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.
It has become such an institution that a generation of Fenelon Falls and district residents may not believe it, but there was a time when the Fenelon Falls Santa Claus parade was held in the afternoon. It became a night time affair in 1999 and has never looked back, growing into an all-day event. This year, in celebration of the 20th anniversary of the evening parade, events are scheduled on the Friday and Sunday bookending Santa Day, always held on the last Saturday of November.
If it takes a village to raise a child, a town can also come together to help feed kids through the summer months. This is what is happening in Lindsay since summer 2018, where an innovative Summer Outreach Lunch Program is providing healthy bagged lunches to children.
Thanks to organizing efforts by 17-year old Abby Jardine, Fenelon Falls joined other parts of Canada and much of the world in a climate strike September 27.
Rallying at the old Fenelon Falls Theatre marquee sign, about 50 marchers took to Fenelon Falls’ main street to bring attention to the issue of climate change.
A politician, a physiotherapist, and an artist walk to a barre. That’s not the set-up for a joke. The ballet barre is one of 13 components in the recently-opened Seniors Play Park in Fenelon Falls, one of the first such parks in Canada, and I’ve asked the three — all seniors themselves — to spend some time exploring the very compact apparatus and then to share their thoughts.
The politician is Doug Elmslie, currently Deputy Mayor and for the past 13 years councillor for the ward that includes Fenelon Falls. He’s also Chair of the Board of Management for Victoria Manor, and so knows something of aging seniors’ needs. Doug is mid-70s, rates his fitness level as 5 on a 1 to 10 scale. He’s on the go most days and he golfs, but not as often as he’d like.
Local MPP Laurie Scott recently met with representatives from the municipality of Kawartha Lakes and Joan Young, an Ontario Trillium Foundation (OTF) volunteer, in Fenelon Falls to celebrate the opening of the Seniors Play Park at the Lloyd Kelly Parkette.
Scott and Young congratulated the City of Kawartha Lakes Family Health Team on the work done with thanks to a $121,600 OTF Capital grant, along with other local donations, to create one of the first Seniors Play Parks in Canada. The free park is an accessible recreation space that promotes exercise and an active lifestyle for older residents.
Miya Bradburn has always loved to bake for her family and friends.
For many years, however, there was one exception to her passion; Bradburn refused to make tarts. “I was probably close to 35 when I made my first pastry,” explains Bradburn, who was continually encouraged by her mother, Helene.
“It’s kind of funny really. Making pastry is one of the things that you say you can’t do, but you end up doing it and realize it’s actually fun…that does make me chuckle a little bit,” says Bradburn.
Active Again — a program that encourages older adults to try various recreational activities in a comfortable environment with other participants who may require an ‘adaptive’ or modified approach to participating — was launched as a pilot project for 2019 in Fenelon Falls.
The Active Again pilot program was born when the Kawartha Cycling Club received a grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation in 2018 to fund the initiative. KLSRC has worked closely with six different sport and rec providers in the area to put together and facilitate the program.
Speak to any four people in the City of Kawartha Lakes about the prospect of growth and development and you are likely to get at least as many opinions.
Some will no doubt abhor the idea of more people, more traffic and less of the tranquility that they either grew up with or came here to enjoy. A business owner might say we need to grow and we need to grow fast to increase economic opportunity and wonder how we can increase employment. A parent with young children might suggest that we are growing too old as a community and ask about much-needed community amenities.
Still others might simply ask, ‘‘When is the Walmart coming?”
Dave has been our neighbour for close to 20 years. Neither Dave nor his wife, Karina, have aged perceptibly. It’s Luke and Spanky that remind me of the passage of time.
Luke, their son, was a toddler when they moved in. Now he’s Promotions Manager at Canadian Tire, and a few months ago found his own place. Their beagle, Spanky (named by Luke, a L’il Rascals fan as a kid) strained at the leash a dozen years ago. At the end of June she passed away. Over her last couple of years she moped along behind Dave, trailing her master by the full length of the extensible leash.
