Smithsfalls081513

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Biennial regatta sails into Rideau Ferry

NEWS

By DESMOND DEVOY desmond.devoy@metroland.com

Premier Wynne visits Lanark County’s agriculture community. — Page 3

COMMUNITY

News – The Rideau Regatta is bringing its show on the road, or water if you will, to the Perth Basin this week. The biennial event will be extending out an extra day early when a number of invited speed boats will be winding their way up the Tay Canal to the basin beside Perth’s Crystal Palace tomorrow (Friday, Aug. 16) at 2 p.m., with an OPP marine escort. While Perth’s town crier Brent McLaren may not be able to part the waters like Moses, he will be on hand to welcome the boaters to the county seat. Many of the boat crews will have photographs of their boats ready as handouts for children. According to an email exchange from Perth town Coun. Jim Graff, one of the event organizers, most of the boats “have been completely restored and are capable of speeds over 100 km/h.” “(This) will be a great opportunity to see these beautiful race boats up close and talk to the drivers and crew,” added Graff. The highlight of the invite list this year for Graff and others at the Port Elmsley, Drummond/North Elmsley Township-centred event is the arrival of a “Canadian icon,” the Miss Canada IV, a vessel from the 1950s. “Miss Canada is an unlimited class hydroplane powered by a 3,500 horse power Rolls Royce Spitfire aircraft engine and was the first boat in the world to reach over 200 miles per hour,” wrote Graff. The regatta trades off its hosting duties with Clayton, New York, and, as such, many of the participating boats are from eastern Ontario and upstate New York. However, some of the participating boats come all the way from Australia, including one can’t miss craft from down-under, the Midnight Miss. Rather than attempt a Pacific

Photo by JENNIFER WESTENDORP

Little Road Racer Events - Beckwith Street of Smiths Falls was closed down on Aug. 11 for the annual NAPA Auto Parts Gravity Grand Prix soap box derby. From Church St. to Main St., downtown Smiths Falls was dominated by hand-made gravity-pulled vehicles. Roughly 30 cars, operated by children between the ages of seven and 17, participated in the event. Five different classes of soap box racers were featured, including hobby street, hobby pro, stock, super stock and masters. The event was put on by the Canadian Soap Box Racing Association, which goes around to different communities and helps put on soap box derbies. The association is based out of Peterborough, which has the only permanent soap box racing derby track in Canada. For more information on the association, check out www.csbra. com. Travis Moore is pictured here.

See REGATTA pg SF2

Smiths Falls recreation agreement shows arena numbers Lanark County’s top cop hangs up his shield and heads into retirement. — Page SF1

SPORTS

Saltos Athletics grabs some silver at a recent international aerobic gymnastics event in Las Vegas. — Page SF20

By HOWAIDA SOROUR hsorour@perfprint.ca

News – About 18 months ago, the Township of Rideau Lakes entered into a Recreational Cost Sharing Agreement with the Town of Smiths Falls. Under the terms of that agreement Smiths Falls was supposed to provide Rideau Lakes with audited financial statements as well as registration data, showing how many township residents were using the facility. “I voted against it at the time even though I had supported the idea, because we hadn’t been given any numbers - we didn’t know how many of our residents were using the facilities,” said Rideau Lakes Coun. Jeff Banks. The numbers are out now, showing that a little more than 300 registered users access the Smiths Falls arena from Rideau Lakes or about 23 per cent of to-

tal arena use. “This is the first time that Smiths Falls has provided the numbers to this degree of complexity,” said Robert Maddocks, CAO from Rideau Lakes. Both the length of the delay in getting accurate user numbers together and to improve the process in the future, Smiths Falls town staff recommended a few changes to the original agreement. “The scope of the facilities subject to that agreement has been pared down - it used to include outdoor recreation facilities, like the splash pad, and the seniors’ centre, but now will only apply to arena usage,” explained Steve Fournier, acting Smiths Falls CAO. The reasons are simply logistical, in that it’s nearly impossible to arrive at a number or an origin for people using the outdoor recreation facilities.

“It’s a good arrangement and fair to all our residents,” said Rideau Lakes Mayor Ron Holman. In addition, Rideau Lakes will only be required to pay the base rate again this year without the additional $10,000 annual increase, to reflect the fact no similar agreements have yet been signed with the other townships that use the facility. “The delay was partly due to staffing changes - our former CAO retired and Steven Fournier only joined us in September and while this was near the top of our priorities, it has taken some time to collect the usage data we have now that allows us to continue our discussions with other townships,” said Smiths Falls Mayor Dennis Staples. For some the cost of the facility seems steep at $232 per user in Rideau Lakes - $70,000 divided by 302 users.

“I don’t support it now either with these numbers; we’re paying more on a per capita basis for a few arena users than we pay for garbage pick-up,” said Rideau Lakes Coun. Rob Dunfield. “I think we’re paying too much for 300 some odd people to use it. I’d rather sponsor kids who can’t afford to play at all.” According to Fournier the current costing is simply based on the operating expenses for the arenas, including those salaries that can be directly tagged to arena operations, but does not include interest on the debt Smiths Falls had to incur to build the facilities. For now the town pays the interest and absorbs an additional 15 per cent of unidentified users. Cost sharing agreements are neither new nor unusual in rural areas where arena facilities are too costly to build in sprawling townships such as Rideau Lakes.

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“We have similar recreation agreements with Westport and Athens because part of our population is served there as well,” said Holman. Montague and ElizabethtownKitley, whose arena users number 156 and 77 respectively have received the new report but had not had a chance to discuss it at the time this paper went to print. “It will be on the next agenda which is not scheduled until Aug. 20,” said Bill Dobson, reeve of Montague. Discussion at Rideau Lakes council promises to be lively at the next council meeting as the amended agreement is dissected and discussed by councillors who are not all fans of the current arrangement.

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