When amalgamation was proposed in Wellington County, “save money and amalgamate” were the buzz words.
When amalgamation was proposed for a township that merged Mount Forest, Arthur, the Township of Arthur and parts of the townships of West Luther, West Garafraxa and Peel, the buzz word was an unequivocal “no” among politicians and former politicians involved in the process.
But despite the opposition, it wasn’t enough to halt the amalgamation that would see Wellington North teamed up with six other amalgamated townships under the Wellington County banner.
The idea was first put on the table around 1997, when the Conservative government of Mike Harris proposed province-wide amalgamations in a bid to save money.
The idea was that merging municipalities would cut down on staffing costs by cutting clerks and treasurers and merging those jobs in the newly-amalgamated municipalities (at the time there were 21 lower tier municipalities).
County council hired consultants Harry Kitchen and Doug Armstrong to create the framework for amalgamation of communities within its jurisdiction, but some of the proposed mergers weren’t met with enthusiasm by councillors of the day.
Evelyne Near, who served on West Luther council for 15 years and on the new Wellington North council for two terms, said the initial response by her council was to oppose amalgamation.
“We were against amalgamation,” she recalled.
Despite the opposition from the small West Luther part of the equation that would help form Wellington North, the belief among councillors was that amalgamation was inevitable.
“The government said, ‘You’re doing it’,” Near said. “A lot of us fought it hard.”
One of the concerns was that West Luther taxpayers would be paying for services, such as the arenas in Mount Forest and Arthur, which their municipality didn’t have.
West Luther wasn’t alone. Politicians in Arthur and Mount Forest opposed the amalgamation of the two communities situated about 24 kilometers apart from one another.
In Arthur some preferred to amalgamate south with Fergus and what would eventually become Centre Wellington, whereas in Mount Forest there was a move to go north and amalgamate with Normanby and Egremont townships, which would become West Grey and Southgate respectively.
Reg Hill was a member of the final Mount Forest council and sat for only one year, as there was a move to match elections in the amalgamated communities with provincial elections. His father Bob Hill had spent 15 years as a Mount Forest councillor and also as a trustee on the school board. Both opposed merging with Arthur, instead favouring a northern amalgamation.
“I had a meeting (at the arena) to express my vision to go north,” Bob Hill recalled.
Both knew Wellington County was not in favour of any amalgamation beyond county boundaries, but Reg Hill went so far as to meet with his political counterparts in Normanby and Egremont located in Grey County to discuss a merger.
He believed, as did his northerly counterparts, that merging Mount Forest with the two townships was a “natural” move because the communities shared recreation and fire agreements and Normanby and Egremont residents often shopped in Mount Forest.
When he returned to his council to talk about a northern merger north in which he thought there was interest, Reg Hill discovered there was no support for the move.
“After I got summoned to what was the transition council they informed me they were not going to support the idea,” Reg Hill recalled.
“I felt they were insincere. They had voted to amalgamate (south), but they hadn’t decided how it would be done.”
Both blame county pressure for abandoning any idea of a merger north for Mount Forest.
“People (politicians) didn’t want to give up their influence with Wellington County,” Reg Hill said.
Both believe that a rumour of the Mount Forest hospital closing if there was an amalgamation beyond county boundaries also swayed votes to merge within Wellington.
Wellington North councillor Dan Yake doesn’t recall a hospital closure argument at the time amalgamation was being discussed. He said hospital closures were, at the time, always a sore point within the community that spawned local concerns, but he does not believe that was a part of the overall amalgamation argument.
Yake was already a seasoned Mount Forest councillor, having been elected in 1994. He has since represented Mount Forest and Wellington North.
Yake said he opposed amalgamation and also considered a merger north. But the plan to amalgamate municipalities only within Wellington County was the main agenda, pushed by county councillors.
“It never would have happened,” he said of the northern merger. “The county sort of took the lead for all the municipalities in the county.”
Eventually the discussions came to a vote on whether Mount Forest should amalgamate into a new township that included Arthur.
“We had this lengthy discussion and we had nine members on council and it was a 5-4 vote to support it,” Yake said of the vote that took place in late 1997 or early 1998.
“They put together an amalgamation committee so there was members from each council. That’s where the recommendation was that these four municipalities (West Luther, Arthur Township, Arthur village and Mount Forest) come together.”
Don Ross was elected the first mayor of the new council, along with councillors Near, Yake, Gilbert Reid and Mike Broomhead, who would eventually succeed Ross in the mayor’s chair until he was defeated in the last municipal election.
Yake said it was strange sitting around a council table with people he didn’t know.
“As neighbours we didn’t really know each other,” Yake said.
Council meetings were moved back and forth between the communities. Among the first orders of business was naming the new municipality.
Yake said council considered retaining the names of all the amalgamated communities into one name, but that was too convoluted. They also discarded a suggestion the municipality be named “North Wellington,” because it sounded too much like it was a formal part of the county. It was decided Wellington North Township would work.
Councillors also had to indicate where they wanted individual municipal surpluses to go. According to Yake, they were established in reserves, earmarked for individual projects in the former municipalities, or simply spent.
“They knew amalgamation was coming so some spent their surpluses,” Yake said. “They wanted to get ahead of it (amalgamation). Whatever reserves any municipality brought they were set aside for that specific community.”
As Wellington North progressed, reserves would be set up for specific projects within the new municipality.
“It worked good in some areas, not so good in others,” Yake opined.
The belief that amalgamation would save money has never materialized, in the opinion of several politicians and former politicians.
“I don’t think overall it saved us any money,” Yake said. However, Yake believes the merger allowed projects to be undertaken by the larger municipality that otherwise would not have been possible for the smaller, individual municipalities to handle.
Even the premise that jobs would be cut didn’t happen when Wellington North came into being. The township has hired more people, including the creation of an economic development department, which today has two people working in it.
Yake believes council should have looked harder at the number of employees it needed.
“In reality that should have started where you looked at jobs and what was redundant,” Yake said. “In 13 years we should have made adjustments.” However, he agrees that provincial downloading and tougher regulations governing sewage, water and buildings, necessitated hiring trained staff.
Today Wellington North is strapped with a debt estimated at about $10 million, with annual interest payments sitting at around $600,000. Much of that was due to the construction of a new sewage treatment plant and sports complex in Mount Forest. The council of the day took advantage of federal and provincial cost sharing to pay for the $16 million sewage treatment plant and provincial money put in for the $10 million sports facility.
A look at the township’s tax levy over the past six years, provided by treasurer Mike Givens, shows the 2006 tax levy was slightly more than $3.8 million. In 2012 the levy has ballooned by $2 million to slightly more than $5.8 million (the treasurer was unable to provide a breakdown of operating and capital costs in either tax year).
The debt load was a major issue in the last municipal election that saw a new mayor and three new councillors elected. Yake sits as the lone veteran on the current council.
Bob Hill believes the township has taken on too much debt and believes if Mount Forest remained on its own, town council would have been forced to budget for any similar facilities.
Major projects in Arthur involved infrastructure rebuilding and a new pool.
According to Near the perception is that Mount Forest “is getting more.”
But Yake points out Arthur may also need a major new facility if it is decided the community needs a new sewage treatment plant.
Bob Hill, who made his mark in politics as a hard-nosed politician who fought hard for issues he held close, said another stroke against amalgamation was the closure of the Arthur high school, with students transferred to a new high school in Mount Forest.
He points out provincial regulations would never have allowed Arthur to be without a high school if it was a stand-alone community.
Current Mayor Ray Tout said he believes the communities are slowly adjusting to amalgamation. He points to the recent amalgamation of the Mount Forest and Arthur fire departments into the Wellington North Fire Service. The mayor said the merger has allowed the fire service to take advantage of more expertise and possibly cost sharing.
Tout said as young people grow up in Wellington North they will become more accustomed to calling it their home community, but will also have roots in their home towns.
“You’re still going to talk about the town you’re raised in and the municipality you’re part of,” Tout said.
Only time will tell.
This is the second of an eight-part series examining the amalgamation that reconfigured Wellington County from 21 municipalities to seven in the late 1990s.
