Fed-up grandmother to run for mayor of Essex

A Harrow grandmother says she’s fed up with all the political grandstanding that’s gone on over amalgamation in Essex.

“We have a dysfunctional council and it needs to be changed,” said Dunn, a frequent observer at council meetings the last few years. “I just got a big mad on.”

In the last election, candidates were misleading voters by suggesting amalgamation could be undone, said Dunn. “All of those men knew it would never happen.”

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Essex arena garners praise

"Things are getting better," said Mayor Ron McDermott. He donned a hardhat and heavy boots for the hour-long tour by Loaring Construction officials.

McDermott says he doesn't get any more angry calls and e-mails since the town, County of Essex and province all rejected de-amalgamation.

No doubt some critics will resurface in the 2010 municipal elections, says McDermott, who plans to run again as mayor.

And McDermott says there are still "diehards" in both ends of town not convinced the aging Memorial Arena nearby had to be replaced.

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10 years later, amalgamation's efficiency questioned

10 years later, amalgamation's efficiency questioned
By Doug Williamson, The Windsor Star
January 9, 2009

On Jan. 1, 1999, amalgamation transformed Essex County from 21 municipalities to seven, and like other communities, Harrow was swallowed up in the process.

Amalgamation was forced on Essex County and other areas by the former Mike Harris government in the name of efficiency.

The ultimate goal was to save money, but 10 years later the jury's still out on that and any other benefits.

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NDP hopeful courts de-amalgamation vote

NDP hopeful courts de-amalgamation vote
By Kevin Werner, Metroland West Media Group
News Jan 02, 2009

Provincial New Democratic leadership hopeful Michael Prue is cozying up to the area’s de-amalgamation activists. While the Progressive Conservatives and Liberals have washed their hands of de-amalgamating municipalities such as Hamilton and Kawartha Lakes, Prue is proposing his party support the Quebec model and allow referendums on whether to permit de-amalgamations to occur.

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Southern Essex separatists vow to keep fighting, Windsor Star

Southern Essex separatists vow to keep fighting
Gary Rennie, Windsor Star
Published: Friday, December 05, 2008

ESSEX - In yet another blow to the citizens' group that wants to divide the town, Ontario Municipal Affairs Minister Jim Watson is praising Essex council for focusing on unification.

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Essex De-Amalgamation Update, November 19th, 2007

Essex De-Amalgamation Update

In our continuing search for information that will help us win our de-amalgamation battle, we’ve recently uncovered some surprising, but infuriating, news.

The facts we’ve come across now lead us to realize that many of our Provincial Legislators (MPP’s), prior to any amalgamations, were aware of the disruptions and the confusion they were about to bring upon large numbers of municipalities and their citizens.

On December 19, 1996, Dalton McGuinty, then leader of the opposition, stated while in the legislature, “With each passing day, people are becoming more and more aware that your Mega-city madness is about three things: Mega-Taxes, Mega-Cuts to services and Mega-Dictatorship by the province.”

During the year between December 1996 and December 1997, on at least 22 separate occasions, Mr. McGuinty made similar public statements in the legislature, expressing his party’s strong opposition to municipal amalgamations. John Gerretsen made nearly as many public expressions of his opposition to municipal mergers. Today, they’re singing a different song.

Subsequently, The prestigious C.D. Howe Institute of Toronto, published the results of an extensive research project they had completed. The report was entitled….“Local Government Amalgamations – Discredited Nineteenth-Century Ideals Alive in the Twenty-First.” The main thrust of their research concluded that, “Smaller, more flexible local governments are much better able to provide services and governance, at less cost, than monolithic amalgamations.”

If you want something that complicates a belief in God, try coming to terms with a legislature packed with individuals claiming to be among God’s special creatures..??

These lawmakers were aware that the actions they were taking would quite likely bring about chaos, confusion and municipal disarray.

We should all be very, very angry…!! Furious..!! Mad-as-hell.

Bruce Macdonald
South Colchester – Harrow Action Committee

-Letter to the editor, November 19, 2007

Premier looking to buy our vote on election day, September 16th, 2007

Premier looking to buy our vote on election day

Our Ontario premier is to be congratulated. He's come up with a creative, new approach for financing his re-election campaign.

I'm certain that many have noticed the recent flurry of announcements telling us that some of our pet projects are now to be given financial boosts from the coffers of the provincial government.

Recently, we were told that a surplus of more than $2 billion was discovered "hidden away" somewhere in the cash drawers of our provincial treasury, coincidentally weeks away from the next election.

He's industriously funding a plethora of local pet projects, attempting to buy our favour come election day. He's hoping to influence our decision at the polls come Oct.10. Ingenious.

All this is being done at our expense, with our tax dollars, with our tax refunds, with our tax breaks, with our tax cuts.

Normally, government funding of various projects proceeds at the speed of an aging pachyderm. Come election time, I'm amazed at the alacrity, the acceleration, the ability to grease the wheels (palms?) of their spending apparatus.

There ought to be a law.

BRUCE MACDONALD

Harrow

-Letter to the editor, sent to various papers September 16th 2007(?)

Media Statement

This de-amalgamation issue has been simmering just beneath the
surface of public opinion for the past eight years. Amalgamation was first imposed on us by the provincial government back in 1999. The local citizenry had no direct say in the process.

They stole from us, …our local heritage..!!

Almost immediately there was a strong backlash against the
compulsory union which mandated the present-day Town of Essex.


An earlier de-amalgamation petition drive, which was also aimed at
restoring the pre-existing local municipal structure, was supported by most, including our present Mayor.

That initial effort, lacking effective organization, fizzled and eventually, with the hope that we would ‘Go Away’, began gathering dust on the shelves of the bureaucracy Ministry of Municipal Affairs & Housing in Queen’s Park.

In our current de-amalgamation effort, we here in Harrow &Colchester South are not an isolated example. Throughout Ontario,there is widespread dissatisfaction with this forced, dysfunctional approach to “Mega-Municipal” style of government.

The Provincial Government promises of streamlined, more efficient and
accountable local government, the provision of better services at
reduced costs, have proven to be nothing more than bureaucratic
fairytales. Anticipated transition costs to area taxpayers have far exceeded expectations.

The vast majority of the residents of Harrow & Colchester South,
independent of political party affiliation, are voicing their opinion of the present situation. …..They are dissatisfied and demanding change.

They believe that they have a democratic right to evaluate and, on their
own, decide on their future direction in terms of services and local
government structure.

We intend to investigate all our options. We intend to proceed steadily along a conventional course and to take such further and other actions as may be deemed necessary to help us realize our democratic rights.

We are not going to allow this effort to get lost in the limbo of the
bureaucratic maze in Queen’s Park. We fully intend to press forward,
relentlessly, to attain our rightful goals.

South Colchester - Harrow Action Committee

Press Release, June 2007

A group of concerned citizens has organized an effort to circulate petitions among the residents of Harrow & Colchester South seeking citizen approval to de-amalgamate and separate from the present Town of Essex.

Our goals include returning control of our local government to local citizens and to put a stop to thoughts of spending our tax dollars on a new arena.

Volunteers to help with petitions and canvassing will be welcomed.

In 1999, the former municipalities of Harrow, Colchester South, Colchester North & the old Town of Essex were, without local citizen approval, amalgamated into a single governmental unit. This forced amalgamation process was instituted on many provincial municipalities by the Harris Government’s “Common Sense Revolution”.

In most cases, this amalgamation is not working…!! It has proven to be disastrous, ….in more ways than one

Provincially, some 177 smaller, local governing units were “amalgamated” into 24 regional amalgamations. Currently, 17 of those forced amalgamations are going through various stages of attempting to “De-amalgamate”, to return to their previous form of local government.

The basic reasons for the lack of acceptance by the public to these forced amalgamations and the fundamental cause of the ensuing public outcry is that the local citizenry in these involved communities did not have a voice in making the decision.

The unfortunate belief by the Provincial Government that these forced amalgamations would be easily and widely accepted has been a colossal misjudgment on the part of the senior bureaucrats in Toronto and Queen’s Park. Instead, it has proven to be a seriously flawed process that has resulted in escalating taxes, higher costs, anger, suspicion, feelings of betrayal, loss of local control, unrest and deep divisions within these communities.

Examples are all around us in Southern Ontario as evidenced by formation of similar groups such as ours in: Chatham-Kent, London area –Alsa Craig, Flamborough, Glanworth and others in the Hamilton Region, Kawartha Lakes, Fenelon Falls, Lindsay; Orleans, Gloucester and others in the Ottawa-Carleton Region, ….the list goes on.

Then there’s the Ontario De-amalgamation Network (ODN), Voices of Central Ontario (VOCO), and the newly formed Ontario Landowners Association (OLA).

For us, amalgamation has produced a dysfunctional government. Contrary to earlier promises, taxes and costs have been increasing, better, more efficient service delivery hasn’t happened, less bureaucracy and streamlined government are unrealistic pipe-dreams..!!