Parry Sounds ~ Ideas and Opinions, In and Around Parry Sound

This week’s agenda items don’t seem to include any mission critical items though all are important for one reason or another. Two items are worth mentioning. The town is starting to think about the 2013 budget. It will be a crunch to get expenses in line with revenues and it’s not too early to begin the process. The second item is a deputation on moving forward with Tower Hill. At one time Tower Hill was a major tourist draw for the town that has since suffered from benign neglect. It would be nice to see the process of restoration start, especially if it does not put an unreasonable drain on town expenses.

(The header photo was taken last week a little south of town off of 69.)

Interesting and Notable Agenda Items

Item 9.4.1, 9A Belvedere is back on the agenda. I can’t really figure how this request differs from the original application that was turned down by town council. IKO Construction still wants to divide the property to allow for two separate buildings, one single and one triple unit. This whole issue is headed to the Ontario Municipal Board for review, so this seems to be a bit of jockeying for position by IKO.

Item 9.4.2, it looks as though Mr. Chips will get his signage request approved. Their new location arrangement is a little ‘funky’ but it is certainly an improvement. It’s something you might see in a hip city like Austin, Texas.

Item 9.4.4, authorizes procurement of surveillance equipment for installation at the high school to address the vandalism issue. I remember high school and the kids who used to head over to the local shopping mall on their breaks and after school before the buses left. Most behaved, but some shoplifted. Things have not changed much in the passing years, except technology permits a closer eye on things. This will cost a few thousand dollars and I’m afraid the kids will quickly figure out how to vandalize the equipment. Stay tuned for how it works out.

Item 9.5.2, is a request to have senior town staff prepare a prioritized list of town services for review by the Service Review Committee. This seems to be the ‘flip side’ to last week’s discussion of the privatization of services. Rather than privatize services to save money the town plans to review all services to identify areas and ways by which the services can be streamlined or even eliminated. In a time of tough budget choices it’s never too early to start looking at this.

Item 10.4.1 & 10.4.2, are by-laws related to the rezoning requests of last week that were received by with no complaints or concerns.

There are a number of additional items on the agenda but these are the ones that struck me as most interesting. Details are provided in the packages available for view at the library and town hall. I’ll miss this week’s meeting as I’ll be in Boston for the BIO conference. Let me know if there is anything important that I missed. I’ll be looking forward to reading the meeting minutes and seeing what was decided on the various issues.