North Dumfries councillors agreed Sunday to dig into the township’s gravel pit reserves to help pay its outstanding deficits and reduce the 2015 municipal tax increase from a projected 23 percent to nine percent.

This recommendation was forwarded to the March 23 regular council meeting.

A nine percent increase on the municipal portion of a tax bill on a home assessed at $300,000 is about $54.

To do this, council had to reduce the budget by over $529,000, the majority of which is coming out of its gravel pit reserves.

Its budget deliberation meeting on March 22 was open to the public for the first time, according to Mayor Sue Foxton.

She said the larger tax in-crease is needed this year to help pay off the debts from the previous two years.

“We can no longer operate this way,“ Foxton said of the poor budget practices that cre-ated the operating deficit in the previous years.

“I hope you don’t find that $54 a year is a hardship,” she said in a message to the town-ship residents at the end of the meeting.

Councillor Rod Rolleman asked for a summary of how the new council inherited a $753,940 debt from the pre-vious council. The $753,940 includes a $172,717 shortfall from 2013 and $581,223 from 2014.

“We’ve been blindsided by this,” Rolleman said. He said since becoming a councillor in December, he has not received one financial report at a coun-cil meeting.

Finance Director William Gott outlined a number of items in 2014 that drove the township’s costs far above what was budgeted. They in-cluded staff wages and ben-efits (including overtime and a payout to a retiring staff member), $35,000 in unbud-geted work done on the Ayr ice house roof that was taken from reserves, $30,000 for the election that was not budgeted for and taken from reserves,

$32,000 for unbudgeted de-sign plans for a new township office at the North Dumfries Community Complex (NDCC) by the previous council that the new council has decided it cannot afford to build. Also included in the township’s in-come for 2014 was the reve-nue from the sale of 199 Main Street for $150,000. The land was never sold.

“Why was a land sale in-cluded in our finances?” coun-cillor Rolleman asked. Rolle-man said having that money listed as income before it is re-ceived “artificially lowers our taxation rate.”

Gott agreed, and he said he instructed the previous coun-cil that if the potential land sale was to be in the budget, it should have been listed in a reserve account.

Funds in a reserve account are not used by the township for regular operating expens-es and do not affect the tax rate, but instead are used for capital or special projects.

The $172,717 outstanding from 2013 includes three debt instalments of $50,000 each scheduled for payment by the previous council in 2014, 2015 and 2016.

Municipalities are not al-lowed to run a deficit from previous years and this debt must be paid now.

“Why did you allow us (the township) to do this?” council-lor Rolleman asked Gott.

Gott replied that it was not his idea to pay off the 2013 deficit in a three year plan.

“Council went against my direction last year,” he said.

The new council also looked at several departments which had costs exceeding their bud-gets in 2014.

Councillor Derrick Ostner said township department heads are going to have to follow their budgets and not spend more than they have been allotted. He also sug-gested they look at ways to decrease staff costs.

Councillor Ostner said that “the blame is on the previous council” for letting the town-ship’s employees overspend their budgets.

“There are no bad employ-ees, just bad management,” he said.

Councillor Gord Taylor stressed that the township does have to be “flexible” be-cause all expenses cannot be anticipated ahead of time.

“Look what happened in Halifax,” he said, referring to the exceptional amount of snow they have received this year.

Council decided to strike some amounts from the 2015 budget to assist in bringing the tax rate down. They in-cluded $30,000 budgeted for repairs to the current town-ship office, $13,000 of $83,000 budgeted to be collected for the fire reserve, and $25,000 budgeted for the roads depart-ment.

The repairs to the township office on Greenfield Road were removed because council has decided to sell the building.

Councillor Neil Ritchie said he would have preferred a tax rate increase of seven or eight percent and suggested a quick sale of the township building.

“The faster we get it mov-ing, the better,” he said.

Over 30 people attended the budget meeting. All of the available chairs were occu-pied, and a few people had to stand in the doorway.

The meeting was open to the public, but was not adver-tised. The township sent out an “eblast” to people on their email list two days before the meeting.

Ayr resident Steve Hamoen said he was not happy with the lack of notification about the meeting.

“It was short notice for a budget meeting, and it wasn’t a run of the mill budget,” he said.

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Serving North Dumfries & Wilmot Townships, Brant & Oxford Counties for over 100 years.

Since a public meeting was held on Janu-ary 15th, a citizens’ group has seen no rental agreement between the Princeton and District Museum/Library Association (PDMLA) and the Oxford County Library Board.

A delegation, represented by Peggy Crosby of Princeton appeared before Blandford-Blen-heim Council at the regular meeting on March 18th demanding that the PDMLA resign im-mediately. She presented council with a peti-tion signed by 306 concerned citizens, which read:

“Given that the working relationship be-tween the Princeton and District Museum Association (PDMLA) Board of Directors and the Princeton Branch of the Oxford County Li-brary has reached a point where the Library is considering moving from their current location and whereas the relationship has deteriorated past the point of no return, we the undersigned, demand the immediate resignation of the cur-

rent PDMLA Board of Directors.”Following the public meeting in January,

council passed a resolution appointing Mayor Marion Wearn, Councillor Randy Balzer and the CAO to mediate between the PDMLA and the Oxford Library Board, but to date their ser-vices were not requested.

Following the council meeting, Mayor Wearn commented:

“We understand that the Oxford Library has presented a counter offer to the PDMLA and the museum board will consider the agreement at their next meeting.”

It is expected that the counter offer will be reviewed at the PDMLA March meeting.

“The township has no authority to interfere with an ongoing negotiation between the two boards,” said Mayor Wearn.

“We are waiting to hear that they have re-solved the issues on their own.”

Princeton Library Preservation Group presents petition to council asking for Princeton Museum board resignations

NINE PERCENT TAX INCREASE EXPECTED

North Dumfries council inherits large deficit

North Dumfries putting Slater Hall up for sale andmoving staff to North Dumfries Community Complex

North Dumfries township staff are going to have a change of address.

At a budget meeting on Sunday, it was an-nounced that, in an effort to save money, North Dumfries council has decided to put the town-ship building on Greenfield Road up for sale and move staff to existing rooms at the North Dumfries Community Complex (NDCC).

Council recently toured the NDCC to look for available space to house township staff.

Township planner and acting CAO Steve Stone said at the meeting that they found three or four offices that could be used and a board-room.

He said they could move people into these spaces with their current office furniture “with-out spending a whole lot of money.”

He said phone and data lines would have to be added to the building. If they wanted to add some walls to rooms, that could be budgeted for in 2016.

The previous council, led by former mayor Rob Deutschmann and former CAO Rodger Mordue, had planned to borrow money to build a new town hall attached to the NDCC. It was expected to cost $1.3-million for the new build-ing and the previous council had design plans made at a cost of $32,000.

After the new council was elected in Octo-ber, its members discovered that the township

finances were not in good shape and cancelled the project.

The new council is paying off $753,940 in deficits from 2013 and 2014 inherited from the previous council.

Eleven staff currently work at Slater Hall and two recreation staff currently work at the NDCC.

Mayor Sue Foxton said they hope to move the staff to the new building in the summer.

When the previous council was making plans to build a new town hall, it was said that the sale of Slater Hall would bring in between $200,000 and $700,000. It currently needs about $80,000 to $100,000 worth of repairs

Last year, higher than recommended lev-els of radon gas were detected in the building. Councillor Gord Taylor asked if it was a prob-lem to sell the building with its higher than al-lowed radon ratings.

Most councillors agreed that the new owner of the building would probably tear the build-ing down or make major renovations that would fix the radon problem. Radon is a gas that seeps into buildings from the outside and must be corrected with venting.

“Let’s move our staff as soon as possible to the NDCC,” councillor Derrick Ostner said, adding it will be a much “better environment” for them.

Last month, Grace United Church in Rose-ville announced that it would be closing and the building was sold shortly after being put up for sale.

Rev. Randy Banks said that the church has been purchased in trust and will be trans-formed into a private residence, as far as the church board understands.

The church board met last week to decide on

the closing date for the sale of the church. They are working on the details for a final church service that will be held in the evening of Sun-day, June 28th.

Until then, regular Sunday services at 11:15 a.m. are continuing.

The church manse, located near Grace Unit-ed on Roseville Road will be going on the mar-ket soon, said Rev. Banks.

Grace United Church in Roseville is sold

OXFORD JUNIOR FARMERS CELEBRATE 100 YEARS — A banquet attended by five hundred former and present Oxford County Junior Farmers at the Oxford Auditorium on Saturday evening, celebrated 100 years of the organization in the county. At its peak, Oxford Junior Farmers had eleven clubs and over seven hundred members across the county, and many of these clubs set up displays of memorabilia for all to view. Blenheim Township was well represented with the group above on hand to celebrate with others from across the county. Pictured are (left to right): Elizabeth Scott, Jim Stevenson, John Perry, Dan McLaren, John Taylor, Betty Perry, Laura Taylor, Marion Harrington, Eileen Hartig, Nelson King, Cathy Bechard, Brent Butcher, Willard King, Wilma Duncan, Diane Sibbick, George Sibbick and Marg Verkuil. Three members of Blenheim Junior Farmers have been county president - Willard King (1954), Allen Scott (1956) and Ralph Sparks (1946) and one member went on to be provincial president. That member was Jack Cockburn and much of Jack’s artwork was included in a video presentation which ran throughout the banquet. Another member, Virginia Dibble of Drumbo, was on the organizing committee for Saturday night’s banquet and is presently the secretary-treasurer of the Oxford Junior Farmers. This year, Oxford J.F.s will plant eleven trees across the county to recognize the centennial of the club.

“We’ve been

blindsided by this.”

North Dumfries councillor Rod Rolleman

on debt inherited from previous council

CENTENNIALS BOUNCE BACK - After losing the first two games of the Schmalz Cup, the Ayr Cens won 4-3 in overtime on Sunday to take their first win in the series. Above, the Cens celebrate a goal in game one Thursday night, from left: Jordan Pettitt, Andrew Richard, Coleton Madge, and Eric Hackborn.

Photo by Tanya Taylor