Canada: Noise committee can't get it in gear!

OFF THE WIRE
http://www.yourottawaregion.com/website/article/834130--noise-control-committee-needs-to-get-in-gear Noise control committee needs to get in gear Lack of progress for two years
Noise concerns. David Somppi and Mark Gallivan, right, tell Greater Madawaska council the township’s environmental noise committee needs to make more progress. Steve Newman After two years on the Greater Madawaska Township’s environmental noise committee (ENC), David Somppi says progress has been irritatingly slow.
He and fellow ENC member Mark Gallivan appeared before the township council’s committee of the whole June 10 to express their concerns, and to suggest solutions.
It appears the township will make moves in that direction at today’s (June 17) council meeting, so Greater Madawaska can adopt an amended noise bylaw sooner rather than later.
The six-member committee is chaired by Reeve Peter Emon, who acknowledged it has been difficult to schedule regular meetings because of committee members’ other commitments.
ENC membership is completed by Coun. John Pratt, plus representatives from Calabogie MotorSports Park and the Calabogie and Area Business Association.
The focus of the presentation by Somppi and Gallivan was on criticism of ENC, but specifically about the need to change township regulations so that all council members review special-event permits for Calabogie MotorSports Park and other applicants before they’re issued or denied.
Somppi indicated two special-event permits, which allow noise levels to be higher during special events, were recently granted (May 27) by chief administrative officer Angela Yolkowskie. Those events are scheduled to take place June 26-27 and July 22-25.
Somppi indicated during his presentation to council that he has spent a great deal of time reviewing noise-control bylaws around the province, and that a page or two could be borrowed from some of them for the betterment of noise control in Greater Madawaska. He suggested the City of Waterloo’s noise control measures, with some modification, could work just fine in Greater Madawaska.
Whatever the noise bylaw, he said all components need to be enforced.
In a memo to council after the meeting, Somppi reiterated his major points:
• council needs to implement a new administrative policy that requires the CAO to inform council when a special-event application is received;
• the general public should be afforded an opportunity to review the application and provide comments to council before council’s decision;
• council “can and should revoke the existing (special-event) events and subject them to” the above administrative policy;
• costs for monitoring or auditing sound levels at the track should be paid for by Calabogie Motor-Sports Park, not by the township;
• the Ministry of the Environment’s noise-pollution control documents shall include adjustments for tonality. Somppi noted that the tonality of motorcycle noise has been of particular concern to several township residents.
The township’s efforts to amend its noise-control bylaw, said Somppi, have been impeded by a slow-moving ENC that he said has “been dysfunctional at best” and featured spotty minute-taking. Council members didn’t disagree.
Coun. John Pratt, who is a member of ENC, said he has asked for progress a number of times. Speaking to Somppi, he said, “I’m as disappointed as you are.”
Coun. Don Mercer said he was “P.O.ed” about the committee’s lack of progress and that “the process has to be changed, or modified, or improved … We have to get a solution to the process of spinning wheels.”
Pratt concluded: “We have some work to do.”
“No kidding,” added Mercer.
Mercer suggested council members should receive special-permit applications, from CMP or other parties, within 48 hours.
To which Coun. Tom Ryan remarked: “Council’s just avoiding its responsibility by passing their duty (on these applications) over to the CAO.”
Barbara Taylor, who was among more than a dozen local residents to attend the June 10 council meeting, said, “I can’t believe it has taken almost two years to have a (noise) bylaw reworked.”
She said such action at a corporate level would have signalled trouble long ago.
Several items are to be considered before the township’s noise bylaw is changed, says Emon.
These, said the reeve, include feelings within the community that a noise is needed to control noise from CMP; that a noise bylaw might limit the use of such every-day tools as lawnmowers; and that there should be a provincial offences fines structure for multiple noise infractions.