NIAGRA THIS WEEK (Ontario) 5/8/12 Much ado about toads. The
developers behind a condo project for Bay Beach may have cleared a major hurdle
in having a civil suit against it dismissed, but there’s still the issue of a
Ministry of Natural Resources permit for a plan to ensure the well being of the
at-risk Fowler’s Toad. Although a judge’s dismissal of a civil suit against the
Bay Beach condo was seen as one of the final hurdles hurdles for the project,
the lingering issue of the Fowler’s Toad has kept council from putting the
topic behind them, as evident by an hours long debate at Town Hall on Monday.
Since the toad is considered an at-risk species in Ontario, the condo
developers, the Molinaros, must obtain a permit from the Ministry of Natural
Resources (MNR) which guarantees an overall net benefit to the toads as a
result of the construction.
To accomplish an overall benefit to the toad while still building the
condo, a roped-off habitat for the toads will be built in the area.
A draft copy of the overall benefit conditions was submitted to council
for information purposes Monday, and Ward 5 Coun. Don Lubberts spoke at length
about how he believed it was going to cost the taxpayer money, and accused
staff of omitting his concerns from previous Bay Beach discussions in the
report.
“I don’t think that we should be putting this to the taxpayer, and
allowing the taxpayer to take the burden of paying for the toad habitat, the
maintenance and the repair of the toad habitat,” said Lubberts.
“We have given the Molinaro’s $2.7 million worth of property and we’ve
made an agreement that they are going to give us community benefits in return
for that, now we just gave them the rest of this property to use for free, and
now they come back, and staff comes back and asks council to approve to allow
the Molinaro’s and us to enter into a cost sharing agreement, but this isn’t
us, this is the taxpayer that has to pay this, they’ve paid enough, the
Molinaro’s have got a pretty good deal here,” he continued.
After Lubberts repeatedly asserted that costs for the toad habitat were
going to end up on the backs of taxpayers, even Ward 3 Coun. Bob Steckley began
to doubt himself.
“I was under impression they were costs to the Molinaro’s, but hearing
councillor Lubberts, he seems pretty convinced that’s not the case, perhaps you
could clear that up,” Steckley asked staff.
Richard Brady, the town’s director of community and development
services, explained the Molinaro’s are the ones holding and the permit and
would be responsible for the costs, but Lubberts remained unconvinced, and
discussion continued back and forth until acting CAO Ron Tripp stepped in to
try and put the matter to rest.
“With respect to cost I think councillor Lubberts has made the
assumption several times that anything in addition, specifically with the toad
habitat, is going to be to the taxpayers, and that is fundamentally incorrect,
or at least is not in line with the philosophy of all the other agreements, and
what the objective is of the maintenance cost sharing agreement,” said Tripp.
Satisfied with the explanation, Lubberts moved on to his second point of
contention with the report.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment
You only need to enter your comment once! Comments will appear once they have been moderated. This is so as to stop the would-be comedian who has been spamming the comments here with inane and often offensive remarks. You know who you are!