ERIN – Tension was in the air at the Erin mayor’s breakfast at the Erin Legion on Oct. 24.
The tension stemmed from an exchange between Mayor Michael Dehn and resident Marieke Wevers about a severance issue.
Last month, Wevers delegated to county council and asked the county to reconsider reallocating rural growth from Erin to Puslinch.
The county has proposed transferring 120 units of rural severances from Erin to Puslinch as part of changes to the Official Plan.
A change is also proposed that makes it possible for Puslinch landowners to receive more than one rural residential land severance.
Currently, they can’t get another severance if they’ve had one in the past 20 years.
But to encourage more Puslinch development to hit a 2051 growth target, the county wants to remove that limit for landowners there.
Erin landowners would remain subject to the 2005 limitation.
During a question-and-answer period at the Erin mayor’s breakfast last Friday, Wevers aired her grievances.
“I can tell you, in the 27 years that I’ve been here, this has to be the most difficult council to communicate [with],” said Wevers of Erin officials.
“In talking to some of the councillors, they say that when the emails go to the group, it’s [the mayor’s] responsibility to answer them. And I guess my concern is that maybe it’s too big a responsibility.”
Wevers continued by urging individual council members to respond to her emails.
“The council should be speaking with a unified voice, not five individual voices,” Dehn replied.
“And in certain cases we have responded, and people have not liked the answer … I think the answer has been given and you just don’t like the answer.”
Wevers said the rural severance decision was made without letting anybody in Erin delegate on the issue.
“We all tried, and it has now been put back to you from county council.”
She added, “That’s not acceptable. And it’s not a personal thing, this is a community issue.”
Wevers concluded with a warning to Dehn: “Please be very cautious about what you say about me personally.”
Dehn replied by reminding the room severance rules in Erin have not changed.
“If you could do a severance January 1, you can still do a severance. If you couldn’t … you still can’t do a severance today,” said Dehn.
There were no other questions or comments for the mayor.
