PC Partners With Rural Ontario (PRO)

By Philippe Blais, rural affairs correspondent

Randy Hillier Hosted the first of a series of meetings of the PC Partners With Rural Ontario (PRO); a project initiated by the leader of the opposition, Mr. John Tory.

Partners with Rural Ontario's Official Launch was Monday, December 1st 2008. Belleville was the first stop of the PRO tour. The Team held private meetings with municipal leaders, business leaders and hosted a town hall meetings at the Belleville Legion Hall from 7:00 to 9:00pm.

The following members of the PRO team were in attendance: PC Rural Affairs Critic Randy Hillier (MPP for Lanark-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington), Bob Bailey (MPP for Sarnia-Lambton), Tim Hudak (MPP for Niagara West-Glanbrook) and John O’Toole (MPP for Durham).

From The podium Randy Hillier defined the team's goals as: “Recognition of PC values, fixing the wrongs in rural Ontario and Removing obstacles to doing business in Ontario.” Mr. Hillier Asked the people in attendance to Define democracy. all the answers given were as different as the people who attended this meeting; hope, freedom etc. Mr. Hillier's response to his question was: “YOU, --the individual.”

In recent months, Queen's Park has debated new young driver restrictions, the use of cell phones in cars, banning plastic water bottles, banning youth under the age of 14 years old from riding as passengers on motorcycles, banning pesticides and incandescent light bulbs etc. Mr. Hillier pointed out the current government's apparent attempts to avoid real issues such as school closures and Government actions that make it difficult to do business in Ontario such as the Green Belt designation of the Golden Horseshoe region.

Mr. Keith Henry told the audience about his red tape issues. Mr. Henry owns Maple Dale Cheese Factory, located north of Plainfield on Hwy. 37. He will have to stop spreading his cheese factory's wash water over his field as of December 31st 2009, after the land is frozen or covered with snow. The water is used used to clean factory equipment and contains phosphates, which Mr. henry says his hay thrives on. According to Mr. Henry, soil analysis have been conducted regularly and have produced no evidence of ground water contamination as result of the disposal practise. Mr. Henry has been consulting with the ministry of environment and the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and Rurral Affairs in hopes to find a viable solution. The Ministry of Environment has recommended injecting the wash water which would require extensive excavation.

Mr. Simon Chapelle of pointed out the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines as the only Ontario Ministry that oversees regional interests, with input into, and some veto powers over policies that would negatively affect Northern Ontario. In conversation, Mr.Chapelle agreed that unilateral policy making at Queen's Park offers restriction without offering solutions or assistance, which often has the greatest impact on rural and small businesses.

The issue of property assessments was raised by someone in the audience.

“Property assessments have skyrocketed in recent years, particularly in the recent 2006 assessment notices. The average assessed home in Ontario leaped from $179,151 in the 2003 taxation year to $232,883 in the 2006 taxation year. This past year, the average provincial assessment increase in the Residential Tax Class was 14.35 per cent, with many municipalities reporting increases of 15-35 per cent. Individual homeowners have been shocked to receive assessment increases of over 100 per cent.” (Source: http://www.wraft.com/news/20060302homestead.html Excerpt from a press release by Tim Hudak)

Tim Hudak had introduced the Homestead Act as a Private Member's Bill, which would protect home owners by capping residential taxes increases to a maximum of 5 per cent a year. This private member's bill was killed while in committee, when the government announced the end of its session on June 28, 2008.

Roger Monahan, representatives from BuyFromTheFarm.ca responded to issues of food safety and country of origin by recommending that producers and processors subscribe to a voluntary origin of product labeling. Mr. Monahan further suggested that this label be individually numbered by product, linked to a database where people could access an ingredient list with accurate Canadian content by percentile. Chili was given as an example. the producer could conceivably list contents such as: Tomatoes from Canada and peppers from Florida. The database would reduce the need for page long labels and give consumers who were interested, access to more detailed information.

Mr Hillier and the panelist closed the meeting at 9:00pm with the promise of bringing the concerns of the rural communities forward at Queen's Park.

References /sources:

Interview with Roger Monahan
Telephone interview with Keith Henry
Telephone interview with Simon Chapelle

Pages on the web:

http://www.wraft.com/news/20060302homestead.html
http://www.ruralpartners.ca
http://www.timhudak.ca