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vnfm bfjxsumbiiils 1997 st the tribune thursday september 25 1997 vol 109 no 60 comment tmons send your letters to the editor to the address below editorial who cares about kids where are the caring concerned residents who want to safe guard and promote education for their communitys youth with only two weeks remaining to register for the nov 10 municipal election so far few candidates have shown an inter est in becoming school trustees for york regions two school boards in stouffville the longtime public school trustee is not run ning again and no other candidate has yet registered to fill his seat for the separate board only one candidate from aurora is registered for the seat which now includes stouffville there are several possible reasons why theres not a stampede of people wanting to become school trustees one is that the provincial government has capped their annual pay at 5000 turning the money into an honourarium not a salary the province is also tightening rules on who can run as trustee another overriding reason is the myriad and massive changes to trustees role and the education system in general resulting in potential and current trustees not knowing what their job description will be after election day however the fact remains that the role of the education trustee is perhaps more vital in these days of overwhelming change than ever before if local people dont step forward as watchdogs of the provinces educational decisions kids in our schools will surely suffer only local trustees can know whats truly happening in the schools in their community can speak out if they see your childrens classroom situation deteriorating the deadline for filing nomination papers through the town office is oct 10 caring committed people are needed to run as trustees in our community it may not be a bigsalary job with lots of power but the future of our children is in your trust water hookup a comedy of errors dear editor open letter to mayor wayne emmerson subject community water supply in ballantrae the purpose of this letter is to express our concern regarding the handling of the new community water supply in ballantrae and musselmans lake we have lived in ballantrae for almost 12 years and love the area this is the first time we have felt there was sufficient cause to object to the workings and decisions of stouffville town council however this entire effort has been so poorly organized from beginning to end and has caused so much confusion and hard feelings that we felt we had to speak up our own well has always supplied us with clean plentiful water we do recognize that there are people in the area particularly those in musselmans lake who suffer from water quality problems markham fair banner not welcome on main dear editor we have lived and operated a business in stouffville for the past three years and i have finally decid ed to voice my opinion about an annual event that takes place at this time every year the banner that is stretched across main street advertising the markham fair is almost a slap in the face for the business people of stouffville do we get the chance to hang a banner across markham main street advertising the strawberry festival in stouffville there is no question that every business in stouffville will suffer when the fair is on why should we add insult to injury for the people of stouffville by blatantly advertis ing this markham event maureen breen stouffville more random dear editor i just wanted to take a minute and tell you how much i like the random spot it is very creative and of high interest any chance of giving us two to four items each time sometimes the most interesting stuff doesnt get a whole column thanks for the creativity ron boyd stouffville in fact the discussion regarding how to deal with this problem has taken place over many years with limited and poor communication back to the constituents there was confusion about the optionality whether wells had to be capped how much had to be paid to hook up etc when the matter finally came to a vote a negative option style was employed whereby those who did not vote were deemed to be in favour of the scheme when cable tv companies apply this method they are castigated in the press but when stouffville town council uses it it is called democracy regardless the work finally got underway in the summer of 1 996 it seems to have been successfully completed but much of the work especially the cleanup has been quite shoddy concrete driveways and curbs were smashed and not properly repaired and the resod- ding effort was very substandard leaving dead grass all over the neighbourhood to top it all off within days of finishing the resodding work crews descended on the area again and started ripping up lawns to install natural gas piping theres nothing like a well coordinated plan this year we were informed that we would have to connect to the community water supply by de cember 311 997 even though our own water supply was excellent as good citizens and believing that council actually meant what it said we proceeded to obtain a permit and engage a contractor to connect the water supply to our house the permit cost more than 300 and the contractor cost more than letters 1200 note that the permit was mandatory even though we were told we had no choice but to hook up what exactly were they permit ting this is all in addition to the frontage fee to the town of almost 1300 this adds up to a major expense ofover 2800 to get some thing a water meter and the privi lege of paying for our water that we didnt want in the first place neighbours have had similar expe riences and have also signed their names to this letter subsequent to our own hookup we have discovered that council has granted an extension for hook ing up to july 1998 apparently in response to complaints from those in musselmans lake who wanted the water in the first place granted an exemption to anyone who can prove their water is potable again in response to com plaints well now were complaining we pay significant property taxes to live in what is normally a wonderful area we believe we deserve better treatment from our elected officials than this comedy of errors would someone from council please provide a rational explana tion for this mess clarify the go- forward situation and tell us how we are to be compensated for all the money that has been needlessly laid out alan brooks ruth brooks tim bain lila bain stouffville tribune a metroland community newspaper patricia pappas publisher andrew mair editorinchief julie caspersen editor debra weller director of advertising mike rogerson retail advertising manager stacey allen classified manager barry goodyear director of distribution vivian oneil business manager pamela nichols operations manager about us news 9056402100 retail sales 905 6402100 classifieds 905 6402874 distribution 9056402100 fax 9056405477 email thetribistarca 6244 main st stouffville ont l4a1e2 the stouffville 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