The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

i economist suntribune thursday oct 24 2002 stouffville tribune sewing the community since 1856 a metroland community newspaper 9 heritage rd markham ont l3p 1m3 publisher ian proudfoot editorial york housing strategy proves offering incentive works people on lengthy waiting lists for afford able housing had a reason to celebrate last week albeit a small one the start of construction on 58 assisted-liv- ing apartments for senior citizens and disabled adults in newmarket marked the first signifi cant housing project to be built in more than five years the project an 8million renovation of a regional health centre demonstrated the local ly developed strategy intended to create 100 new housing units a year is working it brought the federal and provincial gov ernments back to the table in a funding part nership with the region and municipality however its a drop in the bucket in relation to the need across york region and the units are geared to a specific group theres no space in this building for lowincome families the region plans to continue to supply housing with a 60unit project in vaughan and 100unit project in aurora in the works newmarket mayor tom taylor says one of the keys to the success of the initiative has to be longterm dependable funding from the other two levels of government it would certainly help but until the provincial and federal govern ments can get a handle on how much they must commit to health care it seems unlikely they will be in a rush to lock into more long- term funding schemes instead york region could ask the senior levels to follow its own example while the madeinyork housing strategy certainly calls for financial incentives to build rental projects in community cores its focus is on removing obstacles to construction for the newmarket health centre project the town waived 132000 in development charges and the region also committed to waiving fees for affordable housing the region also reduces tax rates to developers who com mit to building a mix of housing in short york region makes it easier for the private sector to provide homes for lower- income residents the reason governments need to build and operate so many housing projects is nobody else will do it theres an enormous demand for reason ably priced rental housing you would think builders would want to supply it the cost of construction including meeting various government requirements is one of the reasons builders dont meet that need ideologically the tories would be far more likely to support ways to remove obstructions to private construction than to make a long- term commitment to support government construction but by increasing rental units social hous ing can be made available to those who need it most opinion letters to the editor thanks for helping foodgrain bank re york fanners produce major grain for third world oct 19 on behalf of the york soil and crop improvement association and canadian foodgrains bank i would like to thank the economist suntribune for coverage of our projects in york region since 1999 our projects have increased from four to 10 also the awareness of what farmers can achieve has assisted in local fundraising and the results are increases each year reporter joan ransberry has shown interest and understanding and the benefits to our project have been outstanding terry oconnor whitchurchstouffville speed demon put on notice something happened in front of our home saturday night and i owe it to our community to create some awareness and hopefully pre vent further violence when our dog escaped his pen my wife and i ran from our driveway on to mccowan road hoping to avoid the unthinkable i head ed north and my wife headed south calling his name then i heard a car coming southbound from bloomington road picking up speed with my wife on the road and our dog loose i waved for the driver to slow down a the economist sunstouffville tribune welcomes your letters all submissions must be less than 400 words and must include a daytime telephone number name and address the economist suntribune reserves the right to publish or not publish and to edit for clarity and space write letters to the editor 9 heritage rd markham l3p 1m3 email letterseconsuncom black corrado wheeled around me and skid ded to a halt my aim asking the driver to go carefully his aim road rage for being stopped i told him slow down theres an emergency and this is a family area outraged he jumped out of his car yelling gonna kill you gonna beat you up with what looked like a stick in his hand he shoved me my wife ran back up the road toward us worried about her involvement i backed off telling him i was going to call the cops a loud bang and screeching tires told me hed taken off again our neighbours alarmed by the yelling were now out on the street we didnt get his licence plate number but well all be on the watch including the police apparently im not the only one who has been victimized by this speed demon many of your readers pass through the whitchurchstouffville hamlet of lemonville cant we slow down and keep our neighbour hoods safe gavin westermann lemonville editorial editor jim mason newsroomeconsuncom advertising retail sales manager steve kane stevekyorkregfoncom sales manager new business development distribution dawna andrews dandreivserttbannercom classified manager ann campbell anncerabannercom real estate manager mike rogerson production electronic communications manager john futhey jfiitheyyrngcom distribution distribution manager barry black bblackcconsuncom administration office manager vivian oneil voneileconsuncom york region events managing director debra weller dtvelleryrngcom shows manager staceyallen sallenymgcom york region printing general manager bob dean bdcanymgcom editorial 9052942200 fax 2941538 advertising 2942200 classified 1-800- 7433353 fax8531765 distribution 9052948244 canadian ontario press circulations audit council board member stouffville tribune a york region newspaper group community newspaper trie stouffville tribune published every thursday and saturday is a member of the metroland printing publishing and distributing ltd a whollyowned subsidiary of torstar corporation metroland is comprised of 70 community publications across ontario the york region newspaper group includes the liberal serving richmond hill and thomhitl vaughan cite markham economist sun stouffville tribune stouffville sun gcorgina advocate york regkxi business rimes at home good life yorkregkxicom and york region printing f s i 1 rii r t t editor in chief debora kelly business manager robert lazurko director marketing new product development brenda larson advertising director retail flyer sales nicole mathieu advertising director classified real estate events management gord paolucci debora kelly t information access taxpayers right as our provincial and federal governments continue to be confronted daily by revelations of improprieties and unethical behaviour you might think they would be encouraged to become more accountable fat chance at the federal level instead of a move toward transparency we are see ing an attempt to make government even more secretive last week the federal access watch dog criticized changes to the access law proposed by a bureaucratic task force in a report to parliament john reid said i fear that these proposals to amend the access to information act are a recipe for turning a good access law into a strong secrecy law while he welcomed the call to expand the act to include new institu tions including crown corporations he took issue with the proposal to dou ble the exemptions and exclusions the government can use to refuse to dis close information as it stands now nearly 200 of 246 government bodies are not required to reveal records this is access but bureaucrats apparently have had enough of the plethora of frivolous and vexatious information requests they want to make it even harder and more expensive for people to use the law and to limit the investigative powers of the information commis sioner who resolves disputes on infor mation requests thats the last thing we need without openness and accountability government waste and conflict of interest will thrive the medias demands for greater access to information must be viewed as an example of democracy in action its a job thats difficult for the media to take on under the present law responses to requests under the act are only met within the mandated 30 days 57 per cent of the time and fees are sometimes astronomical the govern ment can withhold information on a broad range of grounds while appeals to the information commissioner can be made his rulings are not binding and no penalties exist for not responding to requests an overhaul of our access to infor mation regime is long overdue the huge discretion for refusing requests for information needs to be be restrict ed let exclusion be the anomaly information should be more readily available through the internet for instance and the cost of accessing it should be minimized if there is any hope in restoring accountability openness and trust in our public institutions we need a law that meets the true spirit and intent of accejqirifqrmation il r vk yyf