The Creemore
Echo
Friday, August 2, 2013 Vol. 13 No. 31
THIS WEEKEND From live shows and fun activies on Mill Street, to a War of 1812 re-enactment at the Log Cabin, to a movie under the stars at Station on the Green, this Saturday’s Creemore Children’s Festival is sure to be a blast. For more information, see page 7.
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Photo Howie Beattie
A PACK OF HOT RODS The Canadian Rodder Club’s 2013 Back Roads Tour came through Creemore last Saturday morning, bringing 75 vintage and
highly customized cars from all over Ontario and as far away as the United States and Australia. The tour was based in Barrie and consisted of several day trips between Thursday and Monday. For pictures of some of the cars that visited, visit thecreemoreecho.com.
ELECTORAL REVIEW Wind farm opponents GETS UNDERWAY ordered to pay costs by Brad Holden Clearview Township’s Electoral Review Committee held its first meeting on Tuesday, outlining the four possible recommendations it could eventually make to Council: to reconfigure the municipality’s existing ward system, to decrease the number of wards, to maintain the status quo, or to dissolve the wards in favour of an at-large system. The committee also spent much of the night grappling with how to engage the public at large, across all demographics and the entire municipality, on the subject of electoral review, especially considering that most of the 15 or so residents who sat in the audience at
Tuesday’s meeting were of retirement age and from the Creemore area. Those members of the public were free to voice their opinions throughout the meeting, as Councillor Brent Preston, who was elected chair by both the committee and a show of hands from the audience, set up a meeting structure that encouraged free discussion among all present. An initial move by Councillor Thom Paterson to have two members of the public officially sit on the committee, which also includes Councillor Deb Bronee and Mayor Ken Ferguson as an ex officio member, was rebuffed given the tight time line governing the electoral (See “Electoral” on page 3)
by Brad Holden The 21 neighbours of the proposed Fairview Wind Farm who unsuccessfully sued developer wpd Canada and the two Beattie families who would host the turbines have been ordered to pay legal costs of $107,370.78. The plaintiffs, who had been seeking more than $17 million in damages due to loss of property value, will instead have to pay $68,498.59 to wpd Canada and $38,872.19 to Beattie Brothers Farms Ltd. and Ed Beattie & Sons Ltd. Justice S.E. Healey’s decision on costs, issued on Wednesday, July 24 reiterated her earlier findings that a loss in property value could not be
determined at this point, given that the Fairview Wind Farm project has yet to be approved and it is therefore impossible to know exactly what form it will take. Healey rejected the plaintiffs’ arguments that, despite losing the case, they had raised novel points of law, and that the court’s decision would have valuable bearing on future cases – both acceptable defences against having to pay legal costs. Further, Healey criticized the plaintiffs’ lawyer’s assertion in press releases and media interviews that a decision to hear the plaintiffs’ case in the best light during the prehearing – in essence, to pretend that the (See “Beatties” on page 3)
Taking care of buyers and sellers in Mulmur and the Creemore hills for 36 years
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Ginny MacEachern
(705)
444-1414 10230 Highway 26 East, Collingwood E-mail info@collingwood.toyota.ca
B.A., Broker
The Town & Country Agent with the City Connections 1-800-360-5821• 705-466-2607 • maceachern.ginny@gmail.com www.ginnymaceachern.com