March 7, 2012
Ontario

Wind frustration

By Rick Stow, www.bayshorebroadcasting.ca 7 March 2012

A packed council chamber in Huron East expressed its frustration with elected officials, as the municipal representatives once again failed to take a stand against wind turbines.

Both Gerry Ryan and Rob Tetu of Huron East Against Turbines (HEAT) addressed Council at its meeting on Tuesday.

Tetu is the municipality’s designated citizen-observer at the nine partner Inter-Municipal Wind Turbines Working Group that meets in Chesley – Ryan is the alternate.

Huron East Council has also appointed two of its own to sit as members of the Working Group, but they never attend.

Instead, Tetu or Ryan provide Huron East Council with monthly briefings on the Working Group’s activities.

Gerry Ryan thinks the arrangement has its weaknesses.

The pair updated Councillors on two recent meetings, then demanded to know why representatives had failed to move on a proposed by-law protecting the health, safety and property of citizens.

When HEAT’s Gerry Ryan was told that a lawyer had recommended against going ahead with such a by-law, he pressed Council for answers.

Council agreed to hand over a legal file on the matter, but Ryan wasn’t happy with the matter ending there.

Gerry Ryan thinks the incident shows up what’s wrong with how the activists are treated.

Ryan believes that Queen’s Park may loosen some of the restrictions on local governments imposed under the Green Energy Act.

He would like municipalities to prepare for the possibility.

Ryan says Huron East Council supports a moratorium, while at the same time the Municipality’s Official Plan supports wind farm development.

URL to article:  https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2012/03/07/wind-frustration/