create the conditions they need – they then make a formal application and the development is now in the hands of the professional planners employed by the city.
The Planning department follows all the procedures and the protocols that are in place and in the fullness of time they prepare a report on the merits of a development project that goes to city council where it is debated.
 Ward 1 Councillor Rick Craven is proud of the improvements that have been made along Plains Road – some of his residents don’t share his views. Councillor Craven made mention of the development in the Newsletter he publishes and sends out to anyone who asks to have their name on the newsletter list. That’s where Muir and Woodruff became aware of the development – and they swung into gear.
When Muir first got wind of the developers thinking he sent the following to Councillor Craven:
Rick,
This notice of intended redevelopment of this large plaza personifies the issues that people have about what’s happening in Aldershot, and has been happening for some time now.
The wholesale replacement of commercial with what is basically residential, with token retail, makes a mockery of the mixed use, work, shop, play, walk, enjoy, idea.
 Councillor Craven refers to the Plains Road Village Vision and believes it has resulted in a different and better community- he has a number of constituents who don’ share his vision. But nobody at City Hall, including you, seems to listen and all we hear are excuses – like we need to get rid of all the commercial we have, to get more population, so we can somehow get commercial back at some time in the future. This is a joke?
This will never happen, as there will be no place to build meaningful commercial. You heard all the people comments the other night telling you this. What response we got from you guys was; well this plan goes to 2040, so wait and see.
My wife and I have frequented the Home Hardware, Dollar Store (previously Shoppers), the restaurants there, for a long time, and years ago what was a grocery store where the Bingo is. This plaza is one of the few places we find things we need and will walk to. We were very happy to have Home Hardware down here. We can’t walk to the Home Hardware in Waterdown.
All that is in your description of intentions for this site is tear down residential – town homes and mid-rise condos, and of course the token retail. There seems to be nothing anything like the present commercial in this intention statement.
You will recall we had a Canadian Tire, which suffered the same fate. The token retail there is significantly empty and does not offer a lot to replace what was there in services. We can’t walk to Burlington Mall or to Clappisons Corner.
I need to remind you about the Drewloe development replacing the large commercial – grocery store, department store, bank, liquor store, small retail – and the controversy of the bylaw change escaping attention still irks people. No place to walk to the replaces this commercial.
The retail there still has a lot of empty. The Busy Bee from the Bell Motel, Foo Ho, parcel tear down moved in but there was already one across the street next to Hauser/Tim Horton.
The 24 hour fitness gym that moved in is across the street from The Fitness Firm, where you go. That building is also in waiting for a tear down.
I can see from the planning meeting the other night that this is just going to accelerate, sweeping everything away, and there will be no large enough parcels left to build anything commercially significant to replace what we lose. And given the spectacular rise in home prices, this residential conversion is developer irresistible, and I don’t see much resistance from city planning or you.
This is exactly what is terribly wrong with what is being done. The walk, transit, bike plan accompanying this is a farce and doesn’t fit with the reality, which like was also said the other night, it’s all going to be about cars and no place to park
 Plains Road – no longer just the highway to Hamilton but now a Main Street in a part of the city with an identity of its own The south side of Plains Rd meeting completely ignored a mention of the meeting on the same subject a couple of years ago You will recall my complaint then about rampant speculation going on then, that wasn’t even mentioned to the public when they were asked what they wanted, but all I got was a brush off.
At the recent meeting, the planning manager in attendance didn’t seem to know what was going on in this respect of land assembly. Does she really not know what’s going on?
And there was no mention at all of what people had said they wanted, and issues raised, at the meeting 2 years ago. What a waste of their time and my time.
I won’t go on further, as I find it very disturbing, and I’m starting to wonder more and more why I bother because I don’t see from my engagement over many years that city hall gives it attention in a respectful manner. I have been at several meetings where the staff in attendance look, first bored, then frustrated with questions and points, and then annoyed.
I really can’t blame them the way the reality is and it’s their job.
I can agree with more residential development, where it fits (three ten story building on Solid Gold does not fit with neighborhood right to the North), but the speculation and wholesale conversion and tear down of commercial to further this is too much.
Greg Woodruff adds to the discussion with:
I agree with this all.
Staff policies are de-commercializing Aldershot. Staff don’t care or want commercially viable stores, because the parking and space requirements of real commercial means less people on a lot.
Greg Woodruff They have turned the place where we live into a math problem and the only problem is the human bugs that don’t quite act as they want.
From 5 years ago Aldershot has:
1) Less trees than ever
2) Less stores than ever
3) More traffic congestion than ever
If you think applying the same policies for the next 5 years reverses this I’d say you lack the ability to perceive reality.
Yes eventually you will get a handful more bikers and walkers, but this will be offset 25 to 1 with people who now have to drive for the basic commodities of living
Reversing this is easy: Put in the official plan the ground floor of any building must be all commercial, commercially vented, transport truck access and 1 square foot of parking for every 1 square foot of retail space.
Yes 10% or 15% less people will live in that building, but something will be around them.
If you think density alone makes a great place there are several shanty slums around the world with great densities you can move to.
Craven responds with:
Greg and Tom,
Thank you for your input.
 Ward 1 Councillor Rick Craven digging out a business card for provincial Liberal leadership hopeful Sandra Pupatello. Craven at the time was considering a run for the provincial seat. I will not engage in an online debate with you since both of you seem to have more time than I do – and since the City has not received a formal redevelopment application yet.
Having said that – you should know that I personally met with the owner of the hardware store yesterday to discuss his situation. We all want to keep the hardware store if possible.
Otherwise, I find both your comments to be overly negative and lacking in long term perspective and vision.
Thanks again for writing.
Muir isn’t prepared to let the member of council for the ward off quite that easily – replies with: (Muir tends to write long – brevity is not his strength).
We all have the same 24 hour days and 7 day weeks.
I have so much experience dealing with this stuff I was able to write what I did in 20 minutes. Greg likely wrote his piece in 10 minutes, as he has been telling you this for years, as have I. I have large file folders with many such attempts to be heard.
 Tom Muir The city, Mayor, Planning, and you are always soliciting comments and engagement in all kinds of things, and that takes time, lots of it and more, but you complain if we take the time to respond, because you say you don’t have time?
So like I said, respectful listening and attention is not something I expect to receive from you, so thanks for proving my point.
Since you are not on for an on-line debate – frankly, I’m not either, as what we are telling you, and much more, is factual, and is beyond debate – I suggest we all get together, especially to debate your personal long term perspective and vision. I would like to do a reality check of your assumptions.
I hear vagaries about it at every meeting, as you tell us what you say is going to be done regardless of what we think, but these don’t provide an opportunity to have debate and discussion between us all. As I recall from many meetings, you don’t have many people who aren’t concerned about the same things, have similar views, and they express them.
So how about a real debate on this?
Anyways, regarding long term perspective, and vision – this is philosophy of science. The long term perspective, or future, is what the present becomes as we make our decisions and actions real concrete step by step.
Using our capacity for conscious foresight, our ability to logically simulate the future in imagination, is what we are using to tell you what we think is happening in concrete terms, and where it will logically lead.
We don’t lack a long term perspective, we have a very well founded one, based on fact based reasoning, logical outcomes, and where this leads to. Where is your reasoned argument?
You say we are overly negative, but we are telling you facts about reality, proposed changes, and how they are being lined up, and what they lead to.
This leads to something negative in our minds, different from what you say, and not a future we want.
But when we look for you to show the same kind of thinking, you don’t get past the more people part, forget the past consequences as concrete examples of our concerns, like what Greg and I wrote about, and you just tell us it will all work out, so don’t worry, be happy.
The staff do the same thing – they say; remember the plan goes to 2031 or 2040, so who knows how things will happen, they say. No comfort at all.
 It’s a 25 year plan that sets out the strategy for our growth. To get to 2040 we have to move through all the years between here and there, where you say the good things we already have, that we are going to lose along the way, will somehow mysteriously re-materialize, in ways you have no explanation for.
Well, we know that if you do certain things, other things will logically follow. We can see that it happened in the recent past, and the same mechanisms are still in action and will lead to more of the same. Greg said, and I agree, that If you think applying the same policies for the next 5 years reverses the negative trends he cites, I’d say you lack the ability to perceive reality.
Greg suggests several constructive and practical things, including requiring fully functional commercial on the first floor of every new building, as he describes, and has provided more details on elsewhere. This is not about opposing development, but making it work for all functions, and for all people, not just the landowner and developer.
If we really are, as staff emphasized, in a paradigm shift, then let’s internalize and generalize it all across the plan. Not just density of people, on every parcel, but accompanying density of uses and functions.
Not just more people, more density, less meaningful commercial and retail, less trees and green – try for that on the south side of Plains when condos in the pipeline and more want to sprout – and more traffic congestion, because more people density means more car density, and the walk-able necessary commercial spaces, frequented often, are gone.
It’s elementary. So how about a real debate on these things, face to face? The meetings we have are not enough.
Where will all this go?
Nowhere but Craven must have begun to realize that these two are not going to let this issue die a quiet death.
Stand by.
 By Staff
June 14th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
The Halton Regional Police reported that on May 2/3rd, several unlocked vehicles were entered in the Seneca Avenue area of Burlington.
At one residence, the suspects stole credit and debit cards out of a vehicle which were later used fraudulently in the City of Hamilton. Police are seeking the public’s assistance locating the first male and identifying the second suspect. A warrant exists for the first suspect who was identified as, Richard SHIELDS (57) of Hamilton.
A second suspect has yet to be identified. The same two suspects are responsible for further car entries in Burlington on May 18th.
Anyone who knows the whereabouts of or can identify the suspects is asked to contact D/Cst Dave Macedo or Det Ellie Bale of the Burlington Criminal Investigations Bureau – Residential Property Crime Team @ 905-825-4747 ext 2312 or 2316. Tips can also be submitted to Crime Stoppers “See something, Hear something, Say something” at 1-800-222-8477 (TIPS), through the web at www.haltoncrimestoppers.ca, or by texting “Tip201” with your message to 274637 (crimes).
Then there was an ooops from the Regional police – Shields was not there man – they released the following:
After further investigation and with public assistance, police have determined SHIELDS is not one of the persons involved and as such is not a suspect in these occurrences and a warrant for his arrest no longer exists.
 Suspect 1  Suspect 2 Police are seeking the assistance of the public to help identify the two suspects captured on video.
By Staff
June 14th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Every once in a while a local governing authority does something that is just plain welcome.
 Thousands of people have driven up into escarpment country to enjoy a walk along a part of the Bruce Trail or spend some time on Mt Nemo – but there isn’t any place to park other than the side of the road.
So they park on the side of the road and the parking police drive by and issue parking tickets. That has changed there is now a parking lot.
 The lot will accommodate about 25 cars. It is located at the corner of Walkers Line and #2 Side road and is part of Mt Nemo Conservation Area.
The lot will accommodate approximately 25 cars. There will be parking fees.
These fees will be consistent with the rest of the parks at $6.75/adult and $5/child.
The road realignment and parking lot construction is to be completed by the end of July.
The parking lot is currently open on weekends. Fees will not be required until later this year or early 2018.
 By Staff
June 14th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
There are enough clues in this Identity Theft scam to see it for just what it is – a way for the sender to determine that you are gullible and begin gathering information about you.
Vigilant, vigilant, vigilant – check what lands in your mail box. Sort o like crossing a street – look both ways and then begin crossing.
Count the number of errors, clues and red flags in this one:
 By Pepper Parr
June 14th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
The planners have been working on what to do and figuring out what can be done with the Waterfront Hotel site at the foot of Brant Street.
The owner of the property wants to get more density and the city is listening to what the public thinks and feels.
There has been the one public session in May with another scheduled for early July.
 It was a Standing Room only for those who attended the first public meting on what might be done with the site the Waterfront hotel sits on now. More than 200 people participated in two workshops in May to share their thoughts and ideas about what should be located on this property as the property owner considers redeveloping the site.
In his report to the citizens of the city the Mayor recently said: “As I have shared previously, I am very concerned about the impact any redevelopment in this area could have on our waterfront. I believe open space in any redevelopment option needs to be considered to ensure Burlington residents continue to enjoy access to the waterfront.
There will be more opportunities to share your feedback about the waterfront site as we move into the summer.
 Those numbers are the height of the buildings – can you see where this is going? In one of the illustrations used in May event the issue is made bluntly clear – it is about height – who has it – where it is and where it isn’t. No rocket science to figure out what is coming our way.
What kind of height are we talking about? Nothing specific at this point but the city’s Urban Design Guidelines give a hint.
Three illustrations – a map showing which part of the cit we are talking about and then a series of illustrations showing what the planners call the “building envelope” for specific sites.
 This illustration identifieds where the specific block o property is located and what the Urban Guidelines will permit. No reference to height – that gets negotiated.
 We know what is being built on the left hand side of each of these four illustrations – the Bridgewater project – it is what can be done on the right hand side. Look very closely at figures 81,82 and 83 With 2018 an election year for city council the Mayor just might be looking at this redevelopment situation as the kind of campaign issue he can focus on as he looks for a third mandate – assuming he actually wants to go through the current term again.
Other than saying he is concerned – the Mayor hasn’t been very specific.
There are others who are very specific with their views. One downtown resident had these comments about the May event.
It was a typical public information/workshop meeting.
It is the way that the City “placates” the public.
1. Present as little concrete info’ as possible
2. Ask for input from the public
3. The public feels better because they’ve had their opportunity to vent and participate (this is a very real need for the public….everyone needs the opportunity to express an opinion)
It is a political process at best. Maybe a few good ideas come out of it…….
I find Marianne’s continued efforts to push her personal agenda annoying. She claims to be a “listener” but first she tells people what to think and say.
The presenters created a little confusion and didn’t set it up well. I didn’t think she was “smooth”. I thought she was confusing and used too many “buzz” words from the planning world.
And Rick’s previous public comments about green space/parkland didn’t make sense in the context of a private land owner.
It’s first steps towards an application and the politicians will feel good because they’ve gone through the process.
The public will feel somewhat empowered by the process. At the end of the day, not sure it helps create a quality exalted project or in fact the end product is simply the lowest common denominator. I’d love to see an iconic, beautiful, piece of architecture on that site with graceful lines and lovely public spaces. Something we could all say WOW – look what our city has done.
 The space between the condominium on the left and the hotel on the right is not as large as this rendering suggests. The space to the left of the high rise condominium as in the imagination of the artist. A beautiful point tower of 30 storeys was designed originally for the Bridgewater site. It took up less than half the site and was stunning. It had all sorts of “air” around it. Funny, 30 storeys doesn’t seem so high now. But twenty years ago, no one could conceive of it. The compromise became what we see today being built – 3 block buildings (with a tower in one of them) virtually covering the whole site (except for a piazza on the lake side, not visible from the street), 8 storeys + 22 storeys creating a “wall” on Lakeshore Road, with a little “peek a boo” between the two buildings. Mark my words….it’s going to be ugly from the Lakeshore Road side.
We need to be more “forward” thinking. What will our city look like in twenty years?
This was more than a rant from a disgruntled resident – this one is in the thick of development in the city – our Mayor needs to hear from these people – but in Burlington we are far too polite to say what we think and feel.
Wait until the public sees just how little of the lake that will be visible when the Bridgewater site is completed. It will be “we was robbed” and of course far too late.
On July 5, residents have a chance to take part in a design day where participants will be divided into small working groups to explore options for things like buildings, land use, public access and open space.
Two sessions will be held at the Waterfront Hotel in the Blue Water Ballroom. The first session starts at 1 p.m. and the second session will be held at 6 p.m.
 By Staff
June 12th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
It was billed as an opportunity for Canadians to re-affirm their oath of allegiance to the Crown while new Canadians were being made citizens.
 It wasn’t a huge crowd – the numbers were a refection of changing times. We had no idea what the turnout would be like.
Hundreds – thousands? It was closer to the latter.
 Burlington’s newest citizens – youngest was 11 the oldest 97  The Oath Within the group of people who were given certificates of citizenship the youngest recipient was 11 years old and the, most senior was 97.
There was a time in this city when most of the population would have attended an opportunity to reaffirm their oath to King and Country – time have changed.
By Pepper Parr
June 12, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Last week Burlington MPP Eleanor held her now annual Tea for the city’s seniors. The day happened to also be close to her first anniversary as a Member of the Wynne Cabinet and a member of the Treasury Board.
We wanted to hear what McMahon had to say about the move from being a back bencher to becoming a member of Cabinet and then appointed to Treasury Board – which is the group that looks at where the money is going to come from and how it is going to be spent.
 McMahon with Bill Reid Sr of the year 2016 McMahon explained that as a member of Treasury Board she is in a position where she is at times on one side the Treasury Board table asking questions and on other occasions on the opposite side answering questions. She has to explain and justify the plans her Ministry has and get them past the Treasury Board – and that isn’t always easy.
McMahon is the Minister of Culture, Tourism and Sports for the province. At the federal level each of those three is a separate department.
She has a Deputy Minister that reports to her and three Assistant Deputy Ministers that report to her deputy – the job is as close as one is going to get to heading up three ministries. And these aren’t little ministries. McMahon will tell you that culture contributes as much to the provincial gross domestic product as construction – which was a bit of a surprise to this reporter.
 The Art Gallery of Burlington for funding for a van that lets them take art out into the community. Culture is a big deal that pulls the Minister into the soon to begin renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) – content and intellectual property are now big drivers of an economy. And keeping an economy healthy is the biggest part of the job for every Cabinet member.
McMahon will let you know every chance she gets that Ontario is going to have a balanced budget. While relatively new to provincial politics – her 2014 election win was her first venture as a politician. She was personally recruited by Premier Kathleen Wynne; the fluently bilingual Minister has worked in the private sector with Petro Canada, the Ontario Medical Association, the Chamber of Commerce and the United Way.
It was her United Way experience and contacts that made it possible for her to pick up the phone and convince them to let the 2014 flood relief program to use their web site platform to begin collecting donations.
When McMahon first stepped into the provincial legislature we asked her: “What’s it like?” How did you feel when you first walked in the Legislature and took your seat”?
“There are 13 million people in Ontario” explained McMahon. “And just 107 in the Legislature – that fact just overwhelmed me. I am one of those 107 and the 13 million expect me to make good decisions for them.”
While it seems like a long time ago – the 2014 flood was a baptism by fire for McMahon. She had to convince the province to get on board with a matching dollar program and that was not a simple task. The province initially said no – which had McMahon working the telephones to get that decision changed.
The city raised $905,000 which the province matched on a 2 for 1 basis creating a fund of $2,715,000 that was distributed to people whose homes had been flooded.
 Seniors get top billing with McMahon. It isn’t all drudgery and work – McMahon stood up in the legislature recently and said the province needed to have some fun – the rubber duck was coming to Ontario.
A lot of her colleagues on the opposition side of the legislature hammered her for spending tax dollars foolishly – McMahon explained that the rubber duck was going to visit communities that asked to be destinations. “They got it” said McMahon who added that thousands of people will show up to do selfies with the 161 foot tall rubber duck.
The Ontario 150 Tour in celebration of Canada’s 150th anniversary features a summer of entertainment in waterfront cities and towns. It launches on Canada Day weekend in Toronto and then travels to Owen Sound, Sault Ste. Marie, Midland, Amherstburg and finishes in Brockville on August 13th.
McMahon couldn’t say if the duck was coming to Burlington – each destination works out its own arrangement with the festival organizers.
What a draw that duck would be as it slid by the Pier and moved on into Hamilton harbour.
That wasn’t something the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Sport was going to get into. She is now in early election mode – pounding the pavement with the provincial Liberal organization getting the word out on the job she has been doing.
 McMahon moved her office out of a dreary high rise and into a new building with much better exposure. As she works the election trail there will be some explaining to do – the sale of part of Hydro One has a lot of people upset – they don’t think Crown Jewels should be sold.
The huge sums of money being put into infrastructure are a plus and the eventual electrification of the GO train service along with 15 minute service are welcome.
A government heading into its 15th year of leading the province raises some eyebrows. McMahon sees it all a little differently – she saw her win in 2014 as putting a Liberal in the Legislature to represent Burlington for the first time in 70 years.
By Staff
June 11th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
At 4:00am this morning the Halton Regional Police Service and Burlington Fire Department responded to a fire in Lansdown Park at 3448 Hannibal Road in Burlington.
 The first responders found the playground structure fully engulfed in flames. The fire was quickly brought under control and extinguished. The playground structure sustained significant damage.
Investigators are think this fire might be related to two similar incidents that have occurred within the last week in Burlington.
On Saturday June 10th 2017 at 3:00 am, a fire was reported at the playground outside St Anne Elementary School at 4675 Doug Wright Drive. That fire, too, resulted in significant damage to the children’s playground structure.
Prior to that, on Saturday June 3rd there was a fire at Emerson Park – 2390 Sutton Drive in Burlington. A smouldering fire causing heavy smoke inside a children’s play tube that was extinguished before more extensive damage could be caused.
These fires are being treated as arson.
Anyone with information pertaining to these fires is asked to contact the Burlington Criminal Investigations Bureau at 905-825 4747 ext. 2316, or Crime Stoppers (See Something, Hear Something, Say Something) at 1-800-222-8477 (TIPS), or through the web at www.haltoncrimestoppers.ca or by texting “Tip201″with your message to 274637 (crimes).
 By Pepper Parr
June 11, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
It was billed as her annual BBQ – which she called a Chat and Chew – held at the Lions Park in the downtown core where most of her strength exists.
Held on a Friday evening – seemed like a good time. The weather was as good as it gets.
 Figuring it out. It was a large site and there was plenty for the kids to do including a pony ride.
There were information booths galore.
There was free food courtesy of Turtle Jacks.
There were pieces from what we call the Gazebo willows available for those who wanted a keepsake.
There was a fire truck and a police car.
But there was no buzz – no sense that anyone was having fun.
It was certainly a political event – that’s what these things are and held where her political strength exists but ward 2 city Councillor the Marianne Meed Ward’s event seemed to be missing something.
 There were information booths galore – just didn’t seem to be a lot of people walking around. The Gazette didn’t make use of the event to engage the Councillor in conversation – we were there to observe.
Was there any political fallout from the school closure decision the Halton Board of Education made to close two high schools earlier in the week?
 Ward 2 city Councillor Marianne Meed Ward at her Chat and Chew community event. Meed Ward will get credit for ensuring that the high school in her ward didn’t get the chop; she is also getting some blowback for what some described as a conflict of interest in serving on the Program Accommodation Review Committee (PARC ) that was involved in whittling a 40+ school closing recommendation down to five – one of which was Central high school.
When the Director of Education submitted his original school closing recommendation his top choice of the 19 options he and his staff came up with had the closing of Lester B. Pearson and Central high school at the top of the list.
 Terry Ruff former Central high school principal speaks to the first meeting of parents telling them how he two previous attempts to close the school failed. That announcement mobilized the Central parents who left no stone unturned in their drive to get their school off that list.
Once the Director’s recommendations were public the PARC was formed and Central high school chose Meed Ward to represent them. There were howls of protest about a conflict of interst. Meed Ward had a son at the school and she was asked to take on the task.
She brought formidable political skills to the work she did.
The Gazette attended every meeting of the PARC and found Meed Ward to be much less effective at the PARC than she was at city Council meetings.
There were times at city council when Meed Ward was close to brazen, which we see as a plus. She was focused and direct and asked more questions than any other three members of city council.
The rest of council often roll their eyeballs when she asked for yet another recorded vote.
We didn’t see the same kind of energy during the PARC meetings.
 Marianne Meed Ward at one of the seven PARC meetings. The Director of Education, Stuart Miller did change his recommendation from closing Central high school and Pearson high school to closing Bateman high school and Pearson.
Many howled at that change and argued that it was influence from Meed Ward, a member of city council and the Burlington MPP Eleanor McMahon that swayed Miller.
Stuart Miller changed his mind when he saw all the evidence that was collected and put forward by the Central high school parents. Meed Ward didn’t have any undue influence – she was part of a team with formidable skills that they put to excellent use.
They were creating teams and assigning tasks days after the school closing announcement was made. The held a silent auction fund raiser and pulled in $14,000 which allowed them to print up signs that were on almost every lawn in the ward.
They demonstrated and they did their homework. They figured out that it was going to cost $400,000 every year for the foreseeable future to transport the Central high school students to either Aldershot high school or Nelson high school.
$400,000 a year – every year was a stunning number – that was only going to go higher as transportation costs rose.
 The distance Central high school students would have to travel if Central was closed and they were transferred to either Nelson or Aldershot high schools is 6.4 km; the distance between Bateman and Nelson high schools is 1.9 km. The disruption to student extra-curricular life for the students would be immense.
If Central high school was closed their students would have had a 6.4 km trip to either Aldershot high school or Nelson high school. If either Bateman or Nelson were closed those students would have a 1.9 km trip – many would be able to walk to school.
The map and the rationale Central parents provided was one of the most compelling arguments for not closing that high school. The Burlington Downtown Business association put forward a strong argument for keeping the high school open as well.
Most of the points the Central parents made seemed rather obvious when they were looked at closely and on wonders why the Board of Education staff didn’t see what the Central parents discovered.
The Central parents challenged almost every decision the Board staff had made; they missed nothing,
The decision to close Bateman instead of central was made. Central is really in very rough shape physically – mostly as the result of neglect, is going to need a lot of money to be brought up to an acceptable standard. It has an acceptable bit of charm and a lot of history going for it but when compared to what Hayden has got – Central pales in comparison. It is what the Central parents are prepared to accept or have accepted in the past.
Meed Ward with Mayor Goldring: she is more comfortable with herself as a speaker and she wants his job  There just didn’t seem to be a lot of people. Meed Ward has an almost tribal relationship with her constituents – they don’t all think she walks on water but they see her as the member of council that works hard for them and has a vision for the city that other members of council don’t have – including the Mayor who Meed Ward has always wanted to replace.
When she was running for the city council seat in 2009 she wanted the job of Mayor when Can Jackson had it.
For reasons that are not all that clear she chose not to run against Goldring in 2014.
There was a point at which there was little doubt that she was going to run against him in 2018; there now appears to be some doubt.
Were she to remain a city Councillor she would win the ward hands down in 2018 – is the rest of the city ready for her as Mayor?
There are hundreds of them in ward 5 that will campaign actively against her – with a little help from the sitting council member Jack Dennison who is giving every indication that he will run again in his ward, Meed Ward may not be able to pull off a majority of the vote in that ward.
Is the dis-satisfaction from some over the role she played on the PARC going to hurt her longer term political aspirations?
They well might.
 By Staff
June 10th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Parents with an interest in what has happened to the two high schools that are going to be closed by the Halton District school Board are beginning to voice their concerns.
 Rory Nisan, on the left, a Lester B. Pearson alumni who credits the small enrollment school with much of his career success. Rory Nisan, a Lester B. Pearson alumni, takes issue with the explanation Burlington Ward 3 and 6 trustee Andrea Grebenc released yesterday.
“She is adamant about 1000 being the necessary number of students” said Nisan. “This is the crux of her argument for closing our school. However, are mega schools optimal, especially when they are way over designed capacity?
“Absolutely not. They are a far worse scenario than having all three schools at 800-plus students, which is easily achievable (we provided her with the data and a clear plan for this).
“Simply giving back the students that were taken away when Hayden opened would fix the problem. Her vote guarantees that MM and Hayden will be well over capacity for many years if not indefinitely.
“She knew this when she made her decision.”
Nissan adds that Grebenc says there “seemed to be more course conflicts than students”. These are empty words. They don’t take into account that the student experience would have been greatly enhanced with 800 students, a number that is easily achieved by bringing Hayden’s capacity down to appropriate levels.
“She also knew this when she made her decision.”
“She notes” said Nisan that “all of the extracurriculars in which she participated as evidence of how much she loved Pearson. However, with MM and Hayden becoming two mega schools with over 1400 pupils each in 2021, students of those schools will have far fewer opportunities than she did.
“She knew this also.”
 Lester Pearson parents demonstrating at Upper Middle and Headon Nisan, using the material Grebenc provided said that “Again, 1000 students is the minimum, she says. But she voted in favour a dual campus solution for Bateman even though that school only has 747 students (2017).
“Why didn’t she support (or even show any consideration of) a dual campus for MM and Pearson? Why is she more innovative in thinking about Bateman than a school that so many of her constituents have a stake in?
“She knew this was a possibility, in addition to giving Pearson some of Hayden’s students, when she made her decision.”
The 1000 student target that Grebenc appears to see as close to optimum “is not supported by any data that came forth through the entire process. Pearson was never meant to have 1000 students. Several other schools in Burlington will continue to have significantly less than 1000 students after this process is complete. She never mentioned closing any of them” said Nisan.
“She knew this too.”
“She notes that there were 1000 students when she was there because she went through her yearbook and “counted every face”. She fails to mention that there was OAC (grade 13) when she was a student.
“I went through my yearbook (1998)” said Grebenc in her statement. “Pearson was a bustling school that year. The porto-pac was packed. Our sports teams were solid, and I don’t remember ever having a course conflict.”
 The high school will have emptied parents cast ballots in the October 2018 municipal election. Guess how many grade 9-12 students there were? asks Nisan: 686. Another 151 OAC grads rounded out the student body.
“She had these numbers at her fingertips when she made her decision.”
Trustee Grebenc’s short intervention used the word “I” 34 times.
Trustee Grebenc’s statement, filled with rhetoric and hyperbole, and devoid of any data or arguments that passes even superficial scrutiny, was a failure” said Nisan.
“Our students will have to pay the price.”
Related article:
Why Grebenc voted against keeping Lester B. Pearson high school open
By Ray Rivers
June 10th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Rivers and his wife are on a volunteer teaching course in Ukraine. As part of this trip he will be visiting a Canadian Armed Forces Base and reporting on part of Canada’s role in that part of the world.
He will return at the end of June and give Gazette readers his take on all the changes that are taking place in this country at both the federal and provincial levels.
It’s why treating your children to French Immersion will not make them bi-lingual. They need to sleep with the other language, as a former Canadian bi-lingual commissioner once mused. You need to be able to live it, to experience it. So that is what I’m doing over here in Ukraine – helping Ukrainian children to live extemporaneously in our culture. And I’m not alone. There are over 600 volunteer teachers from 140 countries, including a former Russian, all participating in an initiative called GoCamps.
When the Soviet Union collapsed, Ukraine declared its independence, along with all the other Soviet republics. But 70 years of communism had created a culture of passive dependency such that the new nation was reluctant to embrace the changes needed for it to become a fully independent state. That would require abandoning the Russian symbols of authority, its language and religion in particular.
From the Tzars to today’s Vlad Putin, Russia’s leaders have tried to eliminate the traditional language and culture in the lands they occupied. And Ukraine was no stranger to that policy. Ukrainian is a slavic language similar to Russian in that it is based on the almost cryptic Cyrillic alphabet, where the B is a V and the N is a P and the P is an R and the number 3 is a letter. It is very confusing and difficult for we English speakers, and I’m sure the opposite is true.
 Public art in the city of Cherkassy where Rivers is teaching Engish I’m teaching in the industrial city of Cherkasy, some 120 kms south of Kyiv on the expansive Dnieper River. Of the 300,000 people living here it is difficult to find anyone on the street who can speak more than a few words of English, which was likely learned from a TV show or western pop song. Most street signs and restaurant menus, though presumably once in Russian, are almost exclusively in Ukrainian script now, making getting around the city a challenge. Even getting a taxi is difficult since I’ve yet to find a dispatcher who understands either English or my feeble Ukrainian.
Despite that, I am impressed with the high level of English usage among the students at the school I’ve been attending, and their desire to better understand the language and culture that I bring with me. Ukraine’s goal is to eventually replace Russian with English as a second language. I have noticed, in the year since I was last here, how the government has removed Russian language timetables in railway stations – a step in that direction.
There is a segment of the population which would be just as happy to keep Russian but they are becoming a smaller proportion every year and with every new survey taken. It has taken Ukrainians a quarter century to finally decide that they would be better off with memberships in the EU and NATO, something that has held them back from joining previously. It is the youth, the new generation, who more than any others are now making that claim. And for those in doubt about the critical need to improve national security they only need consider what happened to Crimea.
Protection of the Russian language became the official raison d’être for the annexation of Crimea and the invasion of Dunbas, in south-eastern Ukraine. Yet despite an active war, ongoing in the east of the country, which has killed over 10,000 people, it was hard to sense animosity towards Moscow. In part that may be due to the long fraternal and historical association between the nations. It might also reflect embarrassment at having failed to defend themselves from the people they once believed were supposed to be their friends, even family.
 Ukraine is a politically sensitive part of the world. Russian navy ships moored in the bay of the Crimean city of Sevastopol, Ukraine. Assault teams in speedboats and helicopters have captured a Ukrainian ship in Crimea and moved it to Russian military port  Sevastopol is not that far away from where Rivers is teaching English to Ukrainians. There are five million ex-pat Ukrainians living in Russia and for those who can still recall living in the USSR, the border is an inconvenience. Despite the murderous aggression of Mr. Putin’s crowd, Ukraine still buys some goods from Russia, like uranium for its Soviet built nuclear power plants. And given the degree of Russian espionage and attempted sabotage in Ukraine it is bizarre that ordinary Russians still have visa-free access.
I met a young woman from Cherkasy who was completing her master’s degree at an oil and gas technical college in Moscow. For her the future was about working and living there, given the dim economic opportunities she sees in her home town at the moment. She was having to take the train back to Moscow since the airlines have mostly stopped flights there on account of the war.
For her it’s like that war is with somebody else as she continues business as usual in Russia, a nation where half the people consider Ukraine enemy number one and who are responsible for the death of thousands of Ukrainians. It is hard to fathom how her desire for a good education has overtaken what I’d consider her patriotism. It is odd that there seems to be no concern by her family or friends over her personal security in a Russia that regularly imprisons Ukrainian nationals for crimes called extremism, as it did recently with the chief librarian of the Ukraine Library in Moscow.
I met a family displaced by the conflict in Donetsk and forced to move personal and presumably business interests to the nation’s capital in Kyiv, leaving home and property behind. I would have expected outright anger and outrage, but none of that was apparent in our discussions. And even when the discussion came up there was a puzzling reluctance to blame the Russians.
 Political demonstrations are a lot more robust in Ukraine than anything we see in Canada Ukraine’s history as a nation predates much of Europe, and by centuries Russia, its ungrateful birth child. Its fertile productive valleys and plains have made it the object of conquest. Once a powerful monarchy Ukraine’s invasions, first by the Mongols, then by various other nations, including Austria, Germany, Turkey, Poland and Russia. And given its endowment, agriculture is still the life blood of the nation, generating the greatest export revenue.
Unlike Russia which is geographically more Asian, Ukraine has always been a European nation. And Ukrainians are slowly, too slowly for many now, coming to a consensus that their future, national security and pathway to prosperity, like that of neighbouring Poland, lies in the EU. And for that, in addition to retaining their own rich language and culture, they need to communicate and share the languages of with their new western partners and English above all.
…….to be continued.
 Ray Rivers writes weekly on both federal and provincial politics, applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was a candidate for provincial office in Burlington in 1995. He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject. Tweet @rayzrivers
Background links:
GoCamps – Russia and Ukraine – Russian Speakers – Ukrainian Language –
By Pepper Parr
June 10th, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
Burlington Ward 3 and 6 Halton District school Board trustee Andrea Grebenc released a statement on her Facebook page setting out why she voted the way she chose to vote at the Board of Education meeting on Wednesday when trustees decided to approve the recommendation to close two of Burlington’s seven high schools.
 Andrea Grebenc in conversation with Director of Education Stuart Miller “It has been a tough few months” she said “and I know many of you are upset with the outcome of the Program Accommodation Review (PAR). I wanted to let you know that I explored a number of options myself and I was willing to go down the road with respect to a dual campus/one school concept and getting community partners to help fill space in the school.
“I could see the Bateman campus as a truly vibrant community hub. I believe in community hubs and schools should be an integral part of them. I think in this day and age, few people even know their neighbours, therefore providing gathering spaces to provide a true sense of community is important.
“The special education students at Bateman would have had the opportunity to integrate even more with a broader community setting. The north has three community centres. South East Burlington has one community room along with scattered amenities (pools, ice rinks, stadium and park). I believe community hubs should be cradle-to-grave types of places with programming for pre-natal and pre-school, through school ages, youth, adult and seniors programming.
“I took information provided to me from your community and spoke directly with administrators at two dual campus schools in the west. Both schools had similarities and differences to the Nelson/Bateman situation. The administrators were frank about the experience. It wasn’t a perfect solution, it took extra work, but both schools were successful.
“Unfortunately, my colleagues could not see this happening. Community partners were not forthcoming which was the linchpin to make this work. They would take up the On the Ground capacity to make financial sense. I was hoping the city would have stepped up during the final weeks with some possibilities as they are a natural partner and have partnered with us in the past(Hayden/Haber/Alton Library and Kilbride/Public library and community room).
 Bateman high school parents demonstrate to save their high school – it wasn’t enough to change six minds. “When Trustee Collard’s substitute motion about exploring dual campuses failed, I had to support a closure. As I mentioned during statements later in the meeting with regards to Pearson, my research informed me that schools need 1000 students to provide students decent course choices and extracurricular experiences. Without putting Nelson into the same lower enrollment state, Bateman needed to close.
“I care about the students in special education placements residing at Bateman. I promise to hold the Director accountable in his statements that situation at Nelson will be better for those students than what they have now at Bateman and that special care is take with each student transition. It is my duty to make it so and my commitment to the community.”
Bateman high school is scheduled to close in September of 2020.
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