CALEB NICKERSON
CAMPBELL’S BAY June 19, 2019
The MRC office in Campbell’s Bay had a line up stretching to the parking lot before the council meeting on June 19, with more than 50 citizens turning out to discuss a controversial plan to look at allowing motorized vehicles on portions of the PPJ trail.
PPJ trail discussion
The sizable contingent contained elements of both the local quad club and regional cycling groups, who are at odds over a recently created MRC committee that will be researching the possibility of opening up certain portions of the rail-bed-turned-cycling-trail to ATVs and dirt bikes.
The five-person committee is made up of Campbell’ s Bay Mayor Maurice Beauregard, Mansfield et Pontefract Mayor Gilles Dionne, Fort Coulonge Mayor Gaston Allard, Waltham Mayor David Rochon and Shawville Mayor Sandra Murray and was formed at the council meeting on May 15 to study the options available. At the meeting on June 19, the guests filled the council chambers and spilled out into the neighbouring hallway.
The crowd was waiting nearly an hour before discussion on the trail even began, as the council made their way through the Non-Organized Terrritories (TNO) agenda as well as the preliminary items in the regular MRC meeting. The discussion began in the presentations portion of the meeting, with multiple representatives from each group presenting their statements to the room.
First up was Shawville resident Mike Hodgins, who is blind and walks on the trail daily with his guide dog Nellie. He said that allowing motorized vehicles on the trail would make it unusable for families with small children and pedestrians like him who walk it often.
Next was Maurice Lamarche, owner of Base Macrocarpa Campground in Mansfield. Since his business is intersected by the trail and is used often by campers and their children, Lamarche also questioned the safety of motorized vehicles mixing with non-motorized traffic.
Pontiac Quad Club Vice President Yves Martineau tried to alleviate the cyclist and pedestrian concerns, telling the group that safety comes first to the Pontiac Quad Club.
“The reason why we’re here tonight is because we feel it’s a concern, not a conflict but I think it’s almost there with the people who walk or use their bicycle on the PPJ,” he said. “Our goal is not to stop anybody to walk or bicycle on the PPJ, not for now anyway, it’s not our goal.”
The latter comment got a strong response from the crowd, who had to be quieted by Warden Jane Toller, who asked them to let Martineau finish.
He stressed that the Quad Club is not interested in the portion of the trail from Wyman to Campbell’s Bay, which includes the paved portion that transects Shawville.
“We will never touch it,” he said. “We don’t need it, we don’t want it.”
The section the committee is looking at, which was revealed when the council passed a mandate resolution following the public question period, is between Campbell’s Bay and Waltham.
Martineau, backed up by the Association Quad Region de l’Outaouais President Pat Gravelle, stressed that they are motivated by the possibility of bringing more business and tourists to the Pontiac by expanding the current trail network.
They reiterated that areas like Maniwaki attract ATV riders from all over, and that a better trail network in the Pontiac would bring in more riders from elsewhere.
Clarendon resident Nathalie Swanson questioned whether the committee was valid, considering shared-use trails aren’t allowed under Quebec law. MRC Director General Bernard Roy responded that the committee would only be researching the file and reporting back to council.
Green PPJ Vente member Dominique Bomans criticized the committee, alleging that it is biased in favour of ATV riders. Beauregard responded that the council had voted in favour of studying the issue and added that all 18 mayors were offered a chance to join the committee. Litchfield Mayor Colleen Larivière explained to Bowmans that the committee would only make recommendations to the rest of council, who would then vote on any decisions. She also asked that Bowmans give the committee a chance to do its job.
Warden Toller was forced to limit the public comments on the subject in order to keep the meeting moving.
“We’ve got a long agenda and I’m just trying to be considerate to those people that are standing,” she said.
In the end, the mayors passed a resolution that gave the committee a mandate to assess the financial and insurance impacts of converting a portion of the PPJ into a muli-use or ATV-only trail, and to gather all relevant documentation for study. They will also seek a legal opinion on the rights and risks of a potential conversion, as well as its impact on existing provincial funding from the Route Verte program.
Speaking after the meeting, Toller was pleased by the large turnout and urged citizens to wait to review the committee’s findings.
“It was great to have so many people so interested in this issue,” she said. “They both made compelling arguments … We have been asked by many people way back in the election and we made a commitment to re-open the issue. Nothing got decided tonight, the multiuse committee still has to meet.”
Guests and public questions
Pontiac MP Will Amos, who had a meeting with the mayors earlier in the day, gave a quick word to the crowd before departing for the House of Commons for a vote. He noted that the federal government would be allocating more funds for water quality and quantity monitoring across the country.
“The flooding, as we know is happening everywhere in this country and we need the best data possible,” he said. “We saw cutbacks in years past, we need to reinvest.”
He also teased an announcement that would be made the following morning about the long-term refinancing of local SADCs, which promote economic development across the Outaouais.
Representatives from Animal Aide Pontiac gave a report on their spay and neuter program, and requested funding and support from the local mayors.
To round out the public question period, Campbell’s Bay councillor Stéphanie Hébert-Shea asked that Beauregard read a letter from their council, requesting an answer to why the municipality’s application to the Territory Development Fund was declined this year, when it had been approved in years previous.
“We would have been delighted to accept any financial assistance, even a small amount, but this year our project was refused and the council and I did not get any answers to why our proposal did not receive any support from the MRC, despite similar projects being funded elsewhere,” he read. “I understand that a splash pad project might not be what the MRC expects from a development project, but I remind you that this splash pad is the fourth phase of our revitalization project.”
Toller said they would receive the information the requested and thanked the council for bringing the issue to her attention.
Flooding, funding and more
The council passed a resolution that would earmark a $50,000 contribution to the startup of the Villa James Shaw facility in Shawville.
They also passed a resolution from the organizers of the Flood 2019 Facebook group, which currently boasts over 7,000 members. The resolution requests a technical, independent inquiry into the existing dam and reservoir infrastructure on the river, as well as the Ottawa River Regulation Planning Board’s mandate, governance model, operating procedures and policies. The resolution also requests that the province’s disaster relief program be amended to include cottagers and out of province residents as well as increase the current relocation allowances from the current caps to market value.
After the meeting, Toller explained the rationale, noting she had laid out the resolution at a flood meeting on Allumettes Island on June 17.
“In the Pontiac we really depend on our cottagers, our weekend people,” she said. “The taxes that they provide, we can’t afford to lose. The message I had at that Allumettes meeting was, ‘However we can support you we will. Don’t give up and don’t leave the Pontiac.’”
Garbage contract and Energy from waste
The council passed a resolution that expresses the interest of the MRC in becoming the site of an energy from waste facility, which would convert household garbage to energy through heat. Toller said after the meeting that she has met with other local wardens and Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson to discuss a partnership.
“To make this work, we would really need Ottawa as a partner,” she said. “We are currently spending almost one million dollars sending our waste all the way to Lachute. We’re taking our garbage and making it a problem for someone else. What we want to do is take responsibility for our own waste. Because of our location, we can serve the rest of the Outaouais and Ontario.”
Though the plan is still in the very early stages, Toller said that council would be requesting funding for a feasibility study on the issue at future session.
The MRC also launched an early call for tenders for the reception, transport and disposal of waste in the MRC, which is currently handled by Tom Orr Cartage in Clarendon.
“We’re going to an earlier tender,” Toller said. “We hope that by the end of June we can look at the tenders or the responses. And we’re hoping to start the new contract around August 16 … We know that Tom Orr [Cartage] had challenges but I’m happy to say that [they] received some help from some other local businesses to keep the garbage moving. We had an extraordinary amount of waste from flooding. Things are going quite smoothly now.”
Investment committee
Following the recommendation of the investment committee, council approved a $5,000 conditional grant to a local contractor for purchasing tools.
“We all agreed that right now the Pontiac needs a lot of contractors,” Toller said.
In addition, the investment committee had a presentation from representatives from Eureka 93 (formerly LiveWell Foods Canada) who discussed the proposed CBD research facility in Litchfield, which has been stalled for months. Toller called the meeting “very encouraging” and said that the MRC would extend the deadline for the $100,000 grant they offered the company until December.
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