Area growth anticipated from amalgamation.

Come the New Year, there will be a new council for all of Haileybury, New Liskeard and Dymond Township.

"Currently, Dymond, Haileybury and New Liskeard are satisfying the (Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing's) order," says Haileybury Mayor Tom Wells. "We are moving full steam ahead for the next election. People who are elected will be at large so people in the whole municipality will elect them.

"The benefits of this are legion," he says, adding that much of the duplication of services that occurs between the three communities will be eliminated.

A single municipality of 10,000 people is also going to have a stronger voice than several municipalities with only a few thousand people each, adds New Liskeard Mayor Jamie Hawken.

"There are a number of advantages, but the main one, the one that is key, is in looking towards our economic development," he says. "Rather than having a constant tug of war, if we're working together toward a common goal, we will get a lot further.

"If you look at our community, we are strongly intertwined economically anyway," Hawken adds. "We need to eliminate the borders between our communities that begin with a municipal boundary."

Negotiations toward amalgamation first started back in 2001 with an order from the Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing. An advisory committee was struck to develop the amalgamation agreement between the three municipalities. A group of volunteers are currently discussing what to name the new municipality and its logo. Recommendations from the group to the transition board were expected in late July.

Although Dymond Township Reeve Danny Wbalen and councillor Randy Winters are both in favour of the amalgamation, there are three councillors who are seriously questioning the move and have even caused the hiring of a lawyer to investigate the township's options.

Councillor Glenda Labelle, when approached by Northern Ontario Business, would not comment on the group's concern or the status of their investigations.

"According to the province, this is going to happen," says Whalen. "According to the restructuring committee, this is going to happen. We've spent a lot of money on this process."

Hiring is already underway for a new chief administrative officer, as well as other top management positions in the new municipality. November's election will consist of a ballot for councillors to the new municipality.

"We've made a commitment that no one will be out of a job because of this amalgamation," he says. "As a result, we will have exit packages, which we will offer people in positions we feel we don't need. There may be some people who are offered exit packages who don't want to go, so, if they say no to the package, they will be kept on as transition employees until we can find them a permanent job in the new municipality."

Consultants have helped develop the structure of the municipality along with an employee recruitment, departure and organizational structure for the new community.

"We have a set of timelines in which everything is to be done and everything is coming into place to have a new municipality on Jan. 1, 2004," says Wells.

John Gauvreau, manager of the Tri-Town Strategic Economic Development Unit (SEDU) says although the success of the recently-developed economic development package does not hinge on the success of the amalgamation efforts, it definitely will not hurt.

"Whether amalgamation happens or not is a non-issue for us," Gauvreau says. "We have the support of four different municipalities (Haileybury, Cobalt, New Liskeard and Dymond Township). Personally, I think amalgamation is a good thing, but whether or not it goes forward shouldn't defer the economic development of South Timiskaming, which represents a total of 28 different municipalities. We like to think that our plan is good from Latchford to Englehart to Notre dame du Nord to Elk Lake, Matachewan and Gogama.

"We're a product of co-operation, not amalgamation, and we're going to continue to walk that fine line until this issue is resolved," says Gauvreau.

The SEDU was created last year in an effort to develop a call centre proposal for the region, says Gauvreau. There are a couple of companies that have expressed interest in the area. However, no negotiations are underway as of yet. Gauvreau says a lot of work has been done to facilitate its development, as well as identify other areas for economic diversification.

The economic development package developed by the department identifies several areas for economic growth in south Timiskaming, including the development of agriculture biotech technology, forestry re-manufacturing and tourism development.

"We held a series of nine meetings throughout our area," Gauvreau says. "Some were geographical and some were sectoral, and we did a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis with all these meetings and these were some of the critical opportunities we saw come out at each of those meeting."

The call centre has received attention from several companies and there is $5 million in funding available to renovate a site for a call centre, if needed, says Gauvreau. There is considerable opportunity in the bid-fuel industry both in the forestry and agricultural sectors and the area's location on Highway 11 makes it an ideal site for forest re-manufacturing of raw materials into manufactured goods.

The efforts to market the potential of an in-bound call-centre, as well as setting up the other opportunities are still going ahead, he says.

www.town.newliskeard.on.ca

www.town.haileybury.on.ca

www.twp.dymond.on.ca