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01 | 07 | 2016 VOLUME 21 | ISSUE 01
KINGS HAVE A REASON TO CELEBRATE SPORTS PAGE 9
COMMENT PAGE 6
FLU CASES DOWN, BUT WE’RE TOLD TO STAY VIGILANT
Shantz court case adjourned until Feb. 24
www.OBSERVERXTRA.com
Young cyclist seriously injured
LIZ BEVAN
A seven-year-old boy was transported to Guelph General Hospital and then airlifted to Hamilton General Hospital on Wednesday morning with life-threatening injuries after being struck by a courier truck while riding his bicycle northbound on Line 86 near West Montrose. He veered across two lanes of traffic in an attempt to enter Halm Road before being struck. His nine-year-old brother accompanied him, but was uninjured. Waterloo Regional Police kept the road closed until roughly 2 p.m. to complete their investigation. They don’t anticipate any charges will be laid. [JOE MERLIHAN / THE OBSERVER]
Mild end of 2015 provides savings to twp. snow-clearing budgets WHITNEY NEILSON A MILD START TO this winter hasn’t only been good for those of us opposed to the snow and cold associated with this time of year. Woolwich’s snow-clearing budget has benefited from the lack of snow, a welcome change after the rough start to 2015, says Dan Kennaley, the township’s director of engineering and planning.
a very healthy surplus in winter control,” Kennaley said. Right now any surplus goes into the general operating budget. They budget how much they’ll need for snow clearing on a five year rolling average, which helps to soften any peaks in bad winter weather that might occur. “In the last couple years we have had a couple of tough winters where we’ve exceeded the SNOW-CLEARING | 2
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They don’t have final numbers yet because there was some snow at the end of the year. Crews were out snowplowing and then a couple days later there was some blowing snow to deal with. Prior to that their 2015 budget was $694,440. Of that, they had spent $514,837. “That last event will cost something. It will eat into the $180,000 surplus, but we will nonetheless finish the year with
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“The fall has been great and we needed that after the winter last winter. January through April, that was pretty tough. Not huge amounts of snow, but a lot of salting and sanding took place on top of some snow plowing last winter. It was cold for an extended period there. We were concerned about coming into the fall about our budget, but the fall has been fantastic and consequentially we’re actually in relatively good shape,” Kennaley said.
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THE CASE AGAINST WOOLWICH Mayor Sandy Shantz has been adjourned once again, this time until the end of February. Appearing on the Dec. 2 docket at the Provincial Offense Court in Kitchener, the case, which was brought forth under the Municipal Elections Act (MEA) by Elmira resident Alan Marshall, was put off for the third time since the fall. The matter was assigned a return date of Feb. 24. There was also a shuffle in representation on behalf of Shantz. Defense attorney Randall Martin has appeared on the Woolwich mayor’s behalf at previous court dates, but he has recently retired from the legal profession. Shantz is currently without counsel, but Martin says she won’t need representation until the Crown decides what to do with the MEA charges. Crown prosecutor Alexander Andres is giving the case file to an outside Crown prosecutor for review to avoid the appearance of impropriety before returning to court on Feb. 24. “There is no conflict here,” he told Justice of the Peace Andrew Marquette. “However, an outside Crown review is to ensure that justice is done for all parties.” Marquette has also recused himself from future dealings with the case. He initially helped Marshall with laying the charges against Shantz and wanted to avoid the appearance of conflict of interest.
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