At the MRC Pontiac council of mayors public meeting on Jan. 29, there were two big grants awarded through the FRR component four funding envelope, which is distributed by the provincial ministry of municipal affairs and administered by MRC Pontiac.
The MRC awarded $23,000 to the Shawville Curling Club to deal with issues with its ice plant.
Another $100,000 was awarded to the Shawville Arena for emergency ice-related work, and an additional $10,000 was earmarked for a literacy action plan for the MRC.
Council also approved $75,515.31 for a MRC territorial marketing strategy for 2026, with 80 per cent of the funding ($60,531.73) coming from FRR component two with the remainder ($14,983.58) covered by the MRC.
In an email, MRC economic development officer for tourism Stéphanie Hébert-Potter wrote that the marketing budget was slightly smaller than previous years and “supports a range of initiatives, including print publications, partnerships with Tourisme Outaouais for media campaigns, media tours, trade show participation, the production of marketing materials, and various signage projects.”
THE EQUITY has requested an interview with Hébert-Potter for a more thorough breakdown of the marketing budget.
Thorne mayor advocates for increased mayor salaries
Also at the Jan. 29 meeting, the mayors voted to approve salaries for elected officials including a pay bump for the warden, notice of which had been given at the previous monthly meeting (see our Jan. 7 edition). The vote was a unanimous 17-0, as there was no representative from the Municipality of Waltham present at the meeting.
The salary paid to mayors for attending 2026 MRC proceedings was set at $4,635, two thirds of which ($3,105.76) is for attendance at 11 monthly plenary meetings, while the final third ($1,529) is for attendance at 11 public meetings. The plenary meetings last the whole day, while the public meetings typically last around two to three hours. The mayors can also sit on a variety of committees, and while they have their mileage reimbursed for travel to these meetings, they are not paid for attendance like the regular meetings.
Thorne Mayor Terry Murdock said that since he is paid three times as much as the councillors in his municipality, then the mayors at the table should be paid a third of the warden’s salary (which would be $22,214).
“What I do in my municipality is, I take three times the salary of the councillors, and if we did that at this council and made that policy, I think that would work out just fine,” he said.
Toller said that while they were only approving the current salaries noted earlier, she said they would research salaries of similarly sized MRCs to ensure their salaries were competitive, and discuss the issue at their next budget meeting, which would be in February.
“Thanks again Mayor Murdock for having the courage to raise this and talk about it because everyone deserves to be compensated for the hard work they’re doing,” she said
“People, they get to a council like this, and they’re afraid to get a raise because they’re afraid what the public will think of them,” Murdock added. “Well, the public will think they’re dummies if they don’t, you know?”
“I think we’re doing a good job of it, and we should be paid accordingly,” he concluded.
Looking into ice rescue, standardizing fire aid contracts
Council approved a resolution allowing public safety coordinator Julien Gagnon to come up with an estimate for establishing an ice rescue team for the region.
Gagnon said that the issue was raised at the fire safety committee by the Mansfield Fire Department, which is already equipped to handle off-road and water rescues.
“The resolution is just to assess the [equipment] costs and logistics of who would be willing to take the course and what the training costs,” he said.
He estimated the cost would be in the low tens of thousands, and said the goal would be to have one team trained and responsible for the equipment, with additional firefighters in each department trained in ice rescue as well.
He said that if all gets approved, the equipment would be ready to go in time for next winter.
Another resolution was passed to work towards standardizing mutual aid agreements for fire services. Inter-municipal agreements set out the terms for when a fire service responds to a fire in a neighbouring municipality, from the payment of firefighters to the fees charged per truck.
Gagnon said that some departments have numerous agreements, not always at the same rate, and standardizing the pay structures would make things easier.
“The actual inter-municipal agreement they have, the wording in it hasn’t been changing over the years,” he said. “There was a slew of inter-municipal agreements adopted in 2011, with our very first fire safety cover plan, and at the time, it was 15 bucks an hour for a man and so much for the truck, then we’ve moved up to 25 an hour . . . each municipality is responsible to go to its neighbours and change those parameters.”
He said that the new standardized agreements would be sent to the municipalities for assessment and discussion, which he expected would take some time.
