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With all the discussion going on about restructuring, two things are apparent: one is that very few people, in Cobourg, care about the process and the other is that nobody in the County wants to join with Cobourg.
Now why is this? To the first point: the apparent disinterest in the process, I think it is because the subject demands more than the usual political attention span that the average voter possesses. Pollsters have determined that voters make up their minds about issues and politicians in about twenty minutes sometime during an election campaign. This issue has dragged on for over thirty years, so we cannot expect the public to get interested now! As for the second part, why does no other municipality want to amalgamate with Cobourg, as a Cobourger I do not really know. But as an investigator I have found many reasons: the fear of higher taxes, the fear of assimilation and loss of the rural lifestyle. But mainly I have determined that the fear of the loss of political fiefdom and ego is the big one for the people involved. You have to understand that this issue is an "inside the baseball park" issue. That is to say that in the rest of the County, only the players are really interested in it. This is the difference between Cobourg/Hamilton and the rest of the County players. In Cobourg/Hamilton there are groups of people (not of a political nature) who are convinced that the only way for business to grow is to have political stability. And, the only way to have that is to be a larger "standalone" municipality. Consequently the big divide. Progress versus lifestyle.
I have two things to say: one is that in response to all of those people in the County that are afraid of amalgamating with Cobourg because it has invested in its future by having debentures pay for its infrastructure and as such has debt: get over it! You do not want any part of our debt but you will love our millions of dollars of business and commercial taxes. The second thing I have to say is to the Cobourg and Hamilton Twp. politicians, who are absolutely correct in wanting a larger municipality; keep it up.
In the face of the many statements from the Ministry of Municipal Affairs: "A viable municipality is one of no less than 50,000 people", "We want fewer municipalities" etc. it is hard to see so many intelligent local politicians in the County (some readers may see intelligent and politician as an oxymoron, or just some of them (politicians) as morons) not dealing with the "new reality". Do local rural politicians really think that they are serving their taxpayers wisely with the expenditure of local resources on municipal survival, and for how many years will this rearguard action last. Dunkirk was fought on the beaches of France not in the hills of Northumberland!
There are three applications for the Minister of Municipal Affairs to appoint a commissioner to make some sense of the situation. And, the County is meeting on the 22nd of December to finalise its own plan. With a deadline of the 31st of December looming it will be almost impossible that any solution to this mess will be coming from Northumberland. In that case I can only support Cobourg's efforts to conclude this sorry state of affairs. Call in a commissioner I say and when he or she comes everybody will have a chance to explain how they think the new Town should function.
Imagine
that, the people getting a chance to influence the future. A pure millennial
fantasy.
Are
we such bad people?