‘Throw the bums out’

Dear Editor:

Erin council and its planning department stayed true to the prediction that residents’ voices are a hindrance.

After 809 days, the planning department submitted its recommendation to council to pass a commercial zoning amendment on agriculturally zoned land in Cedar Valley, at the exact last council meeting of the term in a lame duck vote.

Exceeding the 120-day time frame guarantees the applicant can take the application to the Ontario Land Tribunal if they lose. Not so for the delegates, due to Bill 185 ensuring that a township vendor gets their zoning uncontested.

In case you are wondering, a 1.1 hectare commercial severance exceeds the county cap of one hectare. At the same meeting, Water Watchers presented to protect town aquifers from water taking at the Cedar Valley bottling well. It is too bad they didn’t stick around to see council put a commercial salt storage yard on that exact aquifer minutes later. Let’s also point out The Erin CARES (Community Action, Reporting Enforcement System) rolled out at the same meeting.

Council is aware that its existing vendor only submitted an application in response to a bylaw complaint that triggered enforcement to conclude the property was not zoned properly for this application and directed the applicant through every hurdle over 809 days. Transparency ... huh. 

I need to quote my father in a letter over 25 years go to this very paper regarding electoral candidates’ abuse of process: “You owe it to yourself every four years to throw the bums out.”

Markus Rabstein,
Elora