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bilko@rgcmail.com Vol.21 No.14
Wednesday, July 5, 2017
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Developer: East Fonthill process "corrupted" Presentation to Regional Council raises fresh concerns; Baty calls for forensic audit The VOICE
Pilgrim at Pelham Centre
BY SAMUEL PICCOLO
Special to the VOICE
L Rainer Hummel, right, waits to speak before Regional Council last Thursday while Pelham Mayor Dave Augustyn, left, makes one in a series of unsuccessful attempts to prevent Hummel's presentation from being heard. NATE SMELLE PHOTO erties adjacent to or near the $928,000-per-acre parcel, stating that his company bought the lots as recently as seven months ago for an average of about $160,000 per acre. All were fully serviced lots. The East Fonthill land purchased by the Town, he said, was “in the middle of nowhere,” and lacked all services. Furthermore, the funding mechanism used to buy the parcel was the product of a scheme that saw the creation of development charges credits, valued at some $3 million dollars, to trade for the land, a practice that Hummel describes as “potentially illegal” and likened to printing money “in the basement.” Hummel asserts that in June 2016 his firm was approached by the Al-
len Group with an offer to buy excess development charges credits at a five-percent discount. When he sought clarification from Pelham Town Hall on an unrelated matter, he said that an offhand conversation about the development charges credits with CAO Darren Ottaway was not enlightening. According to Hummel, Ottaway asserted that, "There’s special ways that we sought legal counsel, and, apparently, there is ways that you can do this, and our lawyer said that it was fine.” After Hummel raised his questions last summer, the Town halted the reselling by buying back credits remaining in Allen Group hands, asserting that accounting for them inside Town Hall had become a lo-
gistical problem. Hummel’s presentation to Council nearly wasn’t heard. By employing parliamentary maneuvers, Mayor Augustyn repeatedly attempted to block Hummel from speaking, moves ultimately shut down by Regional Chair Alan Caslin on advice from the Clerk. After the meeting, Augustyn said that the issues raised by Hummel had already been addressed by the Town. “It’s in our 335-page response and it was raised at the Audit Committee and it was answered,” said Augustyn. “So we’ve debunked those myths already. All this stuff is just somebody trying to dress these See ALLEGATIONS back page
DEBBIE PINE
ET’S TAKE A WALK. It’s early in the morning, at Pelham Centre School, and the building is a week from retirement. It doesn’t look to be fading: its facade is as smart as ever, and you get a grim sense that the structure itself is the only one unaware of its own impending expiration. A pine has been allowed to grow up and cover the name, but there has been a school here since before the U.S. Constitution was signed, and it is unlikely anyone will mistake this place for anything else. Now is the best time to visit. The new sun squeezes slants of light through gaps in the trees, projecting leafy patterns on the asphalt, and the parking lot is empty save for the cars of the most devoted teachers. The students are still in their buses, lapping the neighbourhoods picking up classmates. In a few minutes until they’ll be deposited here, at first walking to the doors, then running after their friends, See COLUMN SIX Page 8
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As elementary school closes, a former student takes a last look
BY DAVE BURKET and NATE SMELLE A Niagara-on-the-Lake-based real estate developer has alleged that the Town of Pelham engaged in a “corrupted” process by its acquisition of land in East Fonthill, and a “potentially illegal” scheme to fund the transaction. Rainer Hummel, a developer with some 30 years’ experience in Niagara, and whose company is the fourth largest holder of East Fonthill acreage, asserts that the Town’s 2014 deal to purchase land from the Allen Group, a GTA developer based in Toronto, cannot be explained rationally. Speaking last Thursday evening in front of Niagara Regional Council, Hummel presented what he alleged was a timeline of transactions that suggested the Town sought to purchase land in 2014 from the Allen Group that the company did not actually own at the time. The Allen Group subsequently purchased the desired land in 2015—approximately eight acres— for about $225,000 per acre. Within days, according to the timeline Hummel presented to Council, the Allen Group resold about three acres of the land to the Town of Pelham for $928,000 per acre. “That’s more than any piece of property has ever been sold for in the regional municipality of Niagara,” said Hummel. “It looks to me nothing more than a backdoor way of bonusing a developer.” Bonusing, or offering municipal incentives to developers, is illegal in Ontario. Hummel listed four other prop-
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
IN THE NEWS
PUBLISHER’S CORNER by Dave Burket
Summer sizzler: You might want to store this issue of the paper in a fireproof container, because there’s a good chance that these 20 pages might spontaneously burst into flame. The Canada Day fireworks above Harold Black Park were something—especially that clever, fake-out non-finale—but they pale in comparison to the grenades lobbed by real estate developer Rainer Hummel starting on page 3. I’ve met Hummel twice—once last Friday, when we spoke at his office, and once in early spring, following Regional Council’s surprise move to examine Pelham finances relating to the East Fonthill project. In the days after Council's decision, we noticed on Mayor Augustyn’s Facebook page a dogged exchange between Augustyn and a number of users, including the uniquely named Hummel, who seemed to know what he was talking about. Getting him to talk to the Voice, however, was a different story. He finally agreed to do so later in April. Shortly after, the paper was ready to go with a story related to East Fonthill similar in some respects to what's in this issue. However, as we did our due diligence in requesting comment from the Town, Hummel’s attorneys persuaded him to pull back, to gather more data before going public with his allegations. We agreed to hold the story. We continued our own digging, however, into the East Fonthill land deal with the Allen Group, making repeated inquiries of the Town for details. You may remember one result of this effort from a few weeks ago—the pure black, 99% redacted appraisal page provided by the Town that confirmed an appraised value of some $1.1 million dollars an acre, until then only an unverified rumour. In his interview this week, Hummel mentions the dangers of “rocking the boat.” We know what he means. One afternoon over the winter, an advertising consultant working at that time on behalf of the Voice was startled by someone tapping on his car window in the Shoppers parking lot in Fonthill. The someone was a former Pelham Town Hall staffer. “The Voice should be careful,” came the warning. “They have their ways.”
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This wasn’t meant as a joke. The consultant declined to identify the former staffer, and stopped working on our behalf a few weeks later. After our Board of Directors discussed the incident, we decided not to take the matter to the police. So far no horses' heads have shown up, but the encounter did have one notable effect. As anyone who knows me fairly well can tell you, once you threaten me you’ve bought yourself twice the attention you had before. You want to avoid being under a magnifying glass? Okay. How about an electron microscope. Moving on. No shortage of news: Any issue that contains pieces both by Nick Saltarelli and Sam Piccolo is going to be special, and for sure they are the cherries on top of this week’s East Fonthill sundae. Nick is understandably alarmed at the potential, and needless, loss of the Haist Street arena parkland, and Sam remembers his elementary school on the eve of its closure. Plus Nate Smelle brings us the joy of Canada Day… We’ll get there, promise: Speaking of great writing, we have a feature piece by John Swart sitting on the shelf, bumped due to a sudden Rainer storm. Honest, John, it’s going to run next week, absent some other incendiary turn of events we can’t predict!… A broken system: That’s the takeaway from former trustee Gary Atamanyk's letter to the editor this week on public school board policies in Ontario. It’s a sobering reality-check on what the Wellington Heights renaming committee is up against. More power to them… Dorothy, we haven’t forgotten: We’re still working out the kinks in getting longtime resident Dorothy Rungeling’s reminiscences into the paper as a regular column. It will be worth the wait… Mystery gifter: Thank you to whoever slid an old newspaper under our office door recently, and to another gentleman who came by with a different issue and asked that it be returned… Well, that’s a surprise: We’re informed that there is only one licensed architect practicing in Pelham, and her name is Gina. Our foundations have been rocked!... Congratulations, E. L. Crossley Class of 2017: Bon voyage.
Voice on vacation!
Fenwick break and enter
NRPS impaired driving charges
other 100 drivers. Within a short time, police arrested one driver for impaired driving and seized his vehicle for 7 days. Another driver was issued a 3-day licence suspension, and a third driver was charged with driving while under suspension.
Police say that between June 22 and June 24 a quantity of tools was taken from a trailer on Sumbler Road near Poth Street. 1-Dewalt 12" compound cuff off saw with a new blade 1 Wacker 14" concrete cut of saw with diamond blade 1 Dewalt worm gear circular saw 1 Milwaukee 1/4" impact tool kit with 2 M18 heavy duty batteries 1 12V right angle drill with case charger and battery 1 Makita power planner 1 Milwaukee reciprocating saw with battery 1 Milwaukee M12 1/4" Impact Investigation continues.
West Lincoln roll-over claims life
Last Thursday, at approximately 11:25 PM, the Niagara Regional Police Service, the West Lincoln Fire Service and the Niagara Emergency Medical Service (EMS), responded to reports of a motor vehicle roll-over that occurred on Smithville Road near South Chippawa Road in West Lincoln. Investigators determined that a 68-year-old male from Brampton was the sole occupant of a 2008 Pontiac G6 and was travelling north on Smithville Road towards South Chippawa Road. The Pontiac failed to negotiate a curve, left the roadway and struck a hydro pole on the east side of Smithville Road, causing the vehicle to roll into an adjacent field. Emergency services attended the collision scene and determined the male occupant had succumbed to his injuries. The name of the deceased is not being released at this time. This collision remains under investigation by detectives of the Niagara Regional Police - Collision Reconstruction Unit. Any witnesses to the collision are asked to contact them at (905) 688-4111.
Weekend R.I.D.E. arrest
Last Friday,, members of the Niagara Regional Police Service opened up the Canada Day long weekend by conducting R.I.D.E. checkpoints in Port Colborne and Niagara Falls. Police first attended the area of Sherkston Shores and spoke with approximately 350 drivers. Most of them were heading into the area to start their Canada Day weekend festivities. One driver was stopped and issued a 3-day licence suspension when a sample of their breath registered an alert on a roadside screening device. Police then attended Niagara Falls and spoke with an-
The Niagara Regional Police Service is committed to reducing impaired driving offences through education and the apprehension of offenders through enforcement programs like RIDE. Impaired driving is still the leading cause of criminal deaths in Canada and destroys thousands of lives every year.
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Vol.20 No.48
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Column Six
Growing up British Part 2 of 2: Coronation to embarkation
Vol.20 No.32
Wednesday October 12, 2016
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Apple Day comes to Fonthill
BY JULIE MANNELL
Special to the VOICE
W
BALLOONING INTEREST Grade 6 student Jinja Shepherd explains her experiment on static electricity at the Glynn A. Green Public School's annual science fair last Friday. See story, page 3. NATE SMELLE PHOTO
Public meeting tonight on school issues BY VOICE STAFF As questions continue to mount regarding an email that Pelham Mayor Dave Augustyn quietly sent to a District School Board of Niagara trustee last summer, Augustyn has agreed to address the issue at a public meeting scheduled for this evening, Wednesday, Feb. 8, in Fenwick. Nancy Beamer, speaking for “Names Matter,” a Pelham citizens group lobbying the DSBN to reverse its decision to rename a local public school, confirms that the meeting will be held at Fire Station #2, known locally as the Fenwick Fire Hall, starting at 7:00 PM. While the Mayor has agreed to ap-
Under pressure, Mayor to address email revelation, other E. W. Farr matters pear, says Beamer, DSBN officials associated with the school-naming process have either declined to attend or have not yet responded to the group’s invitation. DSBN Chair, Dale Robinson, to whom Augustyn’s email was addressed last June, has declined to appear, says Beamer, asserting that she would be
“on holidays.” The Voice was unable to independently confirm Robinsion’s intentions. She did not respond to repeated requests for comment on E.W. Farr-related matters before presstime. Beamer, whose group maintains an email list of some 580 residents, says that all members of the public are invited and encouraged to attend the meeting. “We would especially welcome parents and children who are unhappy with the name change,” she says, referring to the contentious decision by the DSBN to consolidate two Pelham See MEETING back page
HEN I WAS young, my father and I would go for long drives along the rural routes of Pelham. We’d blast George Thurgood and roll down the windows because we loved the smell of the breeze, the sensation of crisp Niagara wind beating our cheeks and tangling our hair against our summer-kissed skin. My father was not a sentimental man. He worked in factories and had a Gordon Lightfoot mustache and never shed tears over injuries. Yet something about the Pelham landscape, the hilly backdrop to his childhood and the childhoods of our ancestors, drew him in. He’d stop by a farm or a gathering of woods and, surrendering his manly veneer, tell me a story about the town. This place is precious. This is the earth that granted us life. Here is the place where we happened upon love or here is a site of devastation. On one particular drive sometime in the late ‘90s we stopped at a tree with a plaque. “This tree looks dead,” I said to my father. “It sure is getting there, Julie.” The Comfort Maple is supposedly Canada’s oldest See COLUMN SIX Page 14
BY VOICE STAFF
A construction error was discovered following the opening of a traffic calming chicane on Haist Street north of Hwy 20 last Monday that prevented large vehicles from passing through. One resident living in the neighbourhood said he contacted the Town after seeing a small schoolbus get stuck as it tried to get through the new traffic calming measure. Later that day while driving behind a cement truck, he said that he became concerned for the public’s safety when the truck had to turn around because it couldn’t get through. “If a small school bus and a cement truck can’t make it through what about a fire
BY HEATHER McLAREN ROHRER
Special to the VOICE
A
Repair measures underway last week to correct a construction error in the chicane. truck or an ambulance?” he said. While waiting for the contractor to return to fix
the mistake, the Town has taken measures to temporarily allow passage for vehicles through the neigh-
VOICE PHOTO
bourhood in the short-term. Manager of Public Works Ryan Cook said that after discovering the issue with
the chicane the morning it first opened, the Town See CHICANE Page 5
Petition-inspired changes coming to 2017 Summerfest BY NATE SMELLE
The VOICE
Representatives from the Pelham Summerfest committee Candy Ashbee and Bill Gibson presented council with a final report on the 2016 Summerfest at the Council meeting on Monday, Nov. 21. Prompted by a story in the Voice in August about a merchant petition to move Summerfest from Pelham Street, in September Town staff met with various stakeholders to hear their complaints, promising at the time that changes in the way Summerfest was mounted would be con-
sidered. The main concerns identified during the community engagement process were security, parking, ensuring customer can access all businesses in town, and liability for damages. How to get all Pelham Street businesses to participate and finding ways to make it beneficial for them to set up a booth were also determined to be of high priority for the committee as they plan for next year’s event. Gibson told Council that the committee is addressing these concerns in a variety of ways. To improve parking, they intend to create bet-
ter signage for out-of-town visitors to designated parking areas and shuttle services. To make participation in Summerfest more enticing to local businesses, they plan to implement a tiered-charge for booths. Under the new system, Pelham Street business owners will be charged the least, other local businesses will pay a slightly higher fee, and vendors from outside Pelham will pay the most. In response to more specific issues for individual businesses, they will also slightly alter the footprint of the event and make adjustments to security. Another way the committee plans
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to improve the 2017 Summerfest is by sponsoring and working with the organizers of the Thursday Night Bandshell Concert series to select the artist performing on the first night of Summefest. They also intend to make more use of the smartphone app they launched in 2016. "We are really going to push it this year," Ashbee said. “It really helps to get people to see what events there are so they can plan out where they are going. We will be able to actually help the merchants and local businesses adSee CHANGES Page 5
FTER LUNCH ON Saturday, Mum and Dad had my afternoon cut out for me. Mum had more brass than anyone I knew, and it had to be cleaned. In addition there was the set of silver fish-knives and forks which were never used, but which had to be cleaned and put back in their velvetlined box. Next was a walk to the newsagents to pay for the daily delivery of the Daily Mirror. As I said, Dad was a printer, but when he was 37 he had been rejected for a job, as being too old, by the printers of the Beano. For that reason, my favourite comic was not allowed in the house, but while I was paying the papers, the newsagent let me have a 'shoofty' at the Beano. I'd explained my predicament and he understood completely. Sundays were different again. Dad would play golf on summer mornings and billiards in winter. Then he'd stop for a 'refresher' at the local and would pick up the prawns, cockles, winkles or whelks we'd be having for tea later. Meanwhile, Mum was roasting the 'joint' and potatoes. I got to make the Yorkshire pud, and mint
See COLUMN SIX Page 14
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BY VOICE STAFF
While shopping in Fonthill between Friday and Sunday, keep an eye out for Beavers, Cubs and Scouts in front of local stores with bushels of apples. As part of the annual Apple Day campaign, Scouting youth of all ages will be trading apples for donations. The yearly fundraising drive is an important way for young Scouts to connect with the communities they are serving, says Leah Marie of Scouts Canada. “The Apple Day campaign holds a great tradition of being able to have youth interacting within the communities they live in,” she says. “All of the Apple Day donations stay directly within the group that re-
The goal is to have these youth develop into confident and well-rounded individuals
ceives them, enabling youth to have experiences that build character, challenge them, and allow them to try new things. The goal is to have these youth develop into confident and wellrounded individuals, better prepared for success. Apple Day helps to achieve that.”
“Any money raised during Apple Day goes towards improving the Scouting program by providing more outdoor adventures for youth, camping equipment, canoes and paddles, training and many other endeavours that the youth want to experience,” says Marie. Scouts Canada has some 100,000 members across Canada, and carries out programs for boys, girls
Joining their principal, Karen Simpson, at the Sept. 19 Council meeting as part of a delegation from EL Crossley Secondary School, students Abby Loewen and Neenah Williams presented Council with a list of reasons that they should immediately approve the construction of the new sidewalk proposed along Hwy. 20. The asphalt side-
walk/trail is slated to be built between the south side of the road from Timmsdale Crescent to the high school. Because of the large volume of motor vehicle traffic travelling at high speeds through this area, and because of the necessity for students to tread this path on a daily basis, many residents would like to see the sidewalk go in sooner than later. After delivering to Council a petition containing
Many residents would like to see the sidewalk go in sooner than later the names of 450 students calling for a safer walk to school, Simpson handed the
podium over to Loewen and Williams to plead their case. Loewen told Council that because there are a lot of students who have work placements and coop placements during the school year, this is the only route for many of them to travel. As one of the students facing this predicament, Williams said she has had no other option but to walk along the dangerous highway.
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and youth ages 5-25. This year the 3rd Fonthill Group, which includes Beavers to Ventures (youth ages 5- 25) will be hitting the streets to drum-up support. Over the weekend, Scouts will be set up in Fonthill outside Sobeys, Tim Hortons, Target Gas station, Fonthill Shopping Plaza and the Pioneer Gas station at the corner of Hwys 20 and 24.
Town Council approves sidewalk to serve E. L. Crossley BY NATE SMELLE
The VOICE
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Second year Beaver with the 3rd Fonthill Group, Russell Letford offers a fresh apple to shoppers in Pelham during the 2015 Apple Day campaign. SUPPLIED PHOTO
A longtime Canadian tradition, Apple Day began in 1932 in Saint John, New Brunswick, when Scouts handed out 21,000 apples as a way to say thank you to the community. In return for their generosity, many people offered them donations. From then on Scouts have reached out through Apple Day to raise funds for their programs.
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Column Six It doesn’t get better than Autumn
Longtime Scouting tradition dates to 1932
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BY VOICE STAFF The District School Board of Niagara is requesting that the Town of Pelham cede a portion of Cherry Ridge Park for use as a soccer field to serve the students of the new Wellington Heights Public School, formerly the E. W. Farr Memorial Public School, in Fenwick. Currently under renovation and expansion, the new school will combine students and staff from the previous school and Pelham Centre, where classes are being held while construction continues. Two letters, containing virtually identical text but signed by different authorities, were sent last week to nearby residents of the park, as well as to parents of Pelham Centre students. “The DSBN is currently building onto Wellington Heights Public School on Alsop Drive,” states the letter. “The size of the school's addition means the existing small soccer field will be eliminated. The Town and the Board have been discussing the possibility of working together to create a field for both the school and the
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In an effort to bring further attention and deterrence to driving while impaired by alcohol or drugs, the Niagara Regional Police Service reports the names of those people who are charged with an alleged criminal impaired driving offence in the Region. None of the following charges have been proved in court. In addition to being charged, these individuals are also bound by a Ministry of Transportation 90-Day Administrative Driver’s License Suspension and are prohibited from operating a motor vehicle on a roadway. The public is encouraged to contact the Niagara Regional Police Service Traffic Safety Hotline or Crime Stoppers to report those who are driving in contravention of the suspension. The following individuals have been charged criminally with impaired driving by alcohol or drugs, driving with a blood alcohol concentration above 80 mgs of alcohol in 100 ml of blood, or refusing to provide a breath / blood sample. Joseph M. GALONE, 40, Buffalo NY Sarah D. ARBOUR, 32, St. Catharines Rudolf THIESSEN, 53, St. Catharines Gary W. R. LINDBERG, 35, Fort Erie John G. KELLY, 29, Niagara Falls Robert M. W. WINGER-WALSH, 20, Ingersoll Shane W. ANDERSON, 63, Hamilton John F. PERRY, 70, Beamsville Gaetane DOIRON, 38, St. Catharines Christopher S. WHITSITT, 31, Niagara Falls Piotr LUKASZCZYK, 53, Thorold Bilal ZAIDI, 23, Kleinburg
“I start work at 2:30 PM and school lets out at 2:15 PM so I can’t take any other route,” Williams explained. “I have had friends, family, teachers and other community members reach out to me in the past about how this is unsafe and how there should be another alternative for us.” Looking ahead to winter, when she will need to walk this path three or four times See SIDEWALK Page 2
HERE IS NO BETTER time to cycle than Fall. It matters not whether you’re new to the sport, a seasoned recreational cyclist, racer, touring rider or mountain biker; we all have reason to look forward to autumn. Summer’s heat has faded, and the streams of sweat that ran from soggy helmets into our eyes are now just slight perspiration. Fitness is peaking from lots of saddle time, making those tough climbs of Spring a breeze in Autumn. It’s hard to beat the feeling of beginning a crisp, cool Fall ride with a slight shiver, knowing your efforts will soon warm you perfectly. The hues of Autumn are outstanding. A Pelham route as simple as following our southern boundary is one that would make most Toronto cyclists jealous, especially when our forests and fields are ablaze with colour. Begin from Harold Black Park, and zig-zag south along Effingham Rd toward the Welland River. If you’re new to cycling, it’s important to know south is the direction away from any hills. If you avoid the morning and evening weekday rush hours caused by those travelling through Pelham between Wainfleet See AUTUMN Page 3
Indulgence Bakery Mossimo’s Pelham Street Grille Sobeys Fonthill DeVries Fruit Farm Beamer’s Hardware & TV Fonthill Library Black Pearl Fish & Chips Bob’s Boys Antiques Moku’s Fonthill Fitness Curves McDonald’s Fonthill Legion Semenuk’s Gas Bar Target Store Tim Horton’s Giant Tiger Shoppers Drug Mart Zee Lube Express Care Lazy Loon Minor Bros Stores Avondale Stores A-1 Market Sobeys South Pelham Broken Gavel Restaurant Grill on Canboro Petro Canada Mtvl. Hwy. Renewed Thrift & Vintage Ridge Berry Farm Circle-K
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
Page 3
The Conversation
A whistleblower blows In extended interview covering a range of East Fonthill issues, Rainer Hummel drops the gloves and comes out swinging BY DAVE BURKET
VOICE Publisher
O
N THE DAY BEFORE THE STA RT of the Canada Day long weekend, Rainer Hummel greets me in his headquarters’ reception area with an offer of coffee, then goes off to punch buttons on a sophisticated machine to make it happen. The building is empty— staff sent home for an early start to the holiday. And what a building it is. Originally a century-old canning factory, Hummel bought out his partner’s share in the St. David’s structure to save it, to prove that there was unique beauty hidden under the everyday ugly.
Hummel’s aircraft hanger-like office is separated from a corridor by a glass wall that extends several meters to an open ceiling. Exposed wood beams discreetly suggest that winter heating bills are no object. On Hummel's desk, five monitors are arrayed in an arc, Mission Control-style. Tasteful art hangs on the walls. Retro toys shine under halogen lighting in a glass display case. We sit at a conference table cluttered with reports and charts— many of them related to East Fonthill. Out in the corridor a regal animal the size of a small mountain lion keeps a wary eye on me through the glass wall. Later I learn he’s an F2 Savannah cat, a cross between a wild African serval and a domestic cat, and his name is Mallee. Mallee knows a commoner when he sees one. Worse, media. The 55-year-old Hummel’s wealth, accumulated over decades of business ventures, is evident both in his office furnishings and his personality. His casual style and an open-necked shirt don’t disguise someone accustomed to seeing orders followed, fools shown the door. If the line between confidence and arrogance is fuzzy, in Hummel both traits are woven together like 600 thread count linen. He holds nothing back on the problems he perceives in the East Fonthill project, and inside Pelham Town Hall. The following has been edited for clarity and brevity, with some answers condensed or merged. All right, so starting from the ground up here, you’re not a resident of Pelham. You're not a councillor. You're not an elected official of any kind. What prompted you to want to appear before Regional Council to make your presentation? Well, it's a combination of things going back a little over a year. And it originally started with my being approached by a representative of Fonthill Gardens [a subsidiary of the Allen Group, a GTA commercial developer] quite enthusiastically selling development charges and all the vari-
ous benefits that go with it. And I know the Act reasonably well, mainly because I fought against development charges escalating as quickly as they have. This is the Municipal Act? The Municipal Act, yeah. And I just said, "You can't do that." "Sure. We have them. We got development charges in exchange for property. And we have way, way more development charges than we can ever use, so we're selling them. And you get a five percent discount, and you get free security fees and free park fees." Again, I said, "You can't do that." And that got me to thinking, so the conversation just ended at that point, and then I asked a few friends in the building community, "You ever heard of this?" And they said, "Yeah, we bought some." "You did?" I said, "Do you not think there's something wrong with that?" "No, not really. I don't know. I saved myself a pile of money." But all right, so— and that's what led into other conversations, and I just kept asking questions. And then, a number of other things happened that really concerned me. One was the construction of Summersides Boulevard. The Town did a really good job buying two parcels, or expropriating, two parcels of land on Station Street. Now they maybe overpaid a little bit for them, but it was a very, very smart move. I have to give credit, they did a good job with that. But the rest I don't understand. The rest of the road, the development community would have to build and give to the Town, give them the land and give them the road [anyway]. That's mandated under the Municipal Act. Yeah, absolutely. On the site of a development, the developer must build the road, give the Town the land, construct it to a specification that's dictated by documents from the province. It's called an “urban section”—a standard section of hollow road is built with sewers and water and all the rest. If the Town wants something different, we still have to build it but they have to pay the
Hummel Properties headquarters, in St. Davids.
VOICE PHOTO
If you talk to any builder, developer, they'll all give you the same answer, "You don't rock the boat because, all of the sudden, your projects will get stalled or your files will get lost."
Rainer Hummel.
SUPPLIED PHOTO
difference between urban section and whatever they want. All of a sudden, the Town has all this land for this massive road, which is one thing I started questioning, but then they started building the road. And that's when the developer in me came up and said, "Hold on a second. First, how can you build this multi-million dollar road that you don't have to build, the developer has to build? Second, how do you know what connects to it? I own the property that abuts it. Other developers own property that abuts it. You have no idea what our plan is going to be. You have no idea how many houses we're putting in, how big the sewer has to be, how big the water line has to be." At the end of the day, this bus is driven by town council on behalf of the taxpayer and if they want to drive that bus into a wall, is it anybody else's problem to tell them to stop? Summersides Boulevard is a train wreck. No one in their right mind, no one in their right mind would build something like that. And this is important because the road will— if those connections aren't made when the road is first built—the road will have to be basically ripped up— Completely torn up. —to add the connections later. Completely torn up. From my way of thinking, unless they magically invented a new way of land development, that entire road will have to be completely ripped up. So that tells me it's built only for one reason, a political reason. Because there's no engineering, no planning reason that you would ever
build that road. I think it was built because it was a political promise made at the last election that, "I'm going to have this done. So come hell or high water, this is going to get done regardless of what the cost is to the taxpayer." The prudent, judicious use of tax dollars is one of the primary responsibilities of our elected officials. You want to build monuments to your ego and build ice pads and community centers that nobody can afford—if people are dumb enough to vote for them, then that's fine. That's what the people voted for, that's what you're going to get. [Mayor Augustyn] promised that and he's delivering on what he promised. I don't have a problem with that. Do I think it makes financial sense? No, but that's beside the point, that's what people wanted. But this, I don't believe the people are prepared to pay two-anda-half million dollars for something that doesn't need to be bought or doesn't need to be paid for. Let's back up a little bit. Did you go to the Town after you were approached with the development charge credits, the offer to buy them, did you approach the Town to ask what was happening? Not directly. I was in a conversation over another matter with the municipality. It was a planning-related issue. It involved the CAO, the director of planning, and some junior planners, and some of my staff, and we were trying to find some solutions. In the course of that conversation, the CAO sat beside me and I asked him, just off-hand during part of the conversation, "I don't understand this. How
does this work? I've never heard of that before and I don't even think you can do that," and he turned the page. He just changed the subject. He didn't respond in any substantive way? He kind of said, "Well, no. There's special ways that we sought legal counsel and, apparently, there is ways that you can do this, and our lawyer said that it was fine." Now I know the Town's lawyer, and I know him because he's also Niagara-on-the-Lake’s lawyer and I've known him for 25 years. Very conservative. This is Callum Shedden. Callum Shedden. I know Callum to be a lawyer, municipal lawyer, who doesn't care what the staff think and he doesn't care what the council thinks. He only cares what's good for the taxpayer, the Callum I know, his concern is what's right for the taxpayer. So I thought to myself, there's no way that this is Callum Shedden. It just didn't add up. And I made a few inquiries and apparently there was a different lawyer used for that, and I don't— I don’t know who he is. I don't know anything about him, but apparently the Town used a different lawyer for their background information on that. That does not necessarily explain why you've continued to push with your objections to the point that you wanted to appear at Regional Council. Anyone looking at this has to ask, what are your motivations? Do you have something personal— a personal grudge against the Mayor or Town Council? I don't. I don't know the Mayor at all. I don't know
the guy and don't care. I don't know a single councilor. If one walked up to me, I couldn't tell you if they were one or weren't. I've just basically sat back and let these guys play developer with taxpayer's money designing this thing. And I've said all along this is the stupidest thing I've ever seen. But, you know what? It's not my job to educate these guys. If they want to be dumb with taxpayer's money, that's not my problem. But that's not the issue. What happened was, I was asking questions about this. I was asking questions about this with builders, the business community, the Niagara Home Builders Association. If you talk to any builder, developer, they'll all give you the same answer, "You don't rock the boat because, all of the sudden, your projects will get stalled or your files will get lost." You're talking about Pelham specifically? No, any municipality. It's not just Pelham. If you, as a builder, you start rocking the boat, your projects aren't going to move along too quick. And it's very easy to do because nobody's paperwork is 100%. A town can find a hundred reasons why not to do something and only two why to do it. So we all know that. But I was asking a lot of questions behind the scenes, and I was certainly having several conversations with the representative of the Allen Group about other related things. But I was getting back to, "I don't understand a whole lot of the stuff that's gone on here." And then what ended up happening was one of my projects was ready to move See CONVERSATION Page 7
Page 4
The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
www.thevoiceofpelham.ca
OPINION
The opinions expressed in submitted commentary and letters to the editor are those of the contributors and not necessarily those of the Voice of Pelham.
The Voice of Pelham is a 1211858 Ontario Limited publication David Burket, Publisher 2-1428 Pelham St., P.O. Box 1489, Fonthill, ON L0S1E0
COMMENTARY / OP-ED Nick Saltarelli Greens areas and greenbacks
O
UR SMALL TOWN is growing up. Construction and real estate are booming. There’s an ongoing influx of people from afield, particularly the GTA. Property values and house prices are on the rise. The major retail sector is expanding by leaps and bounds. There are those who’ll lament the speed of the changes, in particular longtime residents who’d prefer a more measured pace. We’re not about to become a concrete jungle, but over just the past several years the countryfied atmosphere of this small Niagara town has begun to fade in the rear-view mirror. The road ahead is paved over in asphalt, flanked by new houses and buildings and occupied by more and more people. Progress. There’s no going back, like it or not. As vacant land is gobbled up, our elected representatives will need to make provisions for undeveloped buffers into which the growing number of Pelham residents, present and future, can find and enjoy tranquility. By that I mean large, centrally located parkland. This isn’t new think-
ing. Exercising foresight, long-ago planners of some of the most crowded cities on earth —where the value of real estate is eye-wateringly high — set aside vast
There's a queasy feeling stirring in my gut, an entirely unproven impression... open expanses of parkland for the well-being of current and especially future generations. As populations exploded and urban development progressed unabated all around them, these green islands remained intact, untouchable and sacrosanct. What would New York be without its Central Park, San Francisco its Golden Gate Park, Toronto its High Park, Montréal its Mont Royal, and Vancouver its Stanley Park? Materially rich-
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er, certainly. Each of these spaces represents billions of dollars of undeveloped real estate potential. But more certainly poorer in what is immensely more valuable, if intangible. These centrally located lands are public sanctuaries. Treed and gardened respites for residents and visitors alike from the hard hustle and bustle of modern life. No politician in his right mind would propose selling and developing those precious, verdant commons. They’d be turfed out of office by an outraged electorate. What about us, then? There’s a queasy feeling stirring in my gut, an entirely unproven impression that Pelham Council has already made up its mind directionally on the old Pelham arena property. While ongoing Community Co-Design meetings are billed as “an exercise to identify future land uses of the Pelham arena” our choices are limited. The exercise is in fact a “Proposed Redevelopment,” which apparently precludes the option of non-development, or development into more managed parkland. See GREEN SPACE Page 16
Letters Patriotic pride prompts praise Way to go Haist Street! Your Canadian pride on July 1st was fantastic.
Mary Reid Fonthill
Right turns the right way I am very much in favour of the right hand turns as described [Right- turn-only on Pelham panned, June 21, p. 1], in fact I would add a third—coming out from Shoppers Drug onto Highway 20. However I have an alternative for Church Hill. Make it one-way up the hill, this resolves the issue. We do have a precedent—the end of Canboro Road is one-way down so this would just complement that system. Geoff Kirkwood Pelham
CONTACT YOUR ELECTED OFFICIALS Member of Federal Parliament
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Dean Allison, MP 4994 King Street Beamsville, ON L0R 1B0 Dean.Allison@parl.gc.ca 877-563-7900 Member of Provincial Parliament
Electoral District: Niagara West-Glanbrook Sam Oosterhoff, MPP 4961 King St. East, Unit M1 Beamsville, ON L0R 1B0 sam.oosterhoffco@pc.ola.org 905-563-1755
Members of Niagara Regional Council Councillor David Augustyn mayordave@pelham.ca 905-892-2607 Ext 317 Councillor Brian Baty 742 Memorial Dr. Fenwick, ON L0S 1C0 905-892-5317 Town of Pelham 20 Pelham Town Square P.O. Box 400 Fonthill, ON L0S 1E0 905-892-2607
Mayor of Pelham David Augustyn mayordave@pelham.ca 905-892-2607 Ext 317 Members of Pelham Town Council Ward 1 Councillor Richard Rybiak rrybiak@pelham.ca 905-892-2105
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
Page 5
OPINION Letters
FOLLOW THE MONEY By Jim Pitt
continued
Some housekeeping: Oversight Committee, Pelham tax increases
Keep Haist Street park a park ing paths—all would make the area more desirable, a place that allows residents to feel as though they belong to a caring community. The Town should listen to the people, as therein lies the value of any space, a place of coming together as it already is, a public, welcoming space for all. Lets hope the Town of Pelham can see the merit rather than the dollar sign. L. Morgan Pelham
Today I had a one-on-one meeting regarding the Haist Street parklands and arena. I suggested that the idea of taking away our parkland is shortsighted. Such a place is the hub of the community, a socially inclusive space for all, young and old. Resurface the courts where children play tennis and basketball. More park benches and tables should be made available. Shrubs, trees and designated walk-
Former school trustee is pessimistic Since I was the previous public school trustee for Pelham/Thorold for seven years from 2003 until my landslide defeat in 2010, I may be able to shed some light on actions taken during the recent school naming issue. First, I believe that the actions of the District School Board of Niagara during the recent school naming process were exactly what was to be expected. In fact, I believe these actions accurately reflect the normal characteristics of past board actions, and the future does not promise to be any differ-
ent. You may ask why. There are ten main reasons, in my opinion: (1) The Ontario Ministry of Education has instructed their administrative leadership candidates since (at least) 1971 that the top leadership must make ALL final decisions BEFORE there be any consideration of issues during meetings with subordinates. There must NEVER be a possible deviation from the administrative pre-determined outcomes or an issue must be tabled (cancelled) before a vote can
This week we pause for a moment to catch up on some news, and to offer some more accurate assessments of tales being told. Oversight Committee—or Cheerleading Section? In last week's edition of the Voice it was reported that the Oversight Committee finally was heard from, publicly, or at least in a recorded Council meeting. The Chair of the Committee reported on progress, and bricks, and then made a strange comment about Mississauga. He stated that a friend of his told him that the Hershey Centre, in Mississauga, was the same size as the new double arenas being built here in Pelham. He was told that this centre cost $80 million 15 years ago. He then stated that Mississauga had a population of 600,000 and we, with 16,000, were going to build our arenas for half that price. I was curious, so I looked it up. After about a 10-minute search I found the following: The Hershey Centre is a single pad arena with 5,000 seats. It is the home
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the OHL Steelheads. It was started 1998 and completed later that year a cost of $22 million. ($30 million 2016 dollars) In 2007 the Hershey Sports Zone was built. It contains two indoor full-sized soccer fields, a full-sized basketball court, a gymnastics centre and two outdoor soccer fields. The Iceland Sports Centre, next door, contains four indoor rinks— three NHL-sized and one International-sized, with seating for 275 in the three NHL rinks and 1,200 for the International rink. As well, the adjoining facilities include: an outdoor basketball court, a skateboard park, a fitness centre, a triple gymnasium, baseball diamonds, two parks with trails linking them, a dog park, a driving range, a miniature golf course, an allotment for gardening for the apartments nearby, an indoor pool and a splash pad. Mississauga, with a population of 600,000, has 12 arenas, or one for every 50,000 people. We will have two arenas or one for every 8,500 people. In this aspect we are well served;
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I can't imagine then-Mayor Hazel McCallion spending more than was necessary some might argue we are over served, but that remains to be seen. Whether Mississauga built all of these facilities in one area for $80 million is not known; however, I can’t imagine then-Mayor Hazel MacCallion spending more than was necessary. I wouldn’t be surprised if a large portion of the money needed to build these facilities came from provincial and federal grants. After all, that kind of money was available then, whereas there is no money for that today, as the Town found out. Mississauga is a case study in urban sprawl, but at least they put all See FOLLOW THE MONEY Page 19
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Page 6
The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
The Mandevilles featuring Serena Pryne
2017 Bandshell Series
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E. L. Crossley Class of 2017
BY JIM CASSON
Special to the VOICE
Presented by Holy Trinity Anglican Church, The Mandevilles may be the best band from Niagara that you haven’t seen yet. Their rootsy Americana sound, strong songwriting and amazing vocals by Serena Pryne will keep the Bandshell rockin’. This Welland-based band lead by Pryne and her writing partner Nick Lesyk have toured across Canada many times, including being hand-picked by the headliners on The Queens Of Sheba tour, opening for Heart and Joan Jett. Playing in support of their latest album, “Windows And Stones,” recorded in Vancouver with producer Garth
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CONVERSATION continued from Page 3 forward, a smaller one, and all of a sudden it was fraught with problems, problems I would've never had otherwise, never had before. And also I'm being turned down for the simplest, simplest things that simply don't get turned down, approved five times in the last week and all of the sudden my name's on the application and I'm turned down. So I file an Ontario Municipal Board appeal, then I file another Ontario Municipal Board appeal. Now I'm going to be, in another week or two, or a month, we'll be filing our third OMB appeal. So I'm stalled, so— And you think this is because you've rocked the boat? Yeah, I think this is— I mean, this is my assessment. I may be completely wrong, what do I know? But it's just odd that all of a sudden— this is not our first rodeo. Our company's been doing this a long time. We're reasonably good at it. How long have you been in business? Telcon Datvox I started when I was 20 years old. I've been there for 35 years, and we have just over a hundred, a hundred and five, employees there. There's 17 companies in our portfolio. So one of our companies, Humboldt Properties, does land development. We've been doing that since 1988, and we've done projects throughout the Niagara region and Hamilton, and we own a fair bit of land here in St. David's, in Fonthill, in Pelham. And we've owned this for a long time. We've been involved probably 10, 12 years ago in acquiring land in Pelham when the new secondary plan came out. And it's been a very frustrated process, simply because what it's taken Pelham 12 years to do, every municipality can do in two. They've just frittered away time and money, and it's— What are the delays? Micro-management. It is absolute micro-management. Not letting people do their jobs. That's why you have this massive turnover of staff in this community because there's constant interference in the process, because people are building monuments to their own egos with other people's money. Who's interfering? The Mayor interferes and certain councils interfere, but the Mayor— no one can do anything without the nod of the Mayor. So if somebody breaks the tip of their pencil, they sit there and wait for the Mayor to come in. It's absurd. [So] all of a sudden, we couldn't get anything done. And the director of planning at the Town of Pelham—the Town's very, very fortunate to have Barb Wiens as the Director of Planning. You're very lucky to have her. She was a huge loss to us in Niagara-On-The-Lake. She's a very, very solid, very honest, honest planner. I don't think she'll last there. We've always had a working relationship to come up with great solutions. She came up with a brilliant one on my project that solved everything and wrote a report,
The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
a planning impact analysis, that was, frankly, brilliant, and presented to council. It was turned down cold with absolutely no reasoning that made any kind of sense whatsoever. It was a brilliant, brilliant solution that their staff came up with and, I think, this Ms. Hanna, Julie Hanna, who's now apparently left the Town, she was part of the creativity behind that together with the director, and it got turned down. It makes no sense. That's when I said, "All right. Now somebody's playing games with me." So I let it be known, "Are you picking a fight with me?" And— How did you let it be known? I told the planning staff, "Are we going to war here? Is this what this is about? Does somebody want to pick a fight with me? Because ask around, you really don't want to do that because I don't back down. I'm not a builder who's afraid. I've been doing this for 30 years. I'm conservative, I'm careful with my money, I— And what was their answer? It got turned down. Should it have been turned down? Don't know, probably not, certainly not from a planning principle it shouldn’t have been. That's what planning staff were telling you? Yeah. It wasn't the director of planning but I'm not going to say who. But yeah, it shouldn't have been turned down. And there is an email that said, "The Mayor came down and told us not to do it this way. That's not what he wants. Change it." And in professional credentials, when you have an opinion and you believe in something, that's what you write down. And when a politician walks in and says, "That's no longer your opinion, this is," professional people, certainly those with higher levels of integrity, say, "No. Not going to do that." And in this particular case, this was an
What it's taken Pelham 12 years to do, every municipality can do in two individual who probably felt a considerable amount of pressure and correctly sent our staff an email and said, "Sorry, but we've been told we're not allowed to do it this way." And that's when I knew. Is that person still working at the Town? Recently left. By the way, a brilliant young planner, going places. So, moving along a little here, your main bone of contention at Regional Council was the valuation placed on property acquired by the Town from the Allen Group, $928,000 an acre. The appraisal that we've seen, after getting it through [a Freedom of Information request], was a little over $1 million an acre, and this was bumped back by the peer reviewer who, at this point, has declined to be identified. This raised red flags for you. Huge, huge red flags. At first, I didn't believe the number — it was so high — and I think I shared that with a number of people. I think the number is ridiculous. I couldn't actually believe it until it was actually confirmed. And that was confirmed very recently, like in the last four weeks. And that's when I said, "That's enough. I've heard enough now. I want to know, who do I see about this?" And my initial reaction was the Ombudsman of Ontario, which I did contact to determine— and it's really not necessarily their jurisdiction. I know See CONVERSATION Page 12
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
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E.L.Crossley 2017 valedictory address BY MATTHEW BEARD
Special to the VOICE
H
Playing field at Pelham Centre. VOICE ILLUSTRATION
COLUMN SIX continued from Page 1 then walking again once they’ve been scolded. Turn the corner and look out to the field. That baseball diamond has to be new: the sport was only invented in 1839. Pivot back from where we’re standing, on the edge of the grass, and look to the school itself. Most of it isn’t so old, though in the centre still stands what was once a one-roomed schoolhouse, now the library. On June 20th, 1887, the school inspector noted just one student present from the fourth grade. “Strawberry season,” he wrote. Some things have changed. When the first school here turned two, Beethoven was twelve. Aside from the steel posts of the soccer goals, and the grass cut too evenly to have been done over by a scythe, the view is timeless, and Ode to Joy might still be in its debut run in Vienna. Black raspberries line the woods that line the field, and they are darkening now in these last days of the school year. A shrewd student who knows her wildfruits might yet have a snack. Let’s continue on to the north field. It’s much smaller—where the juniors can play and develop their own hierarchies without fear of being trampled by the seniors. The gentle slope that runs from the doors down
to a playset was always the site of “King of the Hill” bouts, made more combative in winter when ice coated the bank and made it all the more difficult to seize the crown. The old wooden playset at the bottom of the hill was replaced when I was in the eighth grade. My class stood at our window and, one by one, recounted all of the injuries we’d suffered at its paws. “Why are they taking it out?” we wondered. Between the two fields is a cramped bog. The skunk cabbage is in bloom, as it always seems to be, belching out its impressive imitation of the real thing. It was never much of a deterrent, though, when marble season came around in May. For weeks, we’d crowd its edges, tossing cat’s eyes and steelies and comets into the gnarled knuckles of the old trees’ roots. A sport for every season—football in the fall, hockey in the winter, baseball and soccer in the spring. Other activities, too. On the benches near the baseball diamond, kids would congregate with trading cards and Gameboys. Sometimes, when we tired of sports and were in the mood for a risk, we’d push the bounds of the field into the forest into which we were forbidden to go, collecting sticks, building little tee-pees. “Before adolescence,” I once read, “memory is
more interested in the future than the past, and so my recollections of the town were not yet idealized by nostalgia.” So it was of those hazy days of Pelham Centre. I can’t remember or imagine what most of the girls were doing in all those recesses when we boys were pretending to play touch football but really tackling when the teachers turned, or starting a snowball and pushing it around the yard, another boy joining our efforts each time the ball got too heavy. At those ages, from eight to thirteen, we don’t linger on the periphery, nor do we think about what we’ll think about when reflecting, years in the future. Youths are immortal, and immortals are not concerned with posterity. To the mortal though, there is much to be nostalgic for at Pelham Centre. I see us playing football, our fingers so numb the ball slips as we try to throw— but now I see other groups, too. Even some girls playing. I see groups from the senior grades leaving the fields empty, instead standing in circles with their fists in their pockets to preempt any attempts to pull their pants down to their ankles. A few in the group are even holding hands; this is, after all, the age at which we begin to have vaguely—and then specifically—impure thoughts about others on
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the playground, classmates who were previously translucent. There are no real fences at Pelham Centre. I recall a few students taking advantage of this and escaping into the woods, or down the street, once they’d cracked. Years ago, this absence of barriers allowed escapees in, too. One day, students were kept inside at recess because there were buffalo roaming in the field. The new Pelham Centre/E.W. Farr school will be modern and sleek. More students will live closer to it, saving on fuel, among other efficiencies, that will total nearly two hundred thousand dollars per year, so we are told. The E.W. Farr site is lovely, too. It backs on to a sizeable wood and its yard has a slope suitable for tobogganing, if students are still permitted to engage in such hazardous activities. But, still. One day last winter I set out walking in the woods
behind my house. I hiked southwest, in a course that brought me crashing through the barren brush into Pelham Centre’s back field. It was late afternoon, seeping into one of those winter evenings that seem to begin at noon and persist until the last glint of the distant sun drops away. When I looked to the asphalt, I could see that a young boy was there, playing basketball. Not wishing to look threatening, I ambled along the tree line, looking away, taking care to seem uninterested in this boy’s presence. When I was within a hundred yards or so, he caught sight of me, and stopped. I turned away again, and began walking, slowly, staring at the ground. When I looked back, he was sprinting off towards the road, ball in hand. I followed him with my eyes, until he was just a shape bobbing in the gloom, and then, soon, he turned a corner and was gone. ♦
EY E V E R Y B O D Y, how’s it going? Yeah, it’s good to be here. This is gonna be a great night. A long night. We’re all so excited… These hats are weird. So, my name is Matthew Beard and I am thrilled to be representing the E.L. Crossley graduating class of 2017. I’m gonna list some of the amazing people who make up that class, feel free to make some noise for them when I do. I’m talking about the art kids, the music kids, the drama kids, I’m talking about the rowers, the basketball, track-and-field, hockey, lacrosse, volleyball and our other athletes, Our students council, chess club, interact club, film club, and our LGBTQ+ club, Even the crochet club with Mrs Wayda— because I can’t forget that one... And everyone else finding their way who I forgot to mention, E.L. Crossley graduating class of 2017… Guys… We did it. We’re done. It’s over! Right? We made it. Tonight marks the end of our four years together— four years of work, of growth, of friendships, and of change. Now I’m not going to stand here and say that high school was “the best years of our lives,” because for most of us it wasn’t. It’s been challenging. It’s pushed us and changed us in ways we couldn’t have imagined before we started. What I will say, with 100% certainty, is that our time together has been the most complicated years of our lives. And if you did it right, that’s exactly what it was supposed to be. Somewhere along the past four years we have all decided how we want to live— we decided how we want to treat the people around us, how we expect the people around us to treat us, what our goals and dreams are, and how much we are worth. Those things are all super weird to figure out. But we made it! We stand today as more fully formed, empathetic, intelligent, and complicated people. That is thanks See VALEDICTORY Page 10
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
Pelham celebra
A
DORNING THEMSELVES WITH MORE leaves than the Comfort Maple, a few thousand patriotic Pelhamanians painted the parade route down Haist Street red and white on Saturday. The destination was Harold Black Park, but the journey was at least half the fun. Marching in the parade were hundreds of members of local service clubs, sports teams and community groups. Local dignitaries were on hand, including MP Dean Allison, MPP Sam Oosterhoff and Regional Councillor Brian Baty. Mayor Dave Augustyn and Councillors Gary Accursi, Peter Papp and John Durley joined in the festivities as well, handing
VALEDICTORY continued from Page 6 to everyone in this room and the experiences we’ve had at this school. Four long, intense, confusing years have led to this moment. This is our day to be proud and to reflect on who we have become. And as we do, we should remember that none of this would be pos-
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sible without our incredible support systems. Our mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, grandparents and siblings who have gotten us here on time, picked us up when we've fallen, and forced us to do the things we hated. We owe our families the deepest gratitude for the work they have done getting us through the insane process of growing up. We also owe a debt to the
out Canada 150 flags, candy, and maple leaf face tattoos to those watching the floats pass by. “Today has been fantastic,” said Melisa Poiraudeau as she watched the parade with her family and friends on the front lawn of their home on Haist Street. “It looked like it was going to rain for a bit before the parade started, but now the sun is shining and everyone is having a lot of fun.” Kicking-off the party at Harold Black Park, Augustyn welcomed the enthusiastic crowd with a few words regarding what he loves most about being a Canadian. “We have fair access to good and affordable health-
incredible faculty and staff that go above and beyond to ensure that not only do we get one of the best educations in the country, we also get to experience success and growth in extra-curriculars unlike anywhere else. I would like to personally thank Mrs. Yallup for encouraging me to write, Mrs. Wayda for her supportive and hilarious presence in my time at Crossley, and Mrs.
Benson for inspiring me to pursue my passions. But while I’ve had my personal mentors, I know that every single student in this room could name the teachers who have gone above and beyond to make their lives better too. On behalf of the student body, thank you for inspiring and preparing a generation of young people. Good teachers really are the most under-appreciated
BY NAT
The
care. We enjoy freedoms of thought, belief, opinio sembly, and of associatio cution and from tyranny. work in a few of these ar global scale, we fare ver thankful.” Following the opening rounded the table near th had been set up to protect donated by Fonthill Sobe their bellies were full, m
members of our society. Okay. Alright, cool. I’ve officially covered everything you’re supposed to say in a valedictorian speech. We reminisced about the past, we celebrated graduation, and we thanked everyone who got us here. But now if you’ll let me, I’d like to talk to the graduating class for a minute. I had a really hard time writing this speech. I did.
Everything I wrote seemed fake. I wanted to be truthful and represent all of you as best as I could, but we all feel so different about today. For all of our lives, we’ve done what we were told. We wouldn’t be here today if that wasn’t true. But now, we’re seeing real freedom on the horizon for the first time. And that’s exciting, and it’s crazy, and it’s terrifying. There are an infinite number
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
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ates Canada 150
TE SMELLE
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of conscience and religion, on and expression, of ason. We are free from persey. While we may have some reas, when compared on a ry well and should be very
g ceremonies, people surhe main gate where a tent t the massive birthday cake eys owner Ron Kore. Once many of the kids lined up
to take a turn in the inflatable bouncing play area. Throughout the day there were several activities including a demonstration by the Krusher BMX stunt team, a KAIROS blanket exercise and a poutine eating contest. To help keep everyone moving there was also live music by ye Olde Folkers and By Design, as well as entertainment from Dance Place in Welland. Also helping to make the celebration a success were the many volunteers pitching in throughout the day. The Rotary Club of Fonthill and District hosted free children’s activities; the Fonthill Lions and Lioness Clubs dished out poutine and other snacks at the food booth; St. Alexander Knights of Columbus held a soccer challenge; the Welland Dis-
trict Humane Society provided information on pet safety; and the Canadian Legion’s Branch 613 Army Cadets took care of security and helped provide partygoers with directions. The Niagara Regional Police Service and St. John Ambulance were also on hand improving public safety. Acting as sponsors for the event were: Fonthill Volunteer Firefighters Association, Heritage Canada, Niagara Peninsula Energy, Sawmill Golf Course and Sobeys Fonthill. Though the forecast had originally called for stormy weather, the sun held out until late afternoon, when a short-lived rainstorm rolled through town, disappearing just in time for the fireworks display.
THE DAY IN PICTURES Clockwise from top left: Kinsmen Citizen of the Year, Ron Kore with his twin brother, Bob—can you tell which is which? Dancers from Dance Place Studios in Welland. A Mountie, marching on guard for thee. Louise Poiraudeau, 7, after engaging in a water gun battle with Pelham firefighters. Members of the Caber-EH! youth theatre group perform Ontario: A Place to Stand. A BMX bike rider in action. Branch 613 Army Cadets. Leanne Oliver-Racine and her sister Sarah Oliver. BMX rider and fireworks photos by Scott Hooper. All other photos by Nate Smelle.
of paths ahead of us and they all lead to different things. The smallest choices today will ripple into entirely different lives for ourselves in the future. And to those of you who are excited by that fact— congratulations, you are entering the world with a courage and open-mindedness that will take you very far. But for the people like me who look to the future and
are terrified of missing out, who are afraid of not living up to their potential or achieving all that they could, I offer this advice— only you can decide what you value, and it is the single most important thing you will ever do. A lot of people are going to try and influence those values— they’ll tell you what is important and what you should care about. They’ll say that life is about
how much money you make or how attractive you look. They’ll tell you it’s how many books you’ve read, or how you raise a family. It’s how you treat the people around you. It’s how hard you can work. It’s how happy you can be. They’ll say it’s love. It’s power. It’s freedom. All of those things matter exactly as much as you let them. And going forward, you have to decide. Because
outside of the way you make money or the subject you study, there is one thing you are making everyday, and that is yourself. That is your job after high school, and you must do it well. No one else can do it for you, but they will try. E.L. Crossley graduating class of 2017, if you are afraid of the uncertainty that tomorrow brings, please don’t be. I know this class, I know
that we are fully capable of living a happy, interesting, and complicated life. We’ll all be fine, we’ve got this. Let's just relax. I am honoured to be able to represent you as valedictorian, and to share my ideas with you tonight. I really am going to miss you next year. My biggest regret in high school is that there are some of you who I have barely even talked to. I can barely imag-
ine the friendships or experiences that could have been. But the future is bright, and this speech has already gone on way too long, so to close out our years together, I’d like to turn it over to the man who has represented us every single day on the morning announcements. Noah, take it away. (Stay classy Crossley!) Thank you.
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
CONVERSATION continued from Page 7 from a debenture that was done for the town of Niagara-on-the-Lake—I think we have a three-and-a-halfmillion dollar debenture— it was underwritten by the Region. The Region, in a sense, co-signed the loan. And that's when I thought to myself, "Well, the Region is the one who co-signed this loan." So I called up the Region and said, "You
guys co-signed this loan." "No, we actually borrowed the money on behalf of Pelham. We borrowed. We borrowed on behalf of Niagara-on-the-Lake, all the other municipalities. So it's our loan." And that's when I'm like, "Okay. You borrowed the money, do you know what it was spent on?" And so I queried several members of Regional Council. "Do you guys even know what this money was spent on?" "Yeah, it was spent
on the community center." "No, it wasn't. Part of it was, but part of it wasn't." I said, "I'm telling you that they had to pay this money back somehow." I looked at [Pelham’s] statements. My accounting staff did, and said they didn't have any money. They had half a million dollars. When you say, "Pay it back somehow," you're referring to the buyback of development charges credits that had been traded for the land valued at $928,000 an acre. Yeah, when the [development] community was out buying these development charges, people started raising the red flag. And I'm not the only one frankly. The Niagara Home Builders Association, "Wait a minute. You can't do this." So it wasn't just me. There were other people in the building community and development community. So it wasn't just me, but it was me who had a bee in his bonnet because all of a sudden I'm the so-called whistleblower, and all of a sudden everything I'm doing is being turned down. So yeah. Was I motivated by something? No question. Absolutely I'm motivated by something. You attack me. You drop the gloves. We're going toe-totoe. It's that simple. It's that simple. So the actual valuation— you've seen the appraisal. There is something called an “extraordinary assumption” that is an integral part of the number. Have you seen something like this before?
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I have actually. Extraordinary assumptions can be put into appraisals, and the reason is an appraiser is a professional. So they have professional liability errors and omissions insurance. If they're going to make a statement about something, and it is outside of what they normally would see, and they're not certain what their appraisal is being used for, they will include the clause “extraordinary assumptions.” And in this case, the extraordinary assumption was that the entire property is completely developed, serviced, individual lots. That's what it's worth. And— So just to be clear, the assumption here is that, instead of empty land— In the middle of nowhere. —in the middle of nowhere, these are now individual lots that have already been supplied hydro, water— Sewer, roads, streetlights. Sewer, everything, cable TV, whatever. They're construction-permit-ready. Ready to be handed over to a developer to build houses. And actually the way the appraisal’s written, it says the day before the building permit is issued. That's how it's written. So— Why is that important? So the appraisal in this case appears to me to be more an appraisal being done for the purposes of a builder paying his park dedication fee to the Town, not what the land is worth. I've seen this before, but not used for this purpose. “This purpose” being? Park land. Park dedications are actually done completely differently. A park dedication appraisal is done the day before the development is approved, so it's still raw land. There's nothing on it, and then you have to deduct the cost of the development to that point, the paperwork. That gets deducted. So lets say a
Absolutely I'm motivated by something. You attack me. You drop the gloves. We're going toe-to-toe. It's that simple.
piece of park land is worth— the day before the development's approved, it's worth $200,000 an acre. Now you deduct the cost of bringing it to that stage, which is about $30,000 an acre. And then, believe it or not, you deduct the developer's profit. The developer's profit on a project like this is about 15%. So then you take another $30,000 off. So now you come to $140,000. That's the value of the land for the park dedication purposes, and that's what we pay on. They’ve reversed this. So this appraisal completely throws that out the window? It's total and utter nonsense. From a layman's perspective— and that's very much what I am. For our readers who look at this and say, "Wait a minute. This is an appraisal based on a situation that doesn't exist. It's as if we said, 'Come in and appraise our house, but assume that we've added a story. We've added a pool. We've added a tennis court, and we have a helicopter landing pad in the back. Now tell us what our house is worth.'" Isn't that what's happened here? Actually, yes, in one way, you could us that analogy. The accurate analogy is: I have a pile of glass. I have a pile of plastic, and I have a pile of steel. These things, all manufactured, are a new Mercedes. What's the value of a new Mercedes? $140,000. But I have a pile of $300 worth of glass, $500
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worth of plastic, and $900 worth of steel. That's what I have. They're not a Mercedes. All those components could be made into one, but they're not. It's just a pile of junk, and until you make the Mercedes, there's no value to it. The Town paid for a complete, ready-to-drivedown-the-street Mercedes, and all they got was a pile of junk. A pile of plastic, steel and glass. That's the analogy. In front of Regional Council, you theorized that the only reason you could come up with that the deal was done this way was as, I think you phrased it, as a “backdoor bonus” to the developer. Could you clarify that, expand on that a little bit? Well, bonusing is where a municipality wants to entice a particular individual, a company, to come to their community. It's called bonusing. It's illegal. Bonusing is, "I want GM to come to Niagara-on-the-Lake. I don't want them to build in Niagara Falls. I'm going to offer them free property taxes for 10 years." That's bonusing. "I'm going to offer to build them a road. I'm going to give them $100,000 towards their first foundation." That's bonusing. Ontario doesn't allow that so communities don't pit against one another, and it's a good law. Its been around the books for decades. It's not legal. And the reason I speculate bonus-
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TRUSTEE continued from Page 5 take place. (Obviously, this archaic dictatorial leadership procedure does not allow diverse inputs that can lead to better results for our children.) As well, any decision, once adopted, must NEVER be changed ... period. (2) The Ontario Ministry of Education does not recognize nor do they respect the role and important effects of a child's community on their individual growth and overall development. If a concerned community member (even a school board trustee) should write about any educational issue to the Ontario Ministry of Education, they will receive a form-like letter stating that the local district school board is "a separate legal entity" and that the Ontario Ministry of Education "has no path by which to influence a district school board decision.” It will go on to state that "you must seek to solve any disagreements at the local level.” (If you choose to go to court, the Ontario Ministry of Education will finance the district school board expenses for the best defence lawyers in Canada, in my honest opinion.) It is interesting to note that our Canadian federal government encourages non-profit and other non-government organizations to build schools in the villages of poor third-world countries. This allows each school to become a social hub supporting the development of a local community culture that caters to the needs of all community members, especially the children. This social hub becomes the social heart of the community and the social safety net of many of its residents, especially the children. Meanwhile, in Ontario, the Ministry of Education does not care when it tears the social heart out of many of our smaller Canadian communities by closing and selling off their only remaining elementary or high school. Then, they "punish" most students by requiring them to be bussed for hours daily, about 190 days per school year, for years. (Imagine if the prison population was subject to this kind of extended daily bussing, the courts would likely rule it "cruel and unusual punishment" before banning the practice.) (3) The Ontario Ministry of Education does not care enough about the welfare of our children to take action if Ontario District School Board decisions are not evidence- based, fair or even legally sound. As well, the Ontario Ministry of Education does not care enough about the welfare of our children to insist that community members (parents and others) who are the primary caregivers to our children be treated with respect at all times. (The Ontario Ministry of Education did not even care enough for the physical safety of our children. When the President of the Ontario Public School Boards Association of school trustees informed the Minister of Education—on my behalf—of dangerously tox-
The majority of voters in Pelham/Thorold don't care who their public school board trustee might turn out to be as evidenced by their neglecting to vote
ic mercury contamination present in high school science classrooms and workrooms throughout Ontario, the Ministry of Education refused to alert the school boards. This toxic mess needed to be cleaned up to protect staff and students as soon as possible. Shame!) (4) The Ontario Ministry of Education does not care enough to have policies, regulations and procedures designed to protect trustees from personal and/or professional abuse. If a trustee should experience malice or malevolence directed towards them while in pursuit of serving students first, they have nowhere to turn except to their own personal healthcare professionals for treatment. All others working in education at the district level have somewhere to turn to resolve these issues, except trustees, who are the very last line of defence in caring for the educational well-being of our children. (I sought to establish such needed protective policy and procedures while serving as a trustee but my efforts were thwarted by others in education who, themselves, had these protections. Go figure.) (5) The Ontario Ministry of Education does not care enough to require and check that school trustees read the training modules that explain and teach trustees what their responsibilities are and how to carry them out, with competence, in order to serve our children's best interests. (These training modules were not even available to trustees until 2011; unless you discovered they existed on your own and were granted a special code from an executive member of the Ontario Public School Boards Association of school board trustees in order to access the training modules on the internet.) (6) The majority of Pelham/Thorold voters do not care enough to investigate if the character, experience, education, work habits and achievements of a school board trustee candidate indicate that they would work hard and serve students first during their time of public service. The electorate do not come to the public meetings for trustees during election campaigns. The electorate does not find out that almost all candidates do not even know what their responsibilities would be as a school trustee. (In 2010, I was the only one of nine trustee candidates at a candidates' meeting in St. Catharines that could state what the legal responsibilities of a school board trustee were in Ontario. By the way, I came eighth out nine candidates in that election. They don't
want me in St. Catharines either. I'm done.) (7) The majority of voters in Pelham/Thorold don't care who their public school board trustee might turn out to be as evidenced by their neglecting to vote. Even if they turn out to vote for other candidate positions, they don't bother to vote for a school board trustee in many instances. The electorate do not support school board trustee candidates either financially or otherwise. (I have a $1,000 reward for anyone who can show evidence that I received even $1 cash money financial support for any of my three election campaigns bids in Pelham/ Thorold.) (8) In regards to the E. W. Farr school naming issue, apparently, the public school board trustee that this community elected doesn't care what you think. This community needs a public school trustee who has the will and guts to debate, bargain, coddle, threaten and shame the DSBN into placing student needs first and all other agendas second. For sure, there is a really high personal and professional price to pay, but our children are worth it! And such an honourable trustee will always be able to hold their head high. (Have you been searching for that SPECIAL MISSION in life? Well, here it is. Go get 'em! (9) There's a great big issue about HONESTY at all levels in Ontario Education. It appears to be lost and cannot be found. (You may think the Americans have problems. Guess again.) (10) There is a prevailing attitude (culture) being promoted throughout education in Ontario. The attitude is that "if something has not been specifically stated in law as illegal then its use is acceptable in the dealings of any district school board.” HELLO! (That throws "good ethics" out the window, in my opinion.) Nothing in this letter should be misconstrued as a criticism of the amazing job that the teachers are doing in the classrooms of the District School Board of Niagara. In my opinion, and I believe, in fact, they are the most dedicated, educated, talented, skilled, experienced, sharing and caring teaching professionals I have ever met in my 75 years. And I see them continuing their professional and personal development by contributing to the communities in which their students live by organizing and participating in community events, as well as by attending courses of study to upgrade their teaching abilities. I salute them all! Gary P. Atamanyk Fonthill
Page 13
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CONVERSATION continued from Page 12 ing, is because of who the developer is. It's the Allen Group. They're great people. They're a great development company. David Allen is a man of— I don't know him personally, but his reputation has no blemishes. He has a tremendous amount of integrity. A very close friend of mine is a close friend of his, and when he tells me this is an absolute gentleman, I believe it. David Allen would never do something like that untoward. He just wouldn't. He doesn't need to. Then how do you explain what's transpired here? If, politically, somebody is motivated to have something happen and a businessman says, "It doesn't make sense to me at this point in time," and then somebody makes it make sense— In other words, you're talking about an offer too good to refuse. An offer too good to refuse. And every business person, developer, does nothing illegal for cutting the best deal you can. If you can out-negotiate the idiot on the other side, you win. They lose. There's nothing illegal, there's nothing wrong with that. If it was me in David Allen's shoes, I'd have done the same thing. I would have cut that deal in two seconds flat. My job is to get as much as I can for myself and my shareholders. If you've got a council that's too stupid or too blind to understand what they're doing, and you take advantage of them, there's nothing wrong with that. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that— From a business perspective, you're saying. Morally, maybe it's not so hot. Even morally. Their responsibility is to take care of business on behalf of the taxpayer. If they want to
The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017 build a monument to their ego and want to use the taxpayer's money to do it, and you could take advantage of that, it's not your problem. It is not your problem to be the moral compass of the elected officials. It isn't. Even at the risk of being the recipient of a bonus that's not permitted under provincial law? It is not illegal for me to take it. It's illegal to offer it. That's what the law says. If somebody wants to build me a road to my new factory, I'm not going to say no. A municipality wants to upgrade its infrastructure—which is what's happened here. The municipality decided to upgrade its infrastructure. I think a lot of people will be shocked to learn that it's illegal to offer but not illegal to accept. Yep, it's true. The laws are funny in that respect. Because the businessman is simply cutting the best deal he can for his company. And a municipality has to operate in the best interest of the taxpayer. And that means they have rules and regulations that they have to follow. That rule and regulation doesn't apply to the developer. We can cut the best— we're private enterprise, we can cut the best deal we can. And if the municipality is, I'm going to use a word, unfortunately, that doesn't maybe necessarily apply, but stupid enough to make a deal like that, I have a 100% right to take advantage of it. In front of council, you said this was either the most corrupted process you’d ever seen, or the stupidest. Yeah, one of the two. And that the question actually I'd like to ask the Mayor, which is it? Because there's no other explanation. This is either the stupidest process I've ever seen someone go through or the most corrupted process I've ever seen someone through.
Have you attempted to contact the Mayor directly? Or has he reached out to you? No. How about David Allen, from the Allen Group? I did receive a telephone call from a representative from the Allen Group about a month ago, asking me what the hell I thought I was doing, and would I please back down? And I said no. Any other contact since then? No, I expect to hear from their lawyers, but I haven't said— I've vetted this through my attorneys, and I haven't said anything, in my opinion, that constitutes anything other than the facts, so bring it on. Third point was the math. So when the Town went to borrow the money or asked the Region to borrow the money on their behalf, the Region obviously want to know, "Well, what's your budget? And in that, the Town chose $12 million coming from the development charges, and when I saw that— it didn't hit me at first, until I thought, $12 million? I recall Pelham’s development charges being like, thirteen or fourteen hundred dollars for recreation. How the hell can they get to $12 million? That's a fixed fee, it doesn't depend on the value of the house or the property? It's a fixed amount, and so that's when I looked it up, and I realized I was actually wrong. That the amount was—. The amount was originally— let's just go to their own bylaw. Where did I have that? Sorry, here it is. So you can see here, the Parks and Recreation in 2004 was $1,250 per home being built. In 2008 it went to $1,600. And then, recently, they changed how they deal with it and they call it something different. So when they changed the schedule in 2014— We're looking at by-
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If you've got a council that's too stupid or too blind to understand what they're doing, and you take advantage of them, there's nothing wrong with that.
law 3527, 2014 schedule of Town-wide development charges. Right. So when they changed in 2014, they separated out outdoor recreation from indoor recreation. Before, the two were combined and it was $1,400. It went from $1,400 to $2,609 plus $1,011. So it went to $3,600 from $1,400. So the Town already doubled the amount that they charge for recreational services and they — you've got to give them credit how they did it — they split it out. But indoor recreational services, they can collect $1,011 per house. That's it. That's to build arenas and community centers and washrooms and structures that have indoor facilities. Can't be used to buy land? Can't use it to buy land. That's park dedication. That's something entirely different. It's not on this. It's not part of the development charges. Development charges, by law, cannot be used to buy park land. The Act is very clear. So the Town showed in its budget $12 million to build their recreational facility. At $1,000 per unit you have to build twelve thousand homes in Pelham in order to get to $12 million. You can't get there. If you built on every square inch, every square inch of Pelham, you can build 3,300 homes. By their own numbers. That's the projected— what's the term, maximum
build-out? In 2030, something like that? 2041. In 2041, the maximum build-out is 3,300 [more] homes. That's $3 million. They said they have $12 million. Where? You're $9 million short. So either they have to take this number and multiply it exponentially, which has never been approved, which has never been part of a public process. Never has the building community seen that. So you're budgeting for something that doesn't exist. Then the other thing that I question, they show $15 million in land that they can sell. I'd love to know where this is, because their own audited statements say they have $12 million-worth of real estate to sell. And then this mythical budget or this budget they presented to Regional Council, it showed $15 million. And I guess my question there is simply, why would you not tell the Regional Councillors making a decision to borrow money on your behalf, the truth? Why do you doubt that the $15 million figure is correct? Or are you doubting that both figures may not be accurate? I just bought land for $160,000 an acre six months ago. It closed in November of 2016, seven months ago. And I paid $160,000 an acre. So I would like to know where this piece of land is. I'd like to know how big it is. And I'll give you a
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rough idea of what I think it's worth. I could ask my appraisers what they think it's worth. I've got a funny feeling it isn't $12 million, although that's what the audit statements say. And if that's what they say, fine. But they listed it as $15 million, $3 million higher. So between the $9 million missing in the development charges, and the $3 million overvalue in the land, you're $12 million behind the eight ball on a $36 million build. Can't get there. Somewhere, they have to go back, and they've now borrowed $33 million as of last night. In my opinion, you're $12 million short. You already have the highest per-capita debt in the Region, higher than the top two municipalities combined. And now you pretty much know you have to add more debt because you can't finish building the thing you've got under construction, because you spent part of the money and you overestimated your budget. The loan was also a factor in your coming forward? It's one of the reasons I wanted to be on the agenda last night. One thing was because of the Audit Committee meeting that happened a month ago, where the Mayor of Pelham presented certain things that I found somewhat questionable. I hope I answered some of those last night. And then, I had also heard See CONVERSATION Page 18
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Page 16
The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
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adline this years from exciting continued Page 4event. It grounds.
I’m perhaps mistaken, but it’s smelling like a cynical exercise. Going through the motions. Wrapping up and petitive ride taking place on Sept. putting a bow on a fait acara and support the Walker Famcompli, then doing what’s already been decided behind closed doors, maybe because Council is left with no other alternative. It’s a fair assumption at m Tuesdays the Pelham Arena this at juncture that it’s not proposal at all, the Bandshella for 9-10:30 am.that There Pelham arena site shall be ormation,built please contact over one way orjcook@ another, regardless of what would be wise planning for the future and what ratepayers may prefer. The site has been well used for decades Market or a non-perishable as bring a park, yet it’s likely all butMarket a sliver on will be sold m Farmers Sept. 4. to commercial interests, then
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rezoned and developed into private properties. Possibly including lowrises. The character of the neighbourhood is about to undergo a change that few, if any, of its residents will celebrate. Our Council has been hard at work to awaken Pelham from its rural slumber and in the process seems to have been especially deferential toward developers, including those from out of town with no stake in the quality of life here. And what a beautiful piece of land the arena property is with its well- drained, sandy loam soils and easy excavation, road construction and servicing. What developer wouldn’t be salivating at the prospect of multiple millions made privatising and building over this pub-
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lic recreation area that local homeowners have for decades enjoyed? They win, we lose. And Pelham’s future generations lose out too. I’m afraid it’s fruitless looking back in that rearview mirror. All there’s to be seen is nostalgia for a pleasant lifestyle come to an end. I’m at a loss. Did we see this coming? Did we all agree this is where we wanted to be in 2017? Or were we asleep in the backseat, trusting the driver to get us safely to a more agreeable destination? I and others have sincere questions for those who’ve driven us to these crossroads. What’s the rush? Is the private sale and development of the publicly owned Arena property a foregone
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Special Investigations Branch. Lost between South Pelham and Deerpark cr Fonthill. It could be on Must CONTACT be able to drive a manual THE VOICE AT the road or in the Bauer trail as I was coming from Lily nails to my transmission. Interviews to be home OCNA Network Ads, I rode my bike and locked it by the fence near Lily Nails then held Nov 14, 1967. Meet inClassifi front ed proceeded to ride the short ride home. of the(AD Canadian Imperial Bank CENTRAL) of Commerce, corner of Hwy 20 Email Tracy Strycker, and Pelham St., 10:00 AM, for email: office@thevoiceofpelham.ca tracy@salonallegra.ca or call the Voice office at of furtherWeek instructions. 905-892-8690
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publicly owned Arena property a foregone This ad is to be printed by all participating Ontario conclusion because Town Hall needs the cash? conclusion because Town Hall needs the cash? Is the open space within walking distance of so many of us about to be taken away and sold to help pay for a new community complex that we can only drive to? And to help pay for newly created positions and increased salaries in Town Hall?
The way I calculate it, increases in the town levy portion of our property taxes have been quite reasonable since 2006 when some of you Councillors, and the Mayor, were elected, about the same or even a bit less than inflation. So on that score you’ve been doing a good job. But have you not
been spending more? If so, where has the money come from? Has some of the extra operating cost been accrued? Compared to compounded inflation, about 19%, how much have individual Town salaries gone up since 2006? How much papers over the same period has the expense of Town administration gone up? How much has our Town’s debt increased? What’s at the bottom of those development fee deals allowed to out-of-town developers? And most fundamentally, how solvent are we? By-and-by we will come to learn the answers to these questions, and they will set the tone for a simple question the rest of us will need to answer in October of 2018.
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
Page 17
Sidebar Anatomy of a land deal: Appraisal alchemy
How did three acres “in the middle of nowhere,” by one developer’s assessment, get transformed into some of the most valuable empty real estate in the history of Niagara? By telling a good story, says a commercial real estate appraiser. BY VOICE STAFF Agreeing to speak off the record (a number of other Niagara appraisers declined to talk on any condition), a senior appraiser we’ll call Smith, with nearly three decades’ experience in Niagara and beyond, says that inflated valuations aren’t unusual, but he’s never heard of a number matching $928,000 per acre in Niagara for unserviced land minus even an access road. “Hello? Are they trying to build Disneyland?” In March 2014 the Town of Pelham negotiated a comprehensive land deal with Fonthill Gardens, a subsidiary of the Allen Group, a GTA commercial development company. (The new Fonthill Marketplace, anchored by Food Basics, is an Allen project.) In September 2015 an additional agreement was reached between the parties calling for the swap of development charges credits in lieu of cash for acreage that the Town sought to acquire. The agreement specified that the value of the acreage was to be determined by the seller, the Allen Group, based on an appraisal that they themselves would commission. Appraisers are chosen to estimate “market value,” says Smith. “It’s up to the seller and buyer to establish ‘actual value’ by acting ‘prudently.’”
If a high appraisal is the goal, he says, “Sometimes appraisers are fed the KoolAid and they drink it.” The resulting appraisal for the East Fonthill land, prepared by the Toronto firm of MacKenzie, Ray, Heron & Edwarth (MRHE), concluded that approximately eight acres situated between Highway 20 and Port Robinson Road were worth a bit over $1.1 million dollars each as of November 2015. Some 148 building lots were projected for the acreage. This figure was “peer-reviewed,” or double-checked, by a second appraiser, who concluded in March 2016 that the $1.1 million figure was high, but not by much. The peer reviewer reduced the perlot value from an average of $60,135 each to $54,000 each. The eventual price was settled at approximately $928,000 per acre. Yet with adjacent and nearby lots selling for $152,000 per acre as recently as last autumn, how did these eight acres come to be valued five times higher back in 2015? The appraisal employed a method known as an “extraordinary assumption” to get its math to add up. Extraordinary assumptions are not uncommon, says Smith, but must be grounded in reality. Smith says that he’s sometimes called on as an expert wit-
ness by malpractice insurers defending appraisers sued for miscalculations, but that some errors are so egregious that he can’t in good conscience take the assignments. (Neither Smith, nor the Voice, has seen evidence that an intentional attempt to mislead was present in preparing the appraisal at issue, nor is there an assertion that any breach of professional ethics, or the law, occurred.) It’s not uncommon, says Smith, to “bury facts” or “bury assumptions” in an appraisal, a document that can run anywhere between a few dozen to a few hundred pages. (The MRHE appraisal is 57 pages.) “The average person— even an OMB judge— doesn’t have the attention span. The longer the appraisal, the easier it is to mislead the reader,” says Smith. Will the reader be able to recognize a buried fact, “or are you being taken down a path.” The extraordinary assumption used in the East Fonthill appraisal was that all eight acres of land, rather than being empty, were instead assumed to be 148 “fully serviced lots,” building lots that have already been supplied with hydro, natural gas, water, sewer, sidewalks, and paved roads, entirely ready for builders to start pouring foundations and commence home
A portion of the peer reviewer's opinion, addressed to former Treasurer Cari Pupo. At their request, the peer reviewer's identity has been redacted from the document. VOICE GRAPHIC
construction. Two cautionary footnotes appear in the appraisal, one at the start, one at the end, defining the term. Both read, “Extraordinary Assumption: an assumption, directly related to a specific assignment, which, if found to be false, could alter the appraiser’s opinions or conclusions. Extraordinary Assumptions (Hypothetical Conditions) presume as fact simulated but untrue information about physical, legal, or economic characteristics of the Subject property or external conditions.” (Our emphasis.) Appraiser Smith, who says that he has worked on
appraisals and as an appraisal consultant across North America, including for all levels of Canadian government and the US federal government—as well as in Pelham in the East Fonthill project itself—asserts that an appraisal is like a story, and that if a reader doesn’t understand the story it’s up to the appraiser to rewrite it until it makes sense. If it can’t be made to make sense, then the underlying premises may be faulty. In this case, it appears that the story was written well enough to be understood by CAO Darren Ottaway, Mayor Augustyn, and
Pelham Town Councillors, who ultimately okayed the deal. The appraisal’s original author has not responded to requests for comment. The peer-reviewer’s name and firm’s name were redacted, at their request, from the appraisal copy the Town eventually provided to the Voice after multiple inquiries. David Allen, principal with the Allen Group, has not responded to requests for comment. Pelham CAO Darren Ottaway has not responded to a request for comment. No Pelham Town Councillor has responded to requests for comment.
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Page 18
The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
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CONVERSATION continued from Page 14 that Pelham was going in to borrow another $12 million last night. Second draw. They borrow $21 million and their second draw was $12 million. And that needed Council approval last night. And so I thought, "Well, if you're going to go borrow another $12 million, are you telling the truth this time?" So I don't know. We'll see once the paperwork on that comes out. The vote to approve that passed. Did you hope that your presentation would make a difference? They have to approve it. The Regional Council doesn't have a choice because the Town's already spending the money. They owe contractors. I'm pretty sure Pelham could sue the Region if they didn't approve it because the first draw was approved. You were given an overall budget. So if I'm Mr. Pelham, I'm saying, "Mr. Region, you approved $36 million. We drew down $21 million of that. We're under construction. We're spending and, all of a sudden, we need the next draw, the next $12 million, and you say, ‘No.’ What do we do? Leave this hulk of a building half-built?” So I'm not disappointed because I expected it to be approved. What I think you have to look at is the vote. Not everybody voted to approve it because I think some flags were raised. I think, because some of the questions that were asked of me afterwards, like, "We
www.thevoiceofpelham.ca didn't know this. We didn't know this. And we're concerned now." A particular councilor came out to talk to me right after I walked out of the Council chambers and he said, "Wow, we just kind of automatically assume everyone's telling the truth
I'm telling you there's a lot of things wrong here
and we just vote yes. We don't even question these things." He said, "We have to start questioning these things. We just can't automatically approve it. We're going to do a better job." And I’ve heard from others, a couple that I really never had any contact with or even know, and they said they had absolutely no idea how this worked or how this was done. They said, even parts of what I presented, they said, it's still confusing to them. They don't completely understand the printing of development charges and then how that actually works. So they were quite shocked by this. And I guess my comment back is, "Well, if you, the people that we entrust for your stewardship over these things, don't
understand it, how does the public understand it?” I had text messages sent to me like, "What the heck? Why didn't you say something earlier?" I said, "Well, I've kind of been saying stuff for awhile." Where do you hope that this goes? Well, the problem is, I think the Town's spending money the taxpayer doesn't have. My serious concern is in the next five, eight years, the Town is going to be facing a significant tax increase. What I would hope comes out of this is that the entire East Fonthill secondary plan gets another look because this is not the only thing that's wrong. I'm telling you there's a lot of things wrong here. I'm not talking from a community perspective because communities don't necessarily look at bottom-line dollars and cents — they probably shouldn't — but when I look at this strictly from a business model perspective, this model's broken. This is not sustainable. What Pelham is building in East Pelham, in East Fonthill, is an absolutely unsustainable, financially unsustainable community. The taxpayer cannot cover the cost of this thing. Even though the developers are going to build it and we're going to hand it over to them— if they stop building it on their own, that is. But the maintenance of this, what they're creating, is not sustainable. Well, I think that's a topic for a future conversation. I appreciate your time. Thank you.
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
Page 19
The
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FOLLOW THE MONEY continued from Page 5
of these facilities in one area. Here in Pelham we will have two arenas with little parking. The land around the arenas will be congested with buildings of various types. There will be no soccer fields, baseball diamonds or pools. Sounds like Mississauga got a good deal. As for the Chairman of the Oversight Committee: checking facts is quite simple today. Just go on Google and all is made clear. Getting information secondhand is no way to oversee a large, expensive project like the two arenas you are charged with overseeing. I can only hope you are getting your information concerning progress and bricks from a more reliable source than your friend from Mississauga.
Fun with Numbers The Mayor reported last week that our property taxes went up a total of 2.0%, not the 2.3% reported this past April. How can this be, you ask. Well, after contacting the Mayor's office repeatedly since April to get clarification on the Town-only portion of the tax bill, I gave up and sent the pertinent information to an expert. He came up with the numbers using some simple calculations. I sent these numbers to the Mayor's office for confirmation. His message for the week seems to have confirmed my expert's numbers. It goes like this. Take your MPAC statement and find your property value for 2017. Multiply that number by the mill rate for each of the three levels of tax paid. That is your tax bill for 2017. You can check your previous increases using your MPAC numbers
JIM PITT GRAPHICS
from other years and multiplying these numbers by the mill rate for the year in question. What does it all mean? The chart above will help explain. The Region has had minimal tax increases for the last four years. The education portion has actually decreased, while the Town portion has increased a total of 15.12% since 2014. While the Region and education portion of property taxes have remained very low, the Town’s portion has exploded. It is well hidden in the overall increase. The Region portion of our taxes has risen an average of 0.67% per year. The Education portion of our taxes has fallen an average of 2.17% per year, while the Town portion of our taxes has risen an average of 5.04% per year. See, wasn’t that easy.
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The Voice of Pelham, July 5, 2017
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ALLEGATIONS continued from Page 1 same issues up in a different way and present it at a different venue, which is not the right venue. We’ve answered all these questions, and our auditor has answered all these questions. It’s standard operating procedure with growing municipalities do these types of things.” Pelham’s other Regional Councillor, Brian Baty, disagrees. “The presentation made at Council contains dates, specific addresses, financial data and questions over lack of public documents that are cause for concern,” Baty said. “They are more clear than the ‘whereas’ clauses in Councillor Barrick’s motion. Despite a 300-plus page document prepared by the Town and a ‘Meeting of Experts’ to rebut concerns, it is clear that the issue has not concluded. It is not the place of the Region to resolve this matter. It is time that the Mayor and Council initiate an independent forensic audit to support or refute these allegations and to make public all related support materials.” Also speaking after the meeting, Hummel asserted that the turnover rate among Town staff is a warning sign. “How do you go through four or five planning directors, or senior planning people in five years? How do you
How do you go through four or five planning directors, or senior planning people, in five years? go through four or five finance people? They’re either fired or they quit. There’s a reason for that. Where is the problem? The question always is, what’s the common denominator? In Pelham, you see these strange transactions and then all of a sudden you see somebody being fired who’s in finance and then you see a strange transaction and you see somebody quitting.” Through its Public Relations and Marketing Specialist, Marc MacDonald, the Town of Pelham released a statement last Friday, reading in its entirety: “Town Council has taken these type of questions very seriously since they first arose at the end of March. Council, staff, industry, and legal experts have reviewed and addressed these same claims in public meetings, presentations, and in the compilation of our response documents. These documents serve as the Town’s official response, and those with outstanding questions are encouraged to consult them. The Town’s lawyers are reviewing Mr. Hummel’s presentation to Regional
Council. Town Council will consider all next steps, including potential legal action.” The implied lawsuit threat is something that Hummel says he’s heard before, asserting that a Town employee contacted him to say that they had been threatened with a suit if they spoke out. “Why does somebody have to be sued for speaking?” he said. “Whistleblowers, when they see something wrong they should have the ability to speak up. I mean I’ve paid the price for speaking up against Pelham. I’ve had every development application I’ve put forward turned down. So, there is a price to pay for it. But, you know what, I’ve been doing this a long time and I’ve got a lot of land, so if I put Pelham on hold for 10 years it’s not going to change my life any.” Hummel expands on his experience with Pelham in an extended interview this week, starting on page 3. See also the sidebar, "Anatomy of a deal," page 17, for an analysis of the appraisal method used in East Fonthill.
Two of eleven slides presented to Regional Council last Thursday by Rainer Hummel. SUPPLIED GRAPHICS