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"Incineration and more time"
There were a couple of major events at the Clarington council meeting held Jan. 17 in the council chambers.
For those of us that stuck it out until about 11:30pm it was quite a show.
Our elected representatives earlier went in camera for a long discussion about a motion concerning the incinerator - which of course means the public doesn't have access to exactly what the bone of contention was.
Clarington Mayor Adrian Foster and Ward 1 & 2 Regional Respresentative Mary Novak eventually voted against the motion proposed by Ward 1 Councillor Joe Neal. Both seem to feel the motion could result in some significant risk to Clarington concerning the incinerator and the host community agreement.
The motion passed - residents will have to wait a few more weeks to see what the result will be but among other things the motion gives Durham Region until Feb. 14 to weigh in on the matter.
Plus residents once again have 10 minutes to make their case in a delegation.
Clarington resident Jim Richards made a strong case during a delegation speech where he pointed out that the five minute rule only served to have more people sign up to speak because they felt not enough information was making it through to their elected representatives.
Council voted in favour of doubling the amount of time delegations have to speak - which brings time limits back to pre-former Clarington mayor Jim Abernethy levels. Ward 1 councillor Joe Neal brought forward the motion and I think he even used the same argument I did during the 2010 election - namely, if people make the effort to come down to the town hall they should be given a fair amount of time to talk.
We'll see in the coming months how much later council meetings go with the revival of the old time limit.
In my next blog post I will discuss issues arising out of the Jan. 31 Clarington council meeting.
