Spreading the Word in Grey & Bruce.

This is a proposal to enhance the communication between Municipal and Regional Councils, Event organizers, Charitable and Social agencies etc. with our local citizens using available internet tools. I hope that the few who continue to visit here will think about it, talk to the organizations mentioned, comment upon it and encourage others to do the same.

The advent of the internet and more particularly Blogs and the systems to easily and quickly post and manage information from a wide variety of sources has made this medium a must for those that wish to keep up with current affairs. Traditional news media (and some blogs) are now linked to internet search engines so that almost any subject may be rapidly researched without leaving your chair.

Unfortunately the things that should be most important and relevant to us are often missing, I refer to items of LOCAL importance that do not necessarily hit the headlines in print or radio and TV. One such item that is often missing are reports from our local or regional councils. Unless there is some controversy or a specific need to notify the citizens much of the work of council goes on unseen and unreported, I believe this should and can change.

Some councils are better at keeping the citizens informed of current matters under consideration that others, and nearly all post approved minutes and by-laws on their web sites. This is however HISTORICAL information and usually only posted as a downloadable file and not viewable online, and one must go to each individual web site to see what is newly posted. I propose a more timely internet content. Producing and managing a forum for this is relativity easy, the difficulty arises in obtaining factual, up-to-date content.

I propose that our various councils and other community boards and committees (across Grey & Bruce counties) be approached to see it they are open to delegating a person within their individual organizations to submit, on a regular basis, details of what is being discussed, upcoming issues and decisions made in order to keep the “public” informed. As I have said above there will be some who want to keep as much as possible out of the public eye but I would hope that others would find such a forum a useful tool. Each organization would have to decide what was suitable for release and who would be authorized to post it and this may well create some difficulties, but most will already have a policy regarding such “news releases”, meeting details, upcoming events or other information of interest to the community.
There may also be room for “citizen” reports from those entities that do not participate themselves, provided that some means of ensuring “objective” reporting can be ensured.

The process must be simple for both the submitting agent and the reader so that neither has to spend a great deal of time to accomplish what they wish to post or read. To that end (and for the benefit of rural and urban users who use dial up connections) I believe that the pages should be simple text with no “heavy” content such as pictures, audio or video. Articles should be short and to the point and contain links to more extensive information as and when necessary, the aim of the pages should be to make the citizens aware of the particular issue not necessarily to discuss it at length. Only the title and first paragraph or so would be shown on the main page in order make it easer to quickly browse the content. It may be desirable to produce, and link to, in depth background articles where the issue needs further explanation.



It is not clear to me at this time exactly who should or should not be able to post in such a forum, but as a rough guide I submit that any not for profit Local organization (which of course includes councils, health committees, community events, and the like) should be allowed to do so. Non member organizations would be able to submit articles for consideration either directly or by email. This would have to be decided on an individual basis either by application or invitation.

I do think, however that it should be possible for citizens to comment upon items and for the submitting organizations be able to review those comments. It may be necessary to require a “membership” to post comments in order to ensure that the responses remain “local” and relevant, that remains to be seen. It should not become just “another blog” and should be narrowly focused upon municipal affairs and community development and have regular new articles clearly indexed by content and date.

The forum will need some upkeep and moderation and this should be accomplished by a “team” rather than an individual, both to reduce the load and to minimize the possibility of “editorial” bias. This could be a group of interested local citizens preferably consisting of those with no particular bias or association with political partys or lobby groups. Another possibility is to solicit simple text business listings on a modest pay for use basis to help pay for web space and upkeep. I suggest that these need to be limited to local independent operations in order to encourage local development and to limit the amount of advertising on the pages.

This then is the general idea and this is a call for those mentioned within this piece and those who may want to view that kind of content to let me know if it is:-
a) a good idea. (or not!)
b) feasible from your organizations point of view.
c) if you have any ideas on how to improve upon the basic concept.

Please pass this around, talk about it, copy it to others that may be interested and let us know what you think. If I get some positive feedback I will go further by providing an email link to collect detailed responses and summarize them in a return email to each responder, and may attempt to form a committee to establish said forum. I would also like to hear from you if you are willing to be part of the “team” or can assist in providing web space or expertise.

PS. I would like to take this opportunity to wish you all Happy Christmas, Seasons Greetings or whatever is your particular preferred greeting is this time of year. May you all have a really great 2008.



12/19/2007

Mixed News!

I found the juxtaposition of these news stories from Owen Sound Radio News this week interesting……..

Farm stories for December 4thWritten by Jim Birchard
Ontario pork producers are facing some very tough times.
It's all becuse of the high value of the Canadian dollar, high feed prices and low pork prices. Curtis Littlejohn is the Chair of Ontario pork and says the Ontario government step forward with some immediate financial help………………………..

And……….

The federal government is reintroducing legislation that would set minimum biofuels content in gasoline, diesel fuel and heating oil within three to five years. If passed, the Renewable Fuels Bill would require five per cent ethanol in gas by 2010 and two per cent biodiesel in diesel fuel and heating oil by 2012.
Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz says the legislation will mean new jobs, as well as new markets and better profit margins for farmers. As part of the package, Ottawa previously announced 1.5 billion dollars to help producers get biofuel production up and running.
----------------
Better margins for GRAIN farmers maybe, but it sure wont help the cattle and pork farmers! I wonder how much of the 1.5M will go to the farmer and how much to the BioFuel lobbying industry. I have previously had my rant about this at http://saugblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/as-push-towards-biofuels-gains-momentum.html


Then there is this on more “green” energy………

New wind farm plans in Tiverton Written by Ken Cassavoy
Suncor Energy and Acciona Energy have started preliminary tests on a possible wind farm site southeast of Tiverton.
Hulse says the proposed project is in the so-called "Orange Zone" which means that, at least for now, there are transmission constraints in place and, until additional transmission capacity is built, no new projects will be built in the area.
She says, depending on developments in the new year with the Ontario government, the project could be as large as Ripley - 76 megawatts-38 turbines - or limited to a 10 megawatt project involving five turbines.

And…………….

Hanover could lose a doctorWritten by Diana Meder
A Hanover doctor says he doesn't want to leave the area ...but may have no choice.
Dr. Paul Eisenbarth is not only the head of the emergency department ..he's also a cattle farmer who's upset with a plan to potentially change the route of the massive hydro transmission lines planned for Bruce Power to Milton.
He says he'd likely have to pull up stakes ...not being able to run his organic heritage cattle farm or protect nearby wetlands. (I really do not understand why not?) Eiesenbarth says its ridiculous to move lines that already have an existing corridor to go through farms and wet lands.


And then this, one of many doctors leaving or retiring……….

Kincardine loses doctor to Hanover Written by Jim Birchard
Kincardine's loss is Hanover's gain.
Kincardine will be losing a family physician this spring when Doctor Susan Boron relocates her practice to Hanover.
Rogan says Doctor Boron currently lives in the Hanover area. He says Doctor Boron has practiced in Kincardine for the past 30 years and the decision to relocate to Hanover was made with a great deal of thought and consideration.

…………………………………..

Seems like somedays you just cant win!!