Shared services the future, North Simcoe forum told

By Nicole Million Midland Mirror Feb 18, 2011

NORTH SIMCOE – Synergy emerged as a theme last week during the second of three public meetings to discuss the possibility of Midland and Penetanguishene as a joint urban node.

Midland Mayor Gord McKay and Penetanguishene Mayor Gerry Marshall hosted the Feb. 17 meeting at Midland Secondary School. The goal was to share comments received at a Jan. 19 meeting in Penetanguishene, as well as to gather input and identify the future directions for the towns under the province’s growth plan.

“The goal of the night is to see what is not there and see what could be there,” said McKay.

While no one overtly endorsed the idea of the two towns amalgamating, the concept of merging various municipal services received great attention.

Midland resident Ilga Shakes was part of a discussion with McKay and Penetanguishene resident Ralph Befort about administration, insurance and purchasing.

“There is going to be a change, and people need to be cognizant of it,” she said during her table’s discussion. “It needs to be handled in a way that people don’t fear the change.”

The group took the discussion wider to take a deeper look at why the towns are considering the option of a joint urban node.

“The whole idea of synergy – one and one is three. It makes both towns better places,” said Shakes. “I think we’re on the cusp right not. We could either become a really great town or become a mediocre town.”

After about an hour of discussion, a facilitator from each table got up and summarized what the group had discussed.

“Our vision is it’s going to be a joint administrative structure,” said McKay. “We’re going to see each department located in one area – centralized. The purpose of doing this is to drive efficiencies, and the main purpose in getting efficiencies is getting new and improved service levels, and also to contain costs.

“Our view is all of this would have seamless services throughout the two municipal areas.”

At the top of the evening, McKay explained the task force took approximately 13 topics discussed previously and collapsed those into 10 as the focus.

“(Our goal) is to add flesh to the bone. This is an exercise in community building. We don’t know where it’s going to go, but we are very excited.”

The approximately 65 people were split into 10 groups to discuss topics that included economic development, arts and culture, fire and police, transportation, housing, etc. They were tasked with defining the scope of the topic, determining the ideal outcome, and forecasting what it would look like. They were also urged to consider why it would benefit the towns, various drawbacks, and what is needed to proceed.

In the group that discussed arts, culture and heritage, facilitator Eleanor Rath said the discussion was wide-ranging.

“Our natural heritage, Georgian Bay and being on the water (are) very much of part of who we are,” said the CAO of the Town of Penetanguishene. “A comment was made (that it should) not be just 100-year-old houses when we’re thinking of heritage; we need to be thinking of it all.”

The ideal outcome, the group concluded, is for the two towns to celebrate what they have.

“We have so much here in terms of arts and cultural heritage. They’d like to see winter and summer events that go on for weeks, not just a day, and that have venues in both communities,” she said.

Debbie Levy’s group examined police and fire services, concluding there should be one fire department and one police department.

“Policing, of course, is … complicated by the fact that there would be the option of OPP in both towns, or what is now the Midland Police Service in both towns,” said the Penetanguishene councillor. “It was amazingly easy to come to a conclusion of what we’d like to see, but getting there with policing would probably be much more difficult. There were good points made on behalf of both outcomes.”

Penetanguishene Mayor Gerry Marshall’s table discussed health care. He said the two towns have a great starting point with Georgian Bay General Hospital.

“We anchored onto that. At the bottom level in the area, we really need support – walk-in clinics, home support, care that can take care of our needs from that level,” he said. “At a family level, we need family physicians in our area.”

Marshall added they can’t talk about any of these issues without talking about logistics and transportation, too. In addition, the group discussed the importance of a healthy lifestyle, as well as the fact that the health-care sector can lead to jobs.

“Elderly parents really like to follow their kids … and our kids are following the jobs. We want to make sure we have the jobs here to keep our children here and also support the parents staying here.”

Paul Hodgins, director of planning for Penetanguishene, said his group, which focused on public works, felt the ideal outcome would be a joint service board with representatives from both towns.

“There’s economies of scale, and that should also eliminate redundancies and, presumably, result in improved efficiencies,” he said. “It would level the playing field. The sharing of services – both equipment and intellectually – would also be beneficial.”

Governance issues would need to be addressed, he said, as well as ensuring equality of service “so that neither town feels like second-class cousins.”

Marshall explained the next step is for the task force to compile all of the information gathered at the meeting and begin to take a deeper look at the recommendations. Once staff and the two councils have successfully grappled with the information, another public consultation meeting will be scheduled for late spring.

Marshall said it’s unclear whether the province will approve of the towns’ plans.

“What I am hearing here, though, is there are a lot of opportunities for the communities to work together and engage in some of these activities long before that stamp of approval hits the table,” Marshall said. “The opportunity to move forward in a lot of areas exists now and, when we do get the blessing, that should come, hopefully, with some funding.”

Joining forces in one manner or another, added McKay, is essential to the future of both municipalities.

“Whether the province designates us or not, we have to be doing something like this. This is the writing on the wall.”