The Kawartha Lakes Health Care Initiative (KLHCI) hosted the third annual Rural Medicine Community Experience Day recently. Forty-four University of Toronto medical students were in attendance.
The first-and-second year students participated in hands-on workshops in suturing and intubation and were actively involved in group discussions regarding rural mental health.
For many people, Omemee will always be the coolest place in the Kawarthas simply on the alone of Neil Young having lived there at one time. But today, there are new reasons to like the little village that too many of us just breeze through on the way to Peterborough. One of the best is a unique union of books and brioche on the main street.
The Academy Theatre’s long-time manager of administrative services, Loretta Kingston, has quit, as has box office support staff member, Penny Hainer, amidst a trying time for the theatre.
Kingston, the long-time administrator, has been under more stress of late after dealing with the loss of former General Manager Helen Nestor, who was turfed by the board in August after only four months at the helm. Many of Nestor’s duties fell to Kingston to try to manage.
Pat O’Reilly, councillor for Ward 7 was elected as the Deputy Mayor of Kawartha Lakes for the 2020 term, effective January 1. Doug Elmslie ended his one year term as Deputy Mayor and made the nomination for Pat O’Reilly.
In its first year in existence the Kawartha Lakes Concert Band performed two concerts. The first happened just three months after it formed; the second was for a sold-out audience at the Academy Theatre. “When the band participated in the Peterborough Kiwanis Music Festival, it earned a mark of 93 per cent and went on to win top prize for community bands in province-wide competition. So, as the band prepares for “To All a Good Night,” the Dec. 14 concert that will kick off its second year, the question is, what’s responsible for this success?
Some good fortune for sure: Who knew 74 musicians would answer a call to join, or that there’d be such a good balance of brass, woodwind, and percussion players? (Show me another community band that has 14 clarinets — a core component, clarinets are the violins of a concert band — and two bass clarinets, or three tubas and six trombones).
Way back in 1996 I was fortunate to win a first place national newspaper award through the Canadian Community of Newspapers Association (CCNA). The only reason I bring this minor tidbit of nostalgia up is because of what the award was for.
As arts reporter for Lindsay This Week at the time, I wrote a series of articles about Kawartha Summer Theatre’s board woes the year previous, back in the waning days of the Academy’s summer stock theatre.
“Apartment for rent $1,600.00 per month, no kids, no pets, no smokers.”
This ad sums up the difficulty facing many renters in Haliburton County. Working full-time at minimum wage, one would have approximately $500 for all other expenses after paying rent.
At the Special Council meeting on December 3, Council approved the 2020 Operating Budget. There will be a 3.5% increase to the tax levy, slightly below the forecasted increase in the long term financial plan.
Council received a presentation from Jennifer Stover, Director of Corporate Services. Stover noted that the Operating Budget is $205 million of a total municipal budget of $305 million. The Capital, Water and Wastewater and Special Project Budgets were adopted by Council on November 26 totalling $100 million.
OSSTF negotiators remained at the table right up to a midnight strike deadline but the union says the provincial government and Minister of Education Stephen Lecce “failed to bring a single proposal to the bargaining table.
The sweeping changes to the labour market in Canada over the past 20 years is sparking an unprecedented use of food banks. Heather Kirby, general manager of Kawartha Lakes Food Source says, “The road to the door of a food bank is as different as there are stars in the sky. Housing, child care and transportation are expenses that must be a priority which moves food to the bottom of the list. These choices are nearly impossible to make.”
The sound of children’s voices during the holidays typically conjures feelings of warmth and sentimentality – unless, of course, those voices are in a homeless shelter.
It’s a jarring mental image but one that A Place Called Home in Lindsay is being forced to contemplate.
