Noront Resources

We will soon bid a not-so fond farewell to 2016; a year of hydro-rate surprises, government over-spending, reconciliation soul searching and climate-change pondering by Ontarians. So, in the spirit of the season and New Year’s resolutions, we’ve put together a wish list for governments and individuals to ponder over the next few days when they’re developing priorities for 2017.

They include:

• Start work on twinning the Trans-Canada Highway from the Manitoba border to Kenora. This project has been promised, then put on the backburner for far too long. Every minute the highway is not twinned the more traveller safety is put in jeopardy.
• Develop a sustainable energy policy that lowers electricity bills and keeps the province competitive. Northwestern Ontario residents should not have to cut back on food to pay their hydro bills.
• Make immediate changes to the way the Ministry of Natural Resources manages moose herds in the province, including making moose habitat a priority when planning forest harvesting plans.
• Announce funding for construction of a road into the Ring of Fire mining camp and finish work on building that road by the end of 2017. This project has been studied for far too long. It’s time to take action to accommodate miners’ plans to develop this regional economic nugget.
• Review the policies and processes of MPAC, particularly in the way the agency determines the value of industrial and commercial properties and residential lakefront. Northwestern Ontario communities are going broke because of unrealistic commercial and industrial re-assessments, while waterfront properties on inland lakes and on Superior soar into the stratosphere.
• Renovate closed schools and institutions into affordable housing units for the homeless, and upgrade programs to get people off the street and into gainful employment.
• Work harder to prevent murders and violent crime in Thunder Bay and elsewhere with adequate social funding while raising the responsibility of community leaders.
• Provide more funding for greenhouse developments on remote First Nations to lower the cost of healthy food. Local food production must become a priority for band councils.
• All governments must learn to live within their means. There is no more room to grow deficit budgets and waste spending. Ratepayers are far too overtaxed. Ontario is already spending $1 billion a month on interests of its debt. It’s time to start paying down that debt instead of adding to it.
• Provide transparency in the cost of carbon pricing and its benefits to Ontarians. Hiding these costs in natural gas and other energy bills does not help promote the government’s plan to cut emissions.
• We also shouldn’t have to wait decades for governments to act on clear and present issues. Electricity prices were a sore point long before Premier Kathleen Wynne discovered it this fall, and rural Internet has been lousy for decades, yet only now is Ottawa officially stepping up.
• Don’t ignore bad optics. Just because you can come up with a plausible explanation (Thunder Bay-Superior North MP Patty Hajdu on why she needed new offices across the street from the ones she could have had for much less) it still stinks of bad old Liberal entitlement. Acknowledgement goes a long way to promoting acceptance.
• Closer to home, people should pay it forward as much as possible. A kind gesture and a smile goes a long way in brightening a person’s day – the giver’s and the recipient’s.

And, remember to hope for and live up to the slogan: Peace on Earth, and goodwill toward all races.