CALEB NICKERSON
CAMPBELL’S BAY
Oct. 2, 2019
On Wednesday afternoon, the MRC council of mayors held an extraordinary session in Campbell’s Bay to dissolve the . . .
current National Park committee and reprimand a mayor over a perceived conflict of interest.
The meeting was prompted by a report from CHIP 101.9 FM in late September that Calumet Island Mayor Serge Newberry owned two small islands in the vicinity of the proposed park on the Lafontaine Islands, and didn’t disclose this information to the committee or to the council of mayors. The islands were purchased in May 2017, prior to his election as mayor.
There have been several attempts in the past to further develop the island group, going back to the 1980s when the land was owned and managed by the Native Alliance.
The most recent iteration of the Lafontaine project was spearheaded by Ontario businessman Joe Kowalski, who owns Wilderness Tours in Forester’s Falls, and also owns a significant amount of property on both sides of the river. Kowalski and Newberry have put forth their own ideas for development to local officials in the recent and distant past, but to no avail.
The committee was formed in November of 2018 after a town hall meeting in Campbell’s Bay, and was made up of Kowalski, Newberry, Campbell’s Bay Mayor Maurice Beauregard, MRC engineer Kim Lesage, Alastair Baird of the Renfrew County and the Ottawa Valley Tourism Associations and Calumet councillor Alice Meilleur Pieschke.
After a lengthy in-camera session, MRC council opened the meeting with two resolutions in response to the controversy. The first ordered the restructuring of the current committee, including membership, the specific islands in consideration for inclusion in the park, and also to define a clear mandate going forward.
The second resolution was to request that the Warden Jane Toller disclose the perceived conflict to the Commission Municipale du Quebec (CMQ), which oversees municipal ethics violations.
Speaking in a media scrum after the meeting, Newberry responded solely in French and said that Kowalski and members of his municipal council were aware that he owned the property. He added that three members of Calumet council own land in the park’s vicinity. He said he wasn’t obligated to, but should have disclosed the specific properties he owned to the MRC.
He said he was glad the MRC would still be pursuing the project, but questioned why the MRC was partnering with a private business to develop public land.
Speaking after the meeting, Toller said all the elected officials are aware that they need to declare even potential conflicts of interest to the rest of council and the public.
“Everyone around the table knows that if there is ownership or any possibility of personal gain, it needs to be declared,” she said.
She noted that the new committee would be an MRC committee rather than a public committee, but wouldn’t say if membership would be limited to only MRC staff and elected officials.
“Now we’re going to have an MRC committee, knowing that the magnificent Lafontaine islands are entirely in Quebec, and in the Pontiac, we want to be in the driver’s seat for plans for better access,” she said.
Council closed the meeting with a discussion of priorities for their upcoming meeting with CAQ minister for Families and for the Outaouais, Mathieu Lacombe, on October 11. Flood compensation, communications, economic development and health care all topped the list.
