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10 stouffville suntribune thursday jan 27 2005 town needs money from parkview project smith i is i from page 1 have to be stepped up council first turned down parkviews request for a fees exemp tion in august mayor sue sherban asked town staff in december to come up with a creative solution allowing parkview home some financial relief councillors couldnt agree on a solution at tuesdays meeting councillors rob hargrave and phil bannon favoured total exemption from the fees when do we stop supporting our seniors councillor bannon said in an emotional plea the answer is we dont the people currently living at parkview home gave 100 per cent of their time as leaders of the com munity councillor hargrave said we will fail as a council if we do not give them a full exemption almost criminal the decision to charge the fees came after much soul searching by the rest of the councillors there should be more support by regional and provincial levels of government for such facilities councillor clyde smith said he called their lack of support almost criminal he was looking to the needs of the entire municipality when he made his decision noting the town needs development charge revenues to build and upgrade its infrastructure for the boom in development to come over the next 10 years he said parkview home was receiving a huge benefit from the town already by not paying taxes for regular town services and infrastructure councillors bannon and susanne hilton tried to get other councillors on board for partial exemptions but without success councillor hilton too was con cerned about a potential shortfall in town revenue of around 18 million over the next decade due to rapid development it wouldnt be fair to grant the exemption to just one facility councillor ken ferdinands noted parkview home is taxsheltered he said while hes heard from seniors living in their own homes who are worried about losing them due to high taxes every taxpayer already supports parkview to some extent he said adding the community has not abandoned parkview noting hes supported parkview home over the years even to the extent of providing a loan of his own money in the early years councillor harry bowes wasnt able to support an exemption we have to maintain the finan cial integrity of the community he said i have to think again about spending the money of taxpayers of whitchurchstouffville mayor sue sherban was disap pointed at the outcome saying again we have not provided our seniors with assistance from the municipality rob hargrave stouffville coun cillor supported full exemption from fees for new parkview home ijg chrysler financial 905415226 8280 woodbine avenue markham south ofhwy f7west side across from costco poverty poor health affect literacy level from page 1 in school if i didnt understand they pass me over said the young mother here i have to do it until i get it its wonderful she has aspirations of tak ing college courses and become an emergency oper ator my prime motivation to be here is my daughter she said i felt i needed to do something for both of us to make us both proud and to earn a living that isnt mini mum wage improve skills margaret is an unem ployed 42year old newmarket resident looking to improve her math com puter and spelling ultimately she wants a full- time administrative position i went to public school in toronto she said if i had a problem they just didnt take the time to teach me proper ly like they do here ive been here three months and i have made good progress at 25 laura could not multiply or divide numbers i failed grade 11 math and it was hard to get extra help she said the classes were ridiculous there were too many students here its awesome i hope to get my graduate equivalency diplo- ma the diploma is also 17- year old ryans quest having left school in grade 8 the teenager was aware his limit ed math and english skills would hamper entry to the working world ive been here three months and im doing well he said its a great environ ment and i like the personal ized instruction the literacy council serves up to 130 adult stu dents annually with the help of two fulltime staff a pair of part time employees and 50 volunteer tutors executive director trisha muise said the bulk of students are aged 25 to 45 though some are in their 70s the number of students may sound small but these are the people who know about us she said one of our greatest challenges is to tell people we exist citing international adult literacy and statistics canada surveys ms muise said 16 per cent of canadians have reading skills too limit ed to allow them to deal with the majority of written mate rial and adults with low liter acy skills are likely to be unemployed literacy prob lems impact negatively on health and standards of liv ing contributing factors are varied she said although they were part of the school system some people didnt get fundamen tals and basics said ms muise they may not have received special attention or had learning disabilities poverty and health are also issues that relate to low liter acy skills programs tonight the council in tandem with public libraries in aurora newmarket and bradford will celebrate family literacy day with special programs beginning tonight at 7 pm at each location literacy council york simcoe infor mation is available by calling 905-853- 6279 or visiting mmlcysca on line literacy council york south in thomhill can be reached at 9057717323 the learning centre for georgina can be accessed 9054769900 yorks literacy councils are members of the metro toronto movement for literacy a network resource for literacy practitioners for information call 416- 9614013