Unity pushed at NOMA

To survive the changes, northern communities must learn to stick together.
It’s a point delegates took home to their respective communities after the annual general meeting of the Northwestern Ontario Municipal Association last weekend in Thunder Bay.
Fort Frances Mayor Glenn Witherspoon said the atmosphere at this year’s meeting was more subdued and less hostile than last year, with communities eager to work together to figure out how to implement all the changes made by the provincial government.
Even those communities which Mayor Witherspoon said traditionally splintered off from the group were quite eager to collaborate on mutual problems.
“For us to accomplish anything at the NOMA level, we must be one,” he stressed.
“That has to happen even more so than it’s ever had,” agreed Jaffray-Melick Mayor David Canfield, who is the new president of NOMA.
“The relationship within the jurisdiction of NOMA I’d like to see even tighter,” he said yesterday. “I think we’ve got to get our heads together so we can help each other.”
The theme of this year’s meeting was “Surviving the Changes,” and that’s what Canfield figured NOMA and its members would be doing over the next year.
“The outlook on the next year is keeping track of changes and making sure we don’t get short-changed,” he noted. “There’s so many things going on. It’s going to be an extremely busy year for all of us.
“It’s inevitable things will fall through the cracks and be missed,” he added, stressing the need for the government to develop a mechanism to act as a safety net for these little mishaps.
Public health services was one of the key issues at the NOMA conference. Mayor Witherspoon said a resolution by Fort Frances was passed to make sure allocations coming from unorganized townships and First Nation communities for the Northwestern Health Unit are correct.
The resolution asks the government to take another look at its public health figures, which Mayor Witherspoon said were quite a bit short.
“There’s a strong belief we’re paying more than we should be,” echoed Canfield. “We want to make sure everybody’s paying their fair share.”
Mayor Witherspoon said municipalities also expressed a strong interest for the government to continue the Community Reinvestment Fund, which is only in place for two years at the moment.
“We wanted a permanency,” he said. “We also want the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines to control that fund.”
Both Canfield and Mayor Witherspoon thought the meeting was very productive, and hoped the ties between communities in NOMA would grow stronger over the year.
Canfield noted with the rapid changes happening in the world, it would be foolish if communities didn’t band together.
“The only way we can benefit by change is if we stick together,” he said.