the north grenville
TIMES
Reaching by direct mail 9,000 homes and businesses in North Grenville and Merrickville/Wolford www.ngtimes.ca
The Voice of North Grenville
Vol. 4, No 49
November 30, 2016
North Grenville Rural Summit
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by Deron Johnston A warm November morning greeted rural residents as they made their way to the inaugural North Grenville Rural Summit this past Saturday. Fittingly hosted at the former Kemptville College, the summit was an attempt to reach out to the rural residents of North Grenville and provide information to them about municipal services. Thanks to the vision of councillor Jim Bertram and his desire to see more input into municipal activities from rural residents, the summit came to life this past year and will now take place
every two years. CAO Brian Carre opened the summit with an introductory greeting and talked about the day’s proceedings, then MPP Steve Clark said a few words of welcome and thanked everyone for coming. Katie Nolan, who is our local representative from the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, was the keynote speaker and told the assembled group of approximately fifty residents about the role of OMAFRA and the tools and programs they use to help municipalities improve the lives of rural residents.
Deputy Clerk Katie Valentin was the next speaker and outlined to everyone the different ways that the municipality attempts to communicate with residents. Clerk Cahl Pominville followed right after and gave a sometimes humorous presentation about the process the municipality uses to make decisions. The rest of the morning was divided up into six separate twenty-minute breakout sessions, where each municipal department made presentations. Each department had its own dedicated room, and residents rotated from room to room so that they
had a chance to see each presentation with a fiveminute break in between. The presentations were made by the directors in charge of each department, with the councillors who chaired that department also in attendance. The scope and responsibilities of each department were covered, but, more importantly with such a short amount of time, it was sometimes difficult to answer all of the questions that residents had before the next session was scheduled to start and a whole new group of residents came in. continued on page 2