Mayor Williams started the meeting with the proclamation that May is Community Living Month. Adam Thompson got up and spoke about how Community Living Dufferin has affected his life…and he was inspiring! For starters, let me tell you a bit about this amazing organization. Community Living Dufferin began in 1954 and their mission statement is “Community Living Dufferin promotes equal opportunity and respect for people who have developmental disabilities by listening to them and supporting their choices to achieve the lives they want.” After listening to Adam speak, I can say that this is an organization who lives by their mission statement.
“Community Living supports me. I live on my own and I look after myself. I have friends there like family. I have my own paper route that I do every Thursday.” Adam said, “Community Living has helped me find friends, work, hobbies and has helped me become who I am today.”
Adam is passionate about drama, photography and sports and Community Living has helped Adam to get involved in hockey with the Orangeville Wolves as a goaltender. Adam is involved with a photography group called Click Connect – Head out to MacMaster Buick GMC on Saturday, May 9th to check out some of Adam’s photography as well as other photographers from the Click Connect Photography group at this show! Tickets are available at Scotiabank and are $10.
Adam, thank you for being such a breath of fresh air at the Town of Orangeville Council Meeting – you spoke eloquently and were a great voice to kick of Community Living Month!
Diane Drive
The residents of Diane Drive can rest a little easier knowing that Council passed a motion to make their road a little safer. Councillor Bradley put forward a motion to erect a stop signs at Oxford Street & Diane and that lines be painted on the road at the intersections of Oxford & Diane and at Manor & Diane to indicate pedestrian crossing. Her motion also proposed that the entire length of Diane Drive from Broadway to C-Line be made a 40km zone and that it be recognized as a Community Safety Zone. Her motion was seconded by Councillor Wilson and passed with the support of Councillor Kidd, however her motion was not supported unanimously. Mayor Williams spoke out against this motion cautioning “This knee jerk response is a dangerous one.” and suggesting simply doing the line painting for now. Councillor Kidd spoke up stating that there is even more of a need for the safety of Diane Drive to be dealt with quickly with the development of the Lions Club Sports Park.
Now that this motion has passed, an amendment to the Traffic Control Bylaw will be brought to Council at the next meeting on Monday, May 11th and assuming that amendment passes, the work should start fairly quickly after that.
Budget
It has been an entire month since any discussion of the Budget has happened and as of now, no date has been set for the next meeting. Perhaps if we don’t talk about the budget, it will just go away?!?
At the last meeting of the Finance Committee, there were a few items that were sent to the Library Board for clarification…now we just wait for another budget meeting to be scheduled.