As 2022 comes to a close, the warden for Bruce County says there’s a lot to look forward to in the new year.
Chris Peabody says that there are goals for 2023 as he works with the recently-installed iteration of Bruce County council, which has old faces as well as new ones.
He also says he’s optimistic about the future, but it’s not without challenges, namely with the price tag of planned projects in the county.
Peabody says that “Cost overruns on capital projects, and looking forward to the future and what that’s going to hold. I know we had a bridge project in Paisley, and it was initiated very successfully and is coming along very well, but looking down the road, we have a similar project for Walkerton, and the cost forecasts are quite shocking. We’re hoping that when things get tendered out, it’ll be cheaper than what’s being forecasted, but with the supply of contractors, and builders, and supplies… Municipally, I noticed that the overruns on these capital projects were very significant, and a challenge to all municipalities.”
For different departments for Bruce County, Peabody shared his appreciation for how hardworking county staff has been this past year. “Our daycare staff successfully completed the agreement on the $10 daycare for public sector, private sector, and non-profit sector daycares in Grey-Bruce. It was a big job that our staff had to work on.”
He also mentioned the Emergency Services team, and the fact that they’re expanding services into Sauble Beach, Huron-Kinloss, and building a new headquarters in Port Elgin.
He says that there are things to look toward for 2023, that will help with ideas for growth in the region.
“Going ahead, we’ve got an official plan that we’ve been working on for five years that will allow for more concrete plans for growth in our towns and hamlets in Bruce County. I’m hoping to get that finished and I know our Chief Planner is working away at it, and that’ll be ready for a vote. The other thing that we have to work on — that all municipalities throughout North America are working on — is affordable housing. I’d like to look at other models of delivering affordable housing that would maybe get the non-profit sector involved, [and] see if we can get some private sector partnerships to put some affordable housing in and some apartment units if we can get them built, so I’m excited about that.”
The Warden, who is also the Mayor of Brockton, says that he would also like to tackle improvements to long-term care, particularly in assisting patients with dementia. “I’d like to see how we can improve services that we deliver to patients with dementia. Right now, we have one dementia unit at the Walkerton facility, but I do know that there are other communities in Ontario expanding their services and doing something different, and I’d like to do some research and get a grant that Bruce County could apply some leading practices in dealing with dementia, to help out those patients, as well as their family members.”
Peabody is also looking forward to travelling to Cannes, France with four representatives from the county’s Economic Development department. The MIPIM Conference, (Le Marché International des Professionels de L’immobilier, or The International Market for Real Estate Professionals) is a 4-day real estate exhibition, conference, and networking event, that will be taking place March 14-17th, 2023.
The county’s Economic Development team was selected as one of the leading departments in Canada and received a grant from the federal government to attend the conference.
The MIPIM Conference will host close to 30,000 delegates from all around the world, and Bruce County will be one of the few Canadian representatives in attendance.
Peabody says that they’ll be using the trip to highlight industrial, commercial, and agricultural opportunities in Bruce County.
