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bilko@rgcmail.com Vol.21 No.27
Wednesday, October 4, 2017
FREE
Public meeting held on East Fenwick planning Residents push back against development that "can't be stopped" BY SAMUEL PICCOLO
The VOICE
Less than three weeks after a contentious public meeting regarding plans for the Pelham Arena site, Town planning staff held another consultation last Saturday, this time to discuss the East Fenwick development. About 70 Fenwick residents filled the local fire hall on a golden Saturday afternoon, perusing the posters of information before the event began. Many in attendance were skeptical of the affair in advance. “They’ve already decided everything,” said one woman. Three others, residents of Welland Road directly across from part of the planned East Fenwick site, which is between Welland and Canboro Road at Balfour Street, announced themselves committed to more drastic measures. “There is a grove of maple trees right across from our homes,” said Irene Birrel. “And we’ll chain ourselves to them if we have to.” Jeff and Sue Pietz, Birrel’s neighbours, nodded in agreement. “Those trees are probably 150 years old,” said Jeff. Pelham’s Director of Planning and Development Barb Wiens stood at the front of the room and explained the East Fenwick process. This particular area of Fenwick has been within an “urban” classification for at least 25 years, she asserted, and now that development of the land is imminent, the Town is drafting a secondary plan to guide construction. Wiens then introduced Ute Maya-Giambattista, a partner at SGL Planning & Design, the firm that the Town contracted to develop this secondary plan. Maya-Giambattista explained that provincial regulations mandate that any new development within an “urban” boundary must be built at a density of 20 units per hectare. This density, which averages out to just under seven units an acre, is starkly divergent from the one-acre lots See FENWICK Page 14
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Column Six Aiming for Bopple Hill BY JOHN SWART
VOICE Correspondent
L
Interested residents listen to a presentation on plans for East Fenwick, some more happily than others. SAMUEL PICCOLO PHOTO
Conservation Authority fires eight Move sees already embattled organization blasted anew BY VOICE STAFF Just days after Ontario’s Auditor General decline to audit the organization, the Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority terminated eight employees, seven of whom were employed in the Watershed Management Department. While the Authority’s CAO Mark Brickell maintained the prox-
imity of the firings to the Auditor General’s announcement was pure coincidence, the move has intensified already prevalent criticism of the NPCA. “This is an assault on workers, on the NPCA’s conservation mandate, and on the environment of the Niagara Region,” said Ontario Public Service Employees Union president Warren Thomas. Thomas, who goes by “Smokey,” expressed concern that the NPCA would have difficulty “fulfilling its mission of conserving, restoring, and managing the Niagara watershed” when half of the depart-
ment had just been eliminated. The termination of the eighth employee, an event co-ordinator, comes less than two weeks before the Ball’s Falls Thanksgiving Festival, one of the NPCA’s biggest events. “This group at the NPCA is out of control,” Thomas said. Brickell refused to even acknowledge that specific firings had occurred, instead stating repeatedly that the NPCA “had taken steps to bring about necessary changes.” Brickell said that the NPCA will be making announcements
ET ME TELL YOU about the Highlander Cycle Tour. The promotional blurb on the website begins: "You’ve survived California’s Deathride and the World’s Toughest Century. You’ve had a Triple Bypass in Colorado and Whimpered your way through North Carolina’s Mountains of Misery, but can you complete the King of the East, the retooled Highlander Cycle Tour?" It then goes on to state that if you manage to finish the Highlander, you can enter the next day's MVP Healthcare Rochester Marathon for free. Wonderful. Calling this masochistic bike ride a “tour” is like calling a canoe trip over Niagara Falls doing some whitewater. The Highlander is just over a "century" in length (160 kilometers/100 miles), and it climbs 3350 vertical metres, more than two miles, over 20 hills with gradients up to 23 percent as it winds through New York's Finger Lakes wine and ski country. That’s the equivalent of cycling up the Olympic Downhill Ski Run at Lake Placid twice, or pedaling up Fonthill's Saylor's Hill sixty-five times. I had yet to ride a century
See FIRINGS Page 16
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