East Gwillimbury mayor lashes out

East Gwillimbury Mayor Jamie Young is mad and he ain't gonna take it no more.
When, for reasons unknown, Mayor Young and long-serving Councillor Marlene Johnston participated in cutting down 83 trees at the Sharon Temple property, it was noticed.
While reading the just-released town report, I noticed some of the downed trees were evergreens, including Norway, white, Colorado blue spruce and Scots pine.
Would somebody tell Jamie the rule-of-thumb in Canada is evergreens are green forever. That's their job. Ours is to leave them alone.
Lord tunderin' Jesus, Jamie has just come out swinging.
The mayor is pointing and shaking the finger of blame in every direction but at himself. He's targeting his council, the town's senior staff, directors of the Sharon Temple and, of course, the people who carried out the inquiry and produced the tree-cutting report.
Thank the gods Jamie didn't leave us out. The media is also bad, he maintains.
Jamie, in your media release, you thanked all your friends and East Gwillimbury residents for "having the insight to question the one-sided information." But, you forgot to add you have not, despite repeated requests, returned media calls.
Jamie, it's a smidgen difficult to get "your side" when you won't talk.
Take it from a media veteran, when you suck and blow at the same time, you run out of hot air.
I do have this annoying habit — I notice how much things cost and who is to pay the freight. Now Jamie stresses the unknown cost of the inquiry is out of control.
Money's a funny thing. It doesn't care who owns it and it can dance like there is no tomorrow.
When the tree report talked money, it was clear:
• value of the trees lost: $27,000;
• cost to replace the trees: $50,000 to $70,000; and
• cost of a fence at Sharon Temple: $10,000.
Don't panic. Council has assured taxpayers the public purse will not have to open. Jamie and Marlene are getting part of the bill. Who knows who gets the rest.
Jamie, you're in a pickle. You can't get rid of your council. You can't fire the town administration all by yourself and you can't silence the media.
But you can resign.

Comments

[judy]

RE:E.G.Mayor lashes out
Come on Joan , aren't you being a tad bit harsh here ?Mayor Young and Councillor Johnston were ORDERED not to comment during the course of the inquiry.Too bad they couldn't muzzle Jack Hauseman.Boy, the media must consider him good fodder,he does love to talk.
Consequently,his ramblings have exacerbated the whole incident leading to an inquiry that was not only unnecessary but very expensive.
Jamie accepted the responsibility for the removal of the trees from day one.I would imagine that he didn't want to get staff involved in this fiasco.
Why then didn't remaining council accept his admission and get on with assessing the damage and dealing with it accordingly?
Why did they choose to drag the Mayor and councillor through the humiliation of an inquiry? The only thing public about it was the shame on them comments made some people.The real information was edited before releasing it to the public.

Concerns I have regarding yesterday's press releases are"
1.The inquiry report states that the Mayor and Councillor "dis regarded the advice of town staff".
The Mayor's release states 'No one indicated the job should be stopped".
Who do you believe?Knowing some of the people involved I believe the Mayor.
2.Why isn't the public privy to Mr.Rust-D'Eye's findings?
3.Why isn't the public privy to the complete reports prepared by Bruce Tree Expert Company Ltd.and the one titled "Preliminary Heritage Evaluation of the trees"?Were there others?
How do we know that the author of the inquiry report just didn't pick and choose the information that HE thought we should know about?
Joan,we are relying on you and your peers to get these reports out.Isn't your motto "To Inform the Public"?We do want to know all of the facts.
These two people acted with good good intentions,stupid maybe,but certainly they are not the "axis of evil" that those who run off at the mouth would like us to believe.It makes one wonder what their agenda is. Hmmmmmmmmm

Judy Laakso E.G.

[Keith Phillips]

Judy Laakso, your comments are interesting. However there are many of us who realise that you quite friendly with one of the miscreants and therefore may be commenting on their behalf.
The fact remains that the mayor and councillor trespassed on private property, incited town employees to follow them and committed acts of vandalism.
Their resignation would be the only decent thing to do, if they want to see how much the public supports them then run again.
Those individuals have reduced our once noble council, with its think green policies, to a laughing stock. Its like Alabama politics transplanted north.

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