POLITICS TAINTS EVERYTHING

Yesterday's Waterloo Region Record carrys this story "More Tory MPs say no to attacks on Trudeau". The majority of this story is political while at the same time clearly indicating that there are numerous Conservative backbenchers who have both spine and ethics. The relevance of this article to the Elmira Advocate is all in the very last sentence namely "Rathgeber, one of the most outspoken MPs, says he has resisted attempts by staff at the Prime Minister's Office to vet the content of his personal blog.". Wow! Aside from the brass and arrogance of the PMO attempting to control a backbencher's blog is the personal significance this has for me. In my case I have been to date stymied in attempts to rejoin CPAC formally by our Woolwich Township Mayor and CAO. The word has been passed to me that the only thing standing in the way of my rejoining CPAC is this blog, the Elmira Advocate.

I've had this blog ongoing six days a week for three years now. It predates the current Woolwich Council by about six months and it's readership has been growing steadily. Faithful readers include numerous universities and colleges as well as different government organizations. Environment Canada and the EPA are on occasionally as are different consulting and engineering companies. Private citizens throughout Waterloo Region, Guelph and Toronto also follow the Advocate. The issues that I write on tend to be environmental with the focus on Woolwich Township. That said they also sometimes include regional environmental issues such as Biosolids and contaminated sites (Northstar, Breithaupt Tannery) that have lessons in common with our contaminated sites in Woolwich.

Bio-En, numerous gravel pits, wind farms, emerald ash borer and other invasive plants and animals are also discussed here. Unfortunately it appears as if Woolwich Township have extremely thin skin. I don't for a second attribute this to the entire Council, only one or two. I have criticized the Council's decision (non-unanimous) on allowing recycling back into the Jigs Hollow Pit (Kuntz). I have also criticized Council over the approval of Bio-En on Martin's Lane in Elmira. At the same time I have applauded serious attempts, that have proven unsucessful, to relocate this facility to a location farther from citizens' homes.

As with any blog there are comments from the public and many are anonymous. Many of these have been highly critical of our Mayor and Council and those that I believe are wide of the mark I will disagree with. The few that are distasteful, profane or simply unduly nasty I have deleted. Apparently all of this is unacceptable to the Mayor and at least one of his advisers. They think that they can blackmail me into dropping this blog. I find their attitude reprehensible and that is why I am going public with it. I have seriously attempted to rejoin CPAC via discreet, polite and proper channels and all I've received back from the Township is paranoid, petty behaviour.

The M.O.E. and Chemtura don't want me to have the status and appearance of township approval. I believe that to date CPAC members have mostly not been aware of the backdoor meddling by the Mayor in CPAC's membership discussions. If CPAC independently don't want me as a member then I would respect that and this need go no further. If CPAC however would like me as a formal member, then quite frankly the M.O.E., Chemtura and the Mayor should all butt out.