COUNCIL MEETING MINUTES- Special Meeting October 26th, 2017

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COMMUNITY OF MISCOUCHE
Special Council Meeting
October 26th, 2017

1. OPENING MEETING:
Chairperson Ivan Blanchard called the meeting to order at 7:00 pm.

Present:

Minister Robert Mitchell,
Kevin MacCarville,
MLA Sonny Gallant,
3 Representatives from Lot 16,
3 representatives from Linkletter,
2 Representatives from St Nicholas,
Ivan Blanchard,
Pat MacLellan,
Ricky Myers,
Joan Arsenault,
Robin Gillis
Michelle Perry.

AMALGAMATION:

Ivan thanked everyone for coming out to talk about the concerns and benefits of Amalgamation.

Minister Mitchell briefed everyone on what the Government is looking to do on the Island with amalgamating communities and the benefits of doing this. He talked about Three Rivers and Georgetown and that the process is long but in the long run the communities will be stronger and able to sustain themselves in the future to become a viable community. 73 municipalities on the Island as small as ours is not sustainable, and with the New Act coming out in the New Year things are going to change, a viable community should be 4000 people but he is willing to look at 2500 -2800 people

MLA Sonny Gallant just wanted to commend everyone here tonight and that this is a great first step, talking to see what the other communities are thinking.

The big question that everyone one has is what can you offer me and will my taxes go up.
Kevin said that the big question should be what if I don’t amalgamate what will my taxes be, with the new laws coming into effect and communities don’t amalgamate those communities will have higher taxes in order to sustain themselves. And with a growing communities comes more opportunity to grow and become a more viable community you will have better chances for infrastructure money as your community will be larger. Those communities that stay on there own this funding will not be available to them. So it’s a win-win situation for everyone.

This can be a long process to achieve but if the communities are interested the government can help fund in the process to have study done to see what makes the best sense for the communities involved and to make sure that this works for all parties.

Ivan thanked the Minister and everyone for coming out and talking about the issues.

3. MEETING ADJOURNED