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Homelessness requires a group effort group of passionate high Ajchool students gathered last ‘riday to ask local politicians what they were doing about the problem of homlessness. It was a simple question to a notâ€" soâ€"simple problem faced by such an affluent area. And while they all agreed more must be done to coordinate the fedâ€" eral, provincial and municipal govâ€" ernments‘ response to the problem, the issue was also put back on the students, making them part of the solution. What could they do? Simply from moving their educaâ€" tion out of the classroom to the reality of the streets, the Grade 12 economics class at WCI learned something the majority of their friends, classmates, families and neighbours didn‘t realize. The problem of homelessness can be found right here in the streets of Waterloo; although we often define it as a downtown Kitchâ€" ener problem. CGir] Guides applaud council decision But with the panhandling probâ€" lem that cropped up in Waterloo‘s core over the winter, and the strong turnout for the Out of the Cold proâ€" gram at Waterloo‘s First United Church, homelessness is quickly gaining a visibility this community has never seen. Some students said Wa!erloo Division Girl Guides applaud Waterloo city council for initiating a pilot reciprocal agreement with the Waterloo Region District school board for Guides. Scouts and neighbourhood associations who offer vouth proâ€" gramming. The Guides are in receipt of a tetâ€" ter from the City of Watetioo notify ing us that we will not have to pay rental fees for school gyms for the 2004â€"2005 school year. We salute Coun. Jim Bolger who brought this issue to council and found the way to make it happen. Region could get by with one CAO y fortunate coincidence, three Bchis‘i admimstrative officer (CAO1 jabs have become vacant in Waterloo Region; Waterâ€" loo, Kitchener and the region itself. What a spectacular opportunity to find administration synergies among our local governments. This super CAO conuld be given the mandate to weed out duplica tron and evverlap of semares that exists within our eight mungerpal tres thatcombineed, are aboutr the same S120 48 ]')IN‘I'II, Ont s on iT\ governed by one uind il Thedist ot possibilitis is exterisive Now is the time to hire one CAO, as did hospitals in Hamilton and Kitchener to administer multiple hospitals within their cities Many CEOs or presidents in pri vate businesses manage multiple companies sometimes in multiple countHes HSINHO it‘s about time. They also suggested more must be done to reduce the barriers between the affluent and poor so that more action can be taken. While planting a homeless shelâ€" ter in the heart of Beechwood might be a little extreme, their hearts were in the right place. This is a problem that needs more public awareness. Awareness that there are people in our community surviving on only a dollar a day. â€" â€" And awareness that there are people who would love to break the cycle of poverty but, because of how the rules of social assistance are applied, don‘t have the support to stand on their own two feet. As Kitchener Mayor Carl Zehr said, it‘s not only a Kitchener probâ€" lem. It‘s a Waterloo and Cambridge problem, too. When the school board decided to charge rental fees for use of their facilities, Waterloo Guides had to pass the cost on to the girls by adding a user fee to their memberâ€" ship dues. No girl is turned away from our organization because of inability to pay. When a girl cannot pay, the user fee is pulled from the small budgets of the individual units. Most of our units moved into churches and community centres and are very grateful to them far sharing their space with us for no COs Naturally, hundreds of reasons why this is "not possible" will be given by power preserving politiâ€" cians and senior bureaucrats. However, with constanth rising raxes svecminst ask oursehues hy a seamless communitty called Mater loo Regron with a population of under 500000 requnbes rig ht dis time t o gpecuerniregy hroadies. arighnt boonman ue sempmcers cb puac tavent eighcooamfoomuatrenbeIreedigss Ultimately a commitment has to be made to build up peopleâ€" not just "It is clear why we are being subjected to excessive taxes." _ housesâ€" by all members of society. â€" Doug Huttan concerned taxpayet COMMENT ORLIA| That‘s why he spent some preâ€" cious political capital to have more affordable housing spread throughâ€" out the community instead of conâ€" centrating in Kitchener‘s core. The Region of Waterloo is also steadily working towards its goal of building 1,000 affordable housing units in five years. While the City of Waterloo‘s had some modest success, with the first new affordable housing project being built locally on the site of the former Brighton public school, not enough is being done to get the whole community to buy into solvâ€" ing the local homeless problem. It is complicated, but there are things that are working, like the new experiment in downtown Kitchener that has an outreach worker buildâ€" ing trust with the needy to get a sense of what efforts are needed to reduce this growing problem. Ultimately, a commitment has to be made to build up people â€" not just houses â€" by all members of society. And if the students‘ responses to what they saw was any indication, the need for a united front was the real lesson learned at school that day. It‘s a program that Waterloo itself can learn from in addressing its panhandling problems. â€" Unfortunately, this took us away from the neighbourhoods where our members live, making accessiâ€" bility difficult and in some cases, because of cultural barriers. imposâ€" sible for girls to participate. Waterloo city council has shown that they value the youth of Waterâ€" too and are willing to support the work of the volunteers. departments, eight purchasing departments, eight public warks management teams, seven parks and recreation departments. (four) library systems and so on. We citizens of this region need to ask our elected representatives WHY we are preserving all this costâ€" ly and needless duplication of serâ€" vices? It is clear why we are being sub jected to excessive taxes. Now is the time, before we hire three new and expensive CAOs, to reapen the debate on public gover nance in Waterlon Region Asoitizens. wedareed to insist Hrat on podimncal leaders commui to finding cost effretemctes and hughur qualim semvices through serious enepebalien Bravo to the City of Waterloo Laurie Strome Commissioner, Waterloo Diviston Girl Guides of Canada HRONLCLE | DNoug Huttan seb Tougher environmental standards, increased population growth and hotter and drier summers have made it more diffiâ€" cult for the existing system. which relies mostly on groundwater. to adequately meet the water supply needs of Waterloo Region. My column a couple of weeks ago examined how our local water system is under extreme pressure to keep up with our community‘s increasing demand. In my view, in order to meet our longâ€"term requirements for water, we need to begin the process of building a water pipeline to the Great Lakes. Most of the eâ€"mails 1 received on the topic were very much in favour of the concept, but not everyone shares my view. Some people wrote me and shared their concern that a water pipeline would open the "floodgates" on development. We should live within our means S.M wrote the following, "You speak of the Waterioo area growing by leaps and bounds. Politicians speak of controllable sustainable growth but many folk will argue that this growth is uncontrollable. If federal and provincial governments were really being responsible they should consider forcing communities such as the Waterloo Region to live within their means." S.M. is right; Waterloo is growing in leaps and bounds. The west side is absolutely booming and in all likeliâ€" hood our city will be stretched to the border at the Wilmot Line within three The east side is also growing rapidly towards and around RIM Park and the city will soon be pushed to its limit on the east side as well. In fact the area bounded by Waterloo Region, Hamilâ€" ton and Toronto is one of the fastest growing areas in all of North America. With this growth comes new revâ€" k . t 0C Snd S enue from property taxes for cities and SEAN regions, new opportunities for busiâ€" STRICKLAND nesses, increased vitality, and some very serious challenges to existing infrastructure. More people require more services and local govâ€" ernments have to expand services in recreation, transit, health care, roads, library and increased water and sewer resources to meet the demand. These increased demands for new services are challenging, but if given the choice between trying to meet the challenges of population growth versus meeting the chalâ€" lenges of no growth, I would choose growth every time. Growth is controllable Despite what some people think, growth is controllable. Through the Planning Act, municipalities have the right to determine land uses and thereby they can choose how fast they want growth to occur, where the want growth to occur and what the growth is going to look like. The Region of Waterloo has the legislative authority to establish "land uses" through a regional official plan. Once these broad land uses are defined the local municipality determines more specifically what the developâ€" ment is going to look like. fust last year the regional official plan was amended to bring more land into the urban area. This is land that was formerly restricted for agricultural use and now can be "rezoned" to either residential or industrial. All of this new growth that may result out of the change to the official plan is controlled. The official plan is prescriptive and clearly indicates what type of growth is to occur where. For example, in the future much of our regions industrial growth is going to occur in the lands near and around the Waterloo Regional International Airport. Another example of control is the "hard line" of rural protection. Under the official plan, the cities can expand up to, but not across the township boundâ€" aries. This means that Waterloo and Kitchener cannot expand past Wilmot Line, and Cambridge cannot expand into North Dumfrics Adequate controls are already in place The irny of this situation is that the development industr beheves we have too many controls. and some in the public betieve that we have to tew Tt‘s aliways a challenge to stike the right batance whend comes to managing growth But T have to condude, based on the controls already in place T have exers confidence a water pipeline vall not canse our commuimits lead ens to threw out the planning promiples on which our ceenion nub lags heen ht L omasl vomi questieas and eommmten‘s ho seanisseanstrick land.com A water system under pressure