Talk of municipal restructuring and amalgamation dominated an all-candidates meeting on Wednesday night in Owen Sound.
Many who are running either for city council or for the mayor’s job say restructuring or, at least, the enhanced sharing of services is something that must be considered as Owen Sound moves into the future.
The dialogue took a Georgian Bluffs township councillor by surprise as she sat in the audience at the Harry Lumley Bayshore Community Centre.
Carol Barfoot says the two municipalities already share a number of services but she was not prepared to hear the word “amalgamation” as many times as she did on Wednesday.
She says the experience was “interesting,” and she’ll talk about it with her council colleagues.
Owen Sound and the surrounding townships do share a number of services as well as interests.
Some council candidates, when asked about the city’s status as a regional centre, remarked that Owen Sound is a community that serves twice as many people as actually live within the city limits.
It was noted that, despite shared services like library and recreation, Georgian Bluffs, Meaford and Chatsworth are likely not going to be interested in boundary adjustments with Owen Sound.
Council candidate Scott Greig has a unique perspective into this as his father is retiring Chatsworth Mayor Howard Greig.
He says his sense is the outlying municipalities don’t want more to do with Owen Sound because they feel the city is not only dictatorial and unaccountable, it can’t manage its affairs very well.
Greig even challenged his fellow candidates to try to name all of the members of Georgian Bluffs council — only one other candidate tried and he wasn’t completely successful.
Rick Beaney, a former Owen Sound mayor who’s running for council, is skeptical of closer ties because he says it’s difficult to talk with somebody who doesn’t want to talk with you.
Current councillors, though, say the relationships between Owen Sound and its neighbours are not as bad or as strained as they’ve been made to appear.
Most of the prospective councillors and mayoral candidates advocated building closer ties with the surrounding municipalities.
Jeffrey Robins says the status quo cannot continue.
Andy McCaffrey says the city must lose its “big dog mindset.”
Ian Boddy says more shared services are vital.
Ray Botten, who’s running for mayor, believes amalgamation of Owen Sound and Meaford is the key to every other issue facing local residents.
Incumbent Mayor Ruth Lovell Stanners says she doesn’t believe closer ties between Owen Sound and the municipalities of Chatsworth, Georgian Bluffs and Meaford would necessarily go far enough.
Other issues discussed on Wednesday by the council and mayoral candidates included low family incomes and high taxes, emergency services, the need for more development in the city, waste management, and the perceptions that Owen Sound is not friendly to business and that there is too much red tape to fight through at City Hall.
