BRAMPTON -
The cost of asking the Province for money is getting too pricey. The Town of Halton Hills has endorsed a resolution from Tay Valley Township requesting the Province revise its method of doling out money. Currently the Province requires each municipality to fill out complicated applications for infrastructure funding— and many times the towns and townships get nothing in return. “Our Director of Infrastructure Services spent two weeks preparing the last application. Two weeks of a department head to get nothing!,” said Councillor Dave Kentner, the mover of the motion. “Then we found out there were other communities that went out and hired consultants, paying them out of their general revenues to get nothing.” Both the Town and Tay Township agree the Province should divvy the money through a simple allocation, and each municipality gets something, and taking the competition element out of it. Fogal appreciated the Tay Township’s candid nature in its motion: “And whereas those applications were submitted as a municipality’s highest priority; and whereas those municipal priorities were then subjected to the Province’s own set of criteria which have been proven to be less than transparent...” “I love that. It’s calling a spade a spade,” said Fogal. “It’s all our money. It should come back to us on a per capita basis. “It’s such a waste of money. When it’s all dressed up to look like we’re being careful with the public’s money... but you end up wasting it up front (doing the application) and wasting it again when you do the reporting back.” Bonnette pointed out year after year the Town has filled out 150-plus page applications for funding and received nothing, but recently filled out a five-page application for the Maple Ave. fire station reconstruction and received $1.9 million. “So maybe they’re getting it,” he said, “but resolutions like this help them get it even more.”
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