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Shelburne requesting they take over management of CDRC and fire services

October 7, 2021   ·   0 Comments

By Peter Richardson

Shelburne Mayor Wade Mills, Councillor Shane Hall and CAO Denyse Morrissey came to Mono Council to share why Shelburne is hoping to change how the Centre Dufferin Recreation Centre (CDRC) and fire service are operated.

The first part of their presentation centered on the topic of indoor recreation and the CDRC.
As Mayor Mills pointed out, Shelburne owns the CDRC building but does not currently govern how it is to be used. Rather, a board of management composed of members of all the surrounding municipalities, is tasked with this undertaking.

When first elected in 2018, Shelburne Council undertook a comprehensive Strategic Planning initiative and what came out of it was that Shelburne needs to provide more recreational and cultural opportunities for its growing population. This included more indoor recreation choices.

Under the current system the CDRC is primarily focused on hockey during the winter and swimming in the summer, and the Board of Management is happy to maintain the status quo.

Recently, the County of Dufferin undertook a comprehensive look at its service delivery system and two of the problem areas that the consultants saw, were indoor recreation and fire service management. They suggested that perhaps the Board of Management system was not necessarily the best option going forward.

Backed by this report and their own service delivery concerns, Shelburne Council was prompted to present their proposed changes to the status quo, to all the involved municipalities. These changes involve taking both the CDRC and the Fire Service under their municipal control and governance.

Mayor Mills emphasized that he was presenting these changes as ideas for discussion at this point and was open to ideas from all the municipalities involved.

It is no secret however, that Shelburne is unhappy with its role in the Fire Services governance. Shelburne does not have a veto and has the same number of voting members as each of the other municipalities, yet they pay over 50 per cent of the costs involved and they own the Fire Hall.

The same could be said of the CDRC arrangement, where they have no power to change the operations despite the wishes of their citizens.

Mayor Mills went on to say that Shelburne saw a much broader selection of use for the building, but was unwilling to invest the capital when it did not control the managerial aspect. He likened it to spending a large amount on renovating a rented property.

Mono Councillor Ralph Manktelow asked if Shelburne had tried in the last two years to institute new programs at the CDRC and been stymied by the current management? Mayor Mills replied that there was a singular focus with the board –≠that this is how they’ve always done it, and so let ’s just continue as we have.

Since Shelburne does not have a majority of vote they are hesitant to make large investments, knowing that they could be overturned with no recourse for the town.

Mono Mayor John Creelman asked Mayor Mills if they were looking at tweaking the governance model to give Shelburne more say, or if the idea was to go to more of an Orangeville type model, where the surrounding municipalities would pay to use the programs and facilities?

Mayor Mills replied that it would likely be closer to an Orangeville model, but with a twist. He said that perhaps the surrounding municipalities would pay an annual fee towards the capital cost of upkeep, which would then allow their residents to participate without paying a fee every time they entered the building. He said that one option would be to establish a Recreational Advisory Committee, reporting to Council, that would include members from the other municipalities that would have a fairly broad mandate to function. This is one of the options that Shelburne was seeking input on.

With respect to fire services, Mayor Mills said the main issue here was creating more operational consistency when it comes to issues like filling out Ministry reports.  

He noted that the whole concept of these municipal boards that exist in Dufferin County, are an oddity to the rest of the province, same for some small municipalities in northern Ontario. Mayor Mills explained that the legislation sees Fire Service as being a municipally run situation with perhaps an agreement to assist neighbouring municipal entities.

Because of this, Shelburne proposes to bring the Fire service into the municipal structure of the Town and the Fire Chief would then become a Municipal employee rather than a board one.

Councillor Shane Hall, who is a member of the current board of management, addressed the meeting to add his insights. He said one of the problem areas concerned the secretary treasurer, who currently has two bosses, the fire chief and the board.

He also saw an area of mismanagement in that this person has had no performance review in five years and subsequently, no raise in pay over the same period. This opens the board potentially, to legal issues and perhaps other problems as well.

Shelburne’s proposal, would alleviate these oversites and streamline the managerial process. Councillor Hall also expressed the opinion that service would not be affected by the change.

It was then asked if costs would be affected. Mono currently pays Orangeville on a type of per call basis and their costs went up 25 per cent over one year.

Mayor Mills stated that this determination would have to be made by staff, but that his gut feeling was no, they would not rise in the short term.

Councillor Fred Nix then asked how the dissolution of the fire board was envisioned? In the agreement of 1991, the assets would be let in place, which realistically, Mono would not likely agree to, so how does Shelburne see this? Mayor Mills put forth one example, where the town would issue Mono an exemption of charges, equal to the value of their assets, until the assets were repaid.

Councillor Manktelow said that having heard Shelburne’s reasoning and read the Dufferin County report, he could not see any benefit to the town in doing this and begged the question, was there an elephant in the room? Mayor Mills said no, there was not ­– Shelburne had no hidden agenda here. Neither the Fire Service nor outdoor recreation could be seen as big money makers. He said this was purely a matter of legal and liability management and to bring the operational structure more in line with the legislation that governs Fire Service in Ontario.

Councillor Manktelow then asked what would Mono gain by the move and Mayor Mills replied by saying that he didn’t think anyone gained from this. However, he was rather looking for a better way to manage the Fire Service, which would benefit everyone.

Coun. Manktelow said that he felt the board was an integral part of the fabric of the Dufferin County community and that it worked extremely well and its dissolution would, in his opinion, be a retrograde stipend requiring careful consideration.

Mayor Mills wrapped the discussion with his thoughts that since the fire Marshalls office was opposed to Fire boards, in general, that Shelburne was proposing this move to prevent being broadsided by a potential Provincial order to dissolve the Board.

He felt being proactive was a better approach than being told to do this and given a deadline for completion, that might not be optimal for the municipalities.

Mono Mayor John Creelman said that the salient points would be the subject of future discussions for Council and thanked the delegation for presenting their views.

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