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Serving the Mapleton Community
Community News Volume 44 Issue 21
Drayton, Ontario
1 Year GIC - 2.10% 3 Year GIC - 3.00% 5 Year GIC - 3.25% Daily Savings 1.50%
Friday, May 27, 2011
Wastewater users likely face increased costs due to lagoon upgrades by Chris Daponte MAPLETON TWP. Drayton and Moorefield residents should prepare for either another increase in local wastewater rates or another capital expenditure bill. As a result of the new lagoon cell construction at the municipality’s wastewater treatment plant, Mapleton Township will have to borrow $950,000 to cover the purchase of 59 acres of land on Concession 9, adjacent to the current plant. Past reports have indicated about 30 acres are required to construct a fourth lagoon cell. In his report to council on Tuesday, Finance Director Mike Givens said the loan means, a “review of wastewater rates for both Moorefield and Drayton users will need to take place prior to 2012 to take into consideration the additional costs associated with the loan payments or council will need to consider a separate capital billing.” Givens offered councillors three choices for the Infrastructure Ontario loan application (all based on the $950,000 principal amount with semi-annual payments): - a 20-year term at 4.3%, with payments ranging from $44,230 down to $24,250, for total interest paid of $419,076; - 25 years at 4.46%, with payments of $40,243 to $19,422, with $540,662 in interest; and - 30 years at 4.56%, payments of $37,552 to $16,191,
with $661,162 in interest. Based on the 25-year term, Givens provided council with the following breakdown of what the township’s first $40,243 payment might look like, “based on the assumption that the payments related to this loan will be made utilizing funds raised through taxation and user fees”: - $19,920 or 49.5% from tax dollars; - $15,852 (39.4%) from Drayton wastewater users; and - $4,471 (11.1%) from Moorefield users. “As well, the taxation portion will need to be taken into account during 2012 and future budgets,” Givens said in his report. Councillor Andy Knetsch said he prefers the 20-year term because of the savings it provides the municipality (over the other options). Councillors Mike Downey, Jim Curry and Neil Driscoll agreed. “We are saving in the long run on the interest,” Mayor Bruce Whale added. Givens told council the interest rates change all the time and he could not guarantee the actual rate for the township will be 4.3% when the loan is approved. Council unanimously approved a resolution directing Givens to proceed with an application for an Infrastructure Ontario loan in the principal amount of $950,000 with a fixed loan term of 20 years.
Rotary Club hosting 21st annual dinner theatre DRAYTON - The Drayton Rotary Club is inviting locals to join in celebrating the club’s 21st annual dinner theatre night on June 9. The evening gets underway at the PMD Arena in Drayton with a great country meal served by the Mapleton Arena eXpansion (MAX) committee between 5:30 and 6:45pm. Guests will enjoy a tasty meal, complete with a quality Ontario vintage beverage, and great fellowship. During the evening the club will be awarding door prizes, and provide guests an opportunity to win a beautiful handmade quilt. At about 7:30pm guests will make their way to the Drayton Festival Theatre to settle in for the production of Dance
Legends, a salute to movers and shakers conceived and directed by Alex Mustakas. This presentation is brimming with music, comedy, and plenty of emotion. The funds raised in this event will be used by the Drayton Rotary Club to support international causes like Polio Plus (polio eradication), and also for local service projects sponsored by the club. The cost for the dinner and theatre is $65 per person, Dinner only is $40 per person, and for Dance Legends only the cost is $35 per person. To secure tickets contact Rotarian Bob Bignell at 519638-2736 or bignell@kw.igs. net, or Rotarian Jim Curry at 519-638-3363 or curry@bell. net, or any Rotary member.
Main St. W. Palmerston
THOR
Rated PG. Starring Chris Hemsworth, Anthony Hopkins & Natalie Portman. Thor comes to Earth and becomes one of its finest defenders.
Times: Friday & Saturday 8pm & Sunday 7pm
For more info call 519-343-3640 or visit www.norgantheatre.com
Local meets legend - Students from Listowel’s Promar Karate, including Sensei Alida Hesselink, far left, of Moorefield, were in London recently to work out with martial arts legend and former UFC Champion Royce Gracie, centre. Joining Hesselink and Gracie, from left, are: Sensei Dustin Dickison, Sensei Becky Schweitzer, Jason Koetsier, Sensei Tamara Yates, Shihan Mark Yates and Trudy Jackson. More photos on page 8. submitted photo
Former pig farmer enjoying success in bait industry by David Meyer MOOREFIELD - When it comes to determining what is good and bad about farmland, a family from just northwest of here has a reliable indicator the humble dew worm. That worm serves as a metaphor for environmental conditions and it even suggests social implications for immigrants, reflects high gas prices and can indicate to farmers they might be using too much or the wrong type of cattle feed. The dew worm, surprisingly, is not even native to North America, according to Dirk Dekker, the owner and operator of Country Bait. As an immigrant himself, Dekker knows a few things about a business he has been involved with since 1986. He moved to Canada from the Netherlands and shortly after got into pig farming. It was a social indicator of those days that he soon decided he did not enjoy the ups and downs of the pork market and began looking around for other ways to make a living. It was also in those days that scam artists were touting African worms for the bait industry but, being careful, he checked with Agriculture Canada and learned he could make more money picking dew worms. Then he found a man from Arthur who had been in the bait industry for years and
was ready to retire. So Dekker switched from pork to dew worms and never looked back. The average dew worm sales operation is 1,000 square feet. Dekker recently completed a zone change on his property and he has two buildings that are 5,000 square feet each, and he has ten acres from which he picks his own worms. The sheds have conveyor belts, bedding boxes, styrofoam flats that contain 500 dew worms apiece, a setup for loading trucks and some areas for testing bedding. “We’re always experimenting with bedding,” he said, citing recent trials with cardboard. “We really think we’ve got a winner. It took us a couple of years to get the formula, but we think we might have something.” Think of it this way: the worms can actually eat the cardboard if they run out of other foods; the cardboard is clean so anglers don’t get dirty hands rooting around for a bait; and clean hands mean a cleaner boat. Dekker chops cardboard and adds other items (a trade secret). He recycles used bait boxes from his shipping division, and he also picks up cardboard from a company in Listowel. “Instead of more and more, we’re trying to sell different-
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ly,” he said. Than means being sensitive to the environment, and “better fields, better pickers.” Dekker moved his fledgling worm business west of Moorefield in the 1980s, and said with a laugh that leaving the pork industry was “probably desperation.” His operation includes hiring worm pickers, and he said many immigrants have their first jobs picking dew worms. Even that industry has changed. When Dekker began worms were picked at golf courses; today he will not even accept worms from them. First, the chemicals used on the grass made those worms smaller, and many of them are now black. He said a desirable worm is one that is pale or translucent. Two or three black worms in a flat of 500 might be okay, but more than 30 and the entire flat could die. For some reason, and Dekker thinks it might be chemicals or changes to cattle feed, some entire farm fields produce black worms, which he believes are “sick.” He is toying with seeing if someone at the University of Guelph is interested in finding out why that is. Instead of golf courses, Dekker and his son, Ryan, rent five or six fields from farmers from Moorefield to Tilsonburg - up to 20 and 30 acres. Farm
owners benefit, too. What he pays can be worth up to more than the crop they harvest. Dekker calls it a second income for many of them. In the fall, after the third cut of hay, Country Bait runs a special mower developed by his son, Ryan, over the stubble and calls in worm pickers. Dekker said clover and alfalfa are the best fields for dew worms, and Ryan noted rye grass is something they do not seem to like. He added some farmers now work worm picking into their field rotation. It is quite a sight to see 30 or 40 people (the Dekkers hire Vietnamese pickers through an agent) on a field. Pickers tie cans to their legs, one for worms and one with sawdust, and strap lamps to their heads. Sawdust takes the worm slime off their hands so they do not miss when they pick. Each carries plastic bags and special ties; when their cans are filled, they are emptied into the bags, tied with the distinctive tie, and left in the field until morning. Then, they go back and collect the bags and tie them to a pole they spread across their shoulders, and carry them to a collection point. Each picker is paid according to his productivity, and Dekker said grabbing someone else’s bags has led to a scrap or two over the years. Continued on page 3