Posted by auroracitizen on February 5, 2010
A request was made for the spreadsheet Council Votes that Horrified developed. It has been made available for download.
WordPress does not allow Excel files to be uploaded, so we copied it into a table in Word. You should be able to copy and paste back into Excel if you would like.
Thanks to Horrified for providing this information.
Posted in Community Corner, Town Council | 2 Comments »
Posted by auroracitizen on January 30, 2010
I wanted to bring attention to Auroran, Shane Eickmann, and his deployment about 1 week ago to Haiti to assist in relief efforts.
Some of you may know Shane as he worked in the Aquatics section at the Leisure Complex for many years. Shane recently graduated from Niagara College as a Paramedic and in now working in that capacity in the Niagara Region. He is also a Rapid Response Team member for a Canadian based organization called Global Medic. Global Medic provides emergency relief to those affected by natural disasters and complex emergencies. In Shane’s words, “we empower the emergency response capacity of organizations and communities in the developing world by providing technological equipment and training.”
Global Medic strives to deliver the maximum amount of aid with the minimum operating cost. They seek to increase the independence of communities in the developing world, while ultimately improving the efficiency of international disaster relief.
Shane went on to say, “currently we have a team of 6 in Haiti that have been there since January 12th. The team has focused on restoring access to clean drinking water through the provision of water purification units, as well as restoring medical infrastructure through the use of a 22ft X 42ft inflatable field hospital. RRT members will train local aid groups on the installation, operation and maintenance of all gear so that it may be operational as long as needed. The team that has been there for the past 2 weeks is now coming out and another 6 team members will be going in to the disaster area.”
For updates on what the team has done in Haiti please visit the website and click on the Haiti mission: www.globalmedic.ca
As we reflect on the crisis in Haiti, let us be thankful for our safe environment and let us be especially thankful that the Shane Eickmann’s of the world step up to help out.
Geoffrey Dawe
Aurora
Posted in Community Corner, Community Input, Guest Post | 6 Comments »
Posted by auroracitizen on January 27, 2010
Letter to the editor of the Banner regarding: Councillors receive vote report, Sean Pearce, January 26, 2010:
Numbers often do tell a tale. In an effort to see if there was in fact a pattern that indicated a block voting mentality on Aurora Council I decided to take a sampling of the recorded votes provided in the 84 page staff report (CLS10-002- Recorded votes) requested by Councillor MacEachern.
I found that it took 40 votes before the pattern was broken.
32 times the Mayor’s block voted faithfully together.
Seven times Councillor Wilson dissented from the block and only once did the Mayor and Councillor Gaertner vote outside of the block.
I will leave it to others to count the other 80 votes, but I’ve seen enough to make up my mind as to what is really going on at council.
It appears that in all too many cases the facts don’t seem to matter at the town hall — but in the big picture the facts do matter.
We can only wonder now if the new Integrity Commissioner will join the block.
Posted in Community Corner, Council Watch-Richard Johnson, Town Council | 20 Comments »
Posted by auroracitizen on January 3, 2010
The following Freedom of Information requests were submitted by the Aurora Coalition in early December 2009.
Responses are expected within 30 days, so accounting for holidays, responses should be available soon. We will publish the responses as they become available.
Posted in Community Corner, Community Input, Freedom of Information | 17 Comments »
Posted by auroracitizen on December 30, 2009
The Aurora Coalition has run a number of ads in the past few months that included fairly dramatic revelations. Based on Freedom of Information (FOI) requests, it provided information that was not made public by Council. In fact, the financial disclosure by the Aurora Coalition about legal expenditures resulted in Mayor Morris having to “adjust” her previous statements to reflect the accurate numbers.
We understand that the Aurora Coalition recently submitted a list of requests to gather additional information about the activities by Council. We believe these facts should be broadly communicated and citizens should have the opportunity to comment and discuss the issues.
Resultant, we have agreed to work in collaboration with the Aurora Coalition to facilitate discussion through this blog.
We have created a new page — FOI Requests — that will track any FOI request we are made aware of. The first FOI is the one referenced in a recent post by Richard Johnson.
The Aurora Citizen will continue to provide accurate information as it becomes available. Confidentiality will always be respected.
Stay tuned.
Posted in Community Corner, Community Input, Freedom of Information | 4 Comments »
Posted by elizabethbishenden on December 19, 2009
One of our readers submitted this piece.
Our initial reaction was not to publish, but on sober second thought we chose to let you make your own decisions on its merits.
The Aurora Citizen in no way endorses any of the opinions expressed. However, we’re not about to tell people what to think. We’re just asking them to think, and to discuss.
In order to provide some context, the quote in the post comes from a letter to the editor “Great Aurora “love-in” currently at Town Park” by Heidi G. A. Stoecklin and Dave Philp published in The Auroran, Volume 10, Number 9, Week of December 15, 2009 (pages 3 & 8).
Perhaps a discussion of this letter is necessary.
“The experiences of the Palestinians and the Red Man in Canada are parallel. In both cases, one country is bullying another and suppressing the truth from the public. Do Canadians realize that part of the conflict in the middle east is because the Arabs and the Palestinians are trying to hold another party accountable for Jesus’s execution? This Christmas, please consider with family and friends, who killed Jesus and why.”
This letter is blatantly anti-semetic and has no place in today’s society. This evangelical christian bullshit belongs in history during the times of the European pogroms and the dreaded era of Nazism.
It has no place in todays Aurora. Whats troubling is not that this type of opinion exists but that a newspaper in a modern affluent town like Aurora would think it is acceptable to publish. Shame on Ron Wallace and the Auroran.”
The Auroran has this Editorial Policy: “Opinions expressed by columnists, contributors, and letter writers are not necessarily those of The Auroran. Letters must include name a phone number, although number will not be published, and limited to 600 words. Letters may be edited or refused. All contents protected by copyright.”
While The Auroran certainly seems to have bent the rules about the length of the letter, it certainly doesn’t endorse the content, either.
At the Aurora Citizen we have a policy about what we’ll publish. You can read it on our “About” page. Opinions that are supported by weak or bad reasoning will be published. Why? Because they are opinions. We respect our readers and we believe they can recognize a lack of logic. You can publish crap on this blog. Just be prepared to have it called crap.
Publish a brilliant idea, though, and you’ll see how it inspires our readers and writers.
Posted in Community Corner, Community Input | 20 Comments »
Posted by auroracitizen on December 16, 2009
In keeping with our desire to include broad community input and provide a platform for debate, we have extended an open invitation to the community to become contributors.
Richard Johnson is the first person to accept this invitation. You can read his first post today. We are excited that Richard has volunteered his time to share his experiences about activities that matter to us as a community.
Of course you already know Elizabeth Bishenden. Elizabeth has been doing an exceptional job of moderating comments for a number of months as well as writing a number of posts. Her contribution has been invaluable and we are delighted to have her on board.
If you are a budding writer, or are you concerned about the apathy in our community to our political process, or would you like to see more people informed and interested in what is happening right here in our community, this is your chance to make a difference and share your voice.
If you are interested in contributing articles, we want to hear from you. We are looking for people interested in writing a regular post to keep everyone up to date on Council activities and other community events. This would be a great opportunity for a student — possibly studying journalism or political science.
We are also looking for someone who has the ability to help with uploading video to YouTube. Possibly a student with an interest in video.
If you are interested in either area, please send us an email.
Posted in Community Corner, Community Input | 11 Comments »
Posted by auroracitizen on December 10, 2009
Just so there is no confusion — this post was submitted by Junius
Dear Aurora Citizen:
Yet again, the Mayor (“I do so know how to run a meeting”) has abused the procedural bylaw, in allowing the announcement that Mr. Dan Elliot has been appointed as the Town Treasurer.
Actually, the announcement of the appointment was made by the CAO, Mr. Garbe, but does anyone think that he does anything that is not pre-approved by the Mayor?
Mr. Garbe has issued an announcement to all Town staff as well as Council, that Mr. Elliot has been appointed to the position of Town Treasurer. Yet, the Municipal Act is very clear that a Treasurer can only be appointed by Council enacting a by-law. No by-law to this effect has been proposed, let alone enacted. So, how has he then been appointed?
So, now we have a Council (or a majority of Council) who do not care about procedure; a CAO, who obviously does not understand or care about the procedure; a Town Solicitor who either doesn’t know or is so completely out of the loop so as to be irrelevant. And, now a Treasurer who is suspect.
I have heard from people, who are in the know and whose opinion I respect that Mr. Elliot is very knowledgeable and does a good job. Yet, I must admit that my cynicism is now to the point where I have to ask, “if he is that good, why does he let the situation be manipulated so”.
The history texts state that Henry II issued these famous words with reference to Sir Thomas Becket, then Archbishop of Canterbury: “Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest”. Sir Thomas refused to acquiesce to the King’s changing whims. (Yes, this historical perspective can be argued).
I ask: “who will rid us of this treasonous, poisonous rabble”
Signed, Junius
Posted in Community Corner, Leadership, Legal, Town Council | 9 Comments »
Posted by auroracitizen on November 25, 2009
To the Aurora Citizen
What seems to be missing in the debate (debacle?) around the November 10th meeting, is the fact that Walter Mestrinaro was making his second appearance before Council to get a decision on the bleachers overturned, because his company did not get the award.
Despite the fact that Mr. Mestrinaro was disqualified for the most of basic of reasons – he didn’t respond on time, he did not provide the proper certifications and his bid was more expensive – he appeared at multiple Council meetings to protest that he did not get the work, culminating in the Nov 10th meeting, where he impugned the town staff for not following procedure.
Mr. Elliot & Mr. Christopher both advised Council (at a previous meeting) that the matter was administrative, strictly within the purview of Staff. They advised Council again on the 10th. Yet, Mr. Mestrinaro was allowed to carry on, impugn town staff, with no input from Mayor Morris nor the sidekicks. Interesting, considering that Councilor Wilson had just recently professed his undying support/respect, etc., for town staff.
The other interesting point is that Councilor MacEachern was “sick” that evening – perhaps the “my friend is appearing a Council to whine about something, and I don’t really want to be a part of it” flu.
And, the kicker? Walter Mestrinaro is a member of the Committee of Adjustments: “The committee considers the merits of applications for land severance and minor variances to land, buildings or structure, in accordance with the Planning Act.” A PAID position.
Yes, good citizens of Aurora. You are paying for Mr. Mestrinaro to sit in judgment of merits of an application as it pertains to the Planning Act (a fairly extensive document) – and he can’t even follow the basic rules of tendering.
I would be concerned, but then I am not Mayor – at least not yet!
From Junius — belatedly and with apologizes added by Aurora Citizen 😉
Posted in Code of Ethics, Community Corner, Conflict of Interest, Leadership, Local Business, Town Council | 15 Comments »
Posted by elizabethbishenden on November 18, 2009
Please see below. In order to prevent the spreading of incorrect information, we will be posting very few comments on this matter. If you have information, please contact the York Region Police.
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Posted in Community Corner | 2 Comments »
Aurora Citizen 