Welland's Water/Sewer Budget fo 2011

After the recent Welland municipal election I would imagine one of the first things that would be on the agenda of the new Mayor Barry Sharpe and the council with seven (7 ) new members as has been the policy for the past years will be the water/sewer budget for 20111. Mayor Sharpe and the five (5 ) incumbents I am sure will remember Mr. Kovacs and yours truly who for the past years have presented to the city council our analysis report covering the proposed water/sewer budget.Unfortunately over those past years our reports were never given the time of day or in many cases never even read by many of the councilors and those that took the time to read them were very vociferous in denouncing our report as wrong but never on any occasion was it saw fit to support the accusations. In the year 2007 our report indicated the Niagara Region was over charging all municipalities in the Region for water and sewer services. Our future reports also brought the over charge to the attention of all municipalities with no reaction until early this year Councilor Sharpe at the time announced in council our report on the region was correct and the Region owed the City of Welland over $2 million dollars At the time of councilor Sharpe's announcement he received support from a city staff member. Councilor Sharpe went after the Region and as I understand he ran into a brick wall. I am sure that now as mayor and a regional councilor he will be pushing the Region for Welland's money. It is most unfortunate with all of his efforts Mayor Sharpe is not receiving any support from the other municipalities who have also been over charged by the Region.

Again as usual Mr. Kovacs and I will again be looking into a new analysis report to present to council however we have also run into a stone wall with the Region. The Region is refusing to give us copies of the flow and financial charts covering water and sewer as we were able to obtain over the past years because now the Region is telling us that information is not for the public. Mr. Kovacs spoke to Mr. Trojan at the Region and explained to him our situation. Mr. Trojan assured Mr. Kovacs we would receive the information as requested by the following Monday. If we do receive what we asked for we will make up our report to present to the new council with hope it will be received in a more positive way than in the past.