Innisfil mayor accused of "hijacking democracy"

An Innisfil councillor is accusing Mayor Gord Wauchope of "hijacking democracy" when he ruled against debating a $70 million project last week.

"I have never seen such disgraceful behaviour by members of council," said Councillor Stan Daurio. 

"The facts tell us that decisions we made to this point were based on misinformation. Only three months were needed to be sure and four members of Council have forced a reckless commitment of $70 million on our water users."

While the majority of council wanted to debate and vote on a controversial recommendation that would have halted plans for a long-awaited sewer and water expansion project to allow more study, there was no debate and no vote after Mayor Gord Wauchope struck a report from the meeting agenda.

Led by Councillor Rob Nicol, the majority of council wanted to vote on the town CAO's recommendation to secure a market analysis study to assess what businesses would locate near Innisfil Beach Road and Hwy. 400 if the lands were fully serviced.

But Wauchope ruled the vote would be a repeat of a December decision that already quashed a market study in an 8-1 vote. He ruled the request for debate "out of order" despite questions from other members of council.

Wauchope did not respond to a list of written questions from BarrieToday and he was not available for a phone interview.

"Our CAO had a report dated January, 2015 that was commissioned by the Town and withheld from Council," Daurio explained. 

"It indicated that we would be unable to match the job attraction rate of Barrie or Bradford-West Gwillimbury."

That fact is especially troubling to some councillors because Innisfil would need to attract half of the forecasted job growth of the area for $70 million investment to service the 400 lands to be worthwhile.

"If we are unable to recover our $70 million investment within a reasonable time, our water users would pay dearly for the carrying charges that would result."

With debate and a vote disallowed, it is expected that InnPower will call tenders for the $70 million project

"We will all keep our fingers crossed over the next two years and hope that two consulting firms and our staff were wrong in their assessments," Daurio said.

Angered by the mayor's actions, Daurio sent a bulletin to residents following the council meeting, cautioning that refusing the review "is to roll the dice with $70 million of our taxpayers' money."

"Councillor Richard Simpson, Councillor Bill Loughead, Deputy Mayor Lynn Dollin, Councillor Rob Nicol and I fought hard on your behalf to convince the four, but it was not enough to defeat this trickery," Daurio wrote in his bulletin.

Deputy Mayor Lynn Dollin says Council took direction from the town Clerk as to what was the proper procedure according to the procedural bylaw.

"He fielded many questions from members of council," she said.