Well that was an interesting welcome back to Council from the summer!
The agenda was fairly light and of the items before Council only a few were pulled for discussion, the rest were approved on consent. The first item that was discussed briefly was the recommendation from the OMB Reform Working Group. This report from the Group – which I have previously provided an update – was before Council for consideration and endorsement. It is the hope of the Working Group and the Summit attendees that the recommendation put forward to the Province as they conduct outreach to support their consultation paper, will help inform and lead to real change to the OMB. I wanted to thank all the elected officials across this province that have participated in this process and the Working group of 17 dedicated elected officials for all their hard work, and for proving that working together does get things done! Aurora Council passed the motion to endorse the Summit’s recommendation unanimously. With respect to next steps, I am looking forward to the opportunity to sit down with the leader of each of the Provincial parties to discuss this further and to ensure we continue to work toward true and bold reform of the OMB.
Quick update of the left turn restriction “pilot project” at Yonge and Wellington. This issue was before Regional Council Thursday September 8th. As the Town’s Regional Representative was not in attendance the item was deferred until next month. The deferral did strike me as a bit odd given that Aurora Council unanimously approved the Pilot project and Regional staff (in their report on the matter) recommends going ahead. I wondered, is this usual practice? That Regional Council will defer items when the relevant municipal representative is not in attendance? Our CAO informed us that Regional Council does – on occasion – defer items out of “courtesy”. Again, curious that this unanimously supported motion was deferred yet there were other items on the agenda that also involved Aurora that were not deferred but were in fact deliberated. In any event, this does demonstrate a clear need for a second seat at the table for Aurora. Deferral of town related business simply because our member is not present, is not in our community’s best interest.
After a full weekend volunteering at the Hoedown, I will be back out going door-to-door next weekend. Maybe I will visit your street!
