The municipal ability to change can sometimes take time, and more so when that number increases; such was the case as Tiny Township discussed a proposed North Simcoe user-fee study.
At the recent committee of the whole meeting, an early July piece of joint correspondence for the municipalities of Midland, Penetanguishene, Springwater Township, Tay Township as well as Tiny was brought forward for discussion.
Suggested in the letter was that a third-party study be conducted to look at resident and non-resident user fees for all recreational amenities and services in the area.
Mayor Dave Evans shared that he was “a little bit remiss” by not adding that although the correspondence was dated in early July, just after the previous Tiny council meeting, there had been additional conversations held in Tay Township council one week prior whereupon that municipality chose to “deny any participation moving forward with the request”.
Coun. Steffen Walma commented that he would be in favour of Tiny going through with the study to see what costs would be associated in running recreational components throughout the region, but his perspective was to not see any decrease in service availability to Tiny residents.
“We also have recreational services that we provide to our neighbouring municipalities, and there is a cost to operate those as well,” said Walma who asked that Tiny’s representatives “at the table” for discussion convey that in whatever criteria comes from a third-party study.
It was a sentiment shared by Coun. Brunelle who called it a very complex issue of “rural versus urban services provider, user fee (against) no user fee tax base”, adding that resolving it at the table through formal discussions would be the best solution.
“We are going to represent the best interests of the township of Tiny residents, but we need to meet with our North Simcoe neighbours – we have to,” said Brunelle. “Tay probably (removed themselves) because we weren’t involved; whatever’s going on, hopefully they come back to the table if we decide to partake in the talking about this issue.”
Evans paraphrased that the response letter from Midland and Penetanguishene was: “‘We want to go back to the status quo, and we made this decision awhile ago to suspend any funding with regards to shared services for a number of reasons, and those reasons are still relevant.’
“I see no reason to participate if it’s a question of status quo, or returning back to what we had before,” Evans stated.
He further noted that Tiny supported the two towns through commercial tax revenue that outweighed other costs, calling the actions “punitive” and drawing attention to Midland and Penetanguishene targeting children and their families’ ability to afford sports, However, he stated he was “always open to discussions… but from my perspective, I will not return to what was in place before”.
Coun. Kelly Helowka agreed with Evans’ comments. “I’d hate to see us getting into a nickel-and-dime situation where we’re charging for people to use our trails in the winter, we’re charging non-residents for our summer recreation programs,” said Helowka. “I think it would be silly to punish the children moving forward.”
Also chiming in was Deputy Mayor Sean Miskimins who pointed out that the Highway 93 commercial land annexation in 1994 to Midland was intended to offset commercial taxes for the North Simcoe Sports and Recreation Centre.
"The fact that here we are, 25 or 30 years later – I'm not going to comment on how money is managed,” said Miskimins, “but now all of a sudden they find themselves in a pickle and they're trying to use children to ask us for more money, when we've been generous in the past when we didn't have to be, quite frankly.”
Miskimins added that a one-year pilot by Midland to provide bus service to Balm Beach hadn’t come through Tiny council for approval, and cited previous transit services of York and Peel Regions where cross-municipality user fees had been removed.
"Unless there's something productive that's going to happen in these discussions, we're not going to talk about user fees – we're going to talk about other strategies – as municipalities to help offset those continuing costs of all the different recreational facilities in North Simcoe. It's a moot point,” Miskimins stated.
Walma rounded the conversation back to Evans’ suggestion of deferring the matter until area council heads could have their get-together in early September.
Evans thanked Walma and Brunelle for the votes of confidence, concluding by saying “we’re still in a pretty formative stage.”
Notably in the last few months, Midland council members have ceased referring to the facility as the North Simcoe Sports and Recreation Centre during official events such as meetings, and have taken to simply calling it a sports and recreation centre when brought up.
The North Simcoe letter for user-fees and charges for all recreation amenities and services can be viewed on the agenda page on the Township of Tiny website.
Archives of council meetings are available to view on the township’s YouTube channel.
