Crimes, Misdemeanors and Google Steet View

New Developments in Torch Mess

Assault charges were dropped last week against a 19-year-old Kitchener woman for the altercation between torch security and protesters during the Olympic torch's run through Downtown Guelph on December 28th. As reported in the Mercury, a new charge of mischief was made against Brittney Simpson. The assault charge was dropped because there was “no reasonable prospect of conviction” according to Assistant Crown attorney Steve Hamilton. A second person arrested in relation to the incident is still facing an assault charge with an additional mischief charge filed against her in court last Monday. Both Simpson and Kelly Pflug-Back from Guelph will be back in court on March 5th.

In other Torch related news, Guelph Police said last week that there was no evidence to support Pflug-Back’s charge that she was assaulted by torch security during the protest. Guelph Police spokesperson Const. Michael Gatto said that the police have two videos of the incident provided to them. “They both had different angles of the scene,” Gatto said of the videos. “Neither video showed any evidence of an assault that took place to match up with what Kelly Pflug-Back was describing.” Pflug-Back, meanwhile, is sticking to her guns. “It’s ridiculous,” she said. “There is a hospital record of the contusion on my lip. I was punched.”

Guelph Goes Google Street View

Guelph can now count itself among the lucky few, one of 150 Canadian cities, that can see itself in full detail on Google Street View. “I am so pleased that we are on the map, so to speak,” said Christine Chapman, program and partnership co-ordinator with Guelph Tourism Services at the City of Guelph. Canada just became a part of the Google app early last year despite the occasionally controversial nature of the program due to its highly detailed photography. Cars equipped with special cameras took the images of Guelph last spring and summer, which explains why when you look at different areas of the city some trees have no leaves and others are lush and green. To check out Street View for yourself, just go to maps.google.ca, type in an address, drag the little orange man on to the area of the map you want to see the street view of and enjoy.

Perfect Attendance Goes To…

The numbers on attendance for city council from 2009 are in, and the winner of the perfect attendance award is Mayor Karen Farbridge. The Mayor’s stats include face time at 38 council meetings, 27 closed meetings and 46 committee meetings. Ward 5 Councillor Leanne Piper also had an impressive finish with 38 council meetings, 27 closed meetings and every meeting of the CDES and land ambulance committees. Not included in the count however were meetings missed while councillors were representing the City at meetings or conferences. As well, it should be pointed out that aside from the Mayor, city councillors have to, you know, work a job and make a living since being a city councillor is only a part time gig.

Crime Beat

In follow-up to an item in The Beat last month, the mysterious case of an 83-year-old man charged with several incidents of anti-Semitic graffiti, saw our octogenarian tagger plead guilty in court last week. Max Mahr of Guelph was arrested and charged on September 30, 2009, with five counts of mischief under $5,000, with an additional charge of wilful promotion of hate being laid following a further police investigation. No word on sentencing, although all parties are due back in court on March 8 for a pre-sentencing report.

GO Trains, Cash and Attendance

Now we know, where to get on GO

We’ve talked a lot about the fact that GO Transit is coming back to Guelph in 2011. The biggest part of the plan to bring GO back was the question of where the new station’s going to be; it wasn’t always a forgone conclusion that it would be at the VIA station downtown, although that would be logical. In fact there were three sites in the running including the VIA station, as well as new stations on Watson Rd. or the Lafarge site. But GO Transit released an Environmental Assessment on the impact of expansion this week that seems to have settled the matter.

In the report, GO with its partners cited that the downtown station would be the best option based on environmental, cultural, technical and economic grounds. Both Lafarge and Watson Road were turned down due to the potential, deleterious impact on the local environment, and inadequate access to the site from the outside. But most importantly, the other two sites were too expensive to convert over the pre-existing VIA station. This is good news for the downtown and Ward 1 Councillor Bob Bell who told me in December that host the GO stop downtown is “the single biggest thing that will happen to downtown Guelph this decade.”

Interestingly, the plan had an addition previously unknown to city staff, a park-and-ride on Neeve St. at Farquhar. Richard Henry, the city’s manager of engineering said he was “a little surprised” to see the notation on GO Transit’s plan for the downtown stop, but added, “It is a potential site. It is not firmed up at this point.” According to Bob Chapman, the city’s manager of parking and traffic, the 210 spaces required for the initial rush can be handled by pre-existing parking downtown, plus the on-the-books development of a parking structure on Wilson St. What’s unclear though is how the creation of new parking on Neeve St. will be paid for. Chapman said that discussions about cost sharing could happen as soon as this April.

Social services cash fractures city and county

The social services and housing budget at a joint city and Wellington County social services committee meeting last week failed to pass after a tie vote. The vote fell along party lines as the three county councillors and Wellington County Warden Joanne Ross-Zuj voted in favour, while Mayor Karen Farbridge and three Guelph City Councillors voted against. The committee’s budget called for Guelph to pay $1.25 million more than the $23.5 million the city approved in its Dec. 15 budget vote. “We're sitting at a 21 per cent (caseload) increase over January of last year,” County treasurer Craig Dyer said, adding the previously expected 20 per cent increase through 2009 is not enough. Despite the failed vote, the social services budget will now go to county council on February 26 where it can be reopened and approved with the county's entire budget.

Roll Call released

The city recently posted attendance numbers for councillors at all meetings in 2008. There was a three-way tie for first in attendance at 47 out of 47 council meetings; Mayor Karen Farbridge and Councillors Vicki Beard and June Hofland were counted present for every meeting of the whole council. Reversely, Ward 5 Councillor Lise Burcher has the worst attendance at 37 meetings, followed by Ward 3’s Maggie Laidlaw at 38. Interestingly, Gloria Kovach tied for third best attendance even though she spent three months in the middle of the year running for higher office. You can find all the numbers on the Mercury’s 59 Carden St. blog.

LIMITS Update

The group Land Is More Important Than Sprawl will be holding a press conference today (Thursday) at 11 am at the (maybe) future site of the Hanlon Creek Business Park. For more information, jump over to my blog, guelphpolitico.blogspot.com, or come back to next week’s Guelph Beat.