Big decisions

Ten people sat around the table for nearly two years working toward a plan they could recommend. All but two were firefighters—plus a municipal councillor and the County’s administrator responsible for the fire service. A representative of the Ontario’s Fire Marshall’s office listened, but did not vote.

Nine of the ten committee members recommended that the County replace two aging and inadequate Picton firehalls (downtown and on the Heights) with a single larger firehall at the traffic circle on the western edge of the town. They arrived at that conclusion after nearly two years of investigation, consideration and deliberation. Knowledge-based judgment.

Among the committee members: a volunteer firefighter from Hillier with more than 33 years experience; the Division Commander from Ameliasburgh with 44 years; the Picton Division Commander with 30 years; a Hallowell volunteer firefighter with 28 years; a full time firefighter with 19 years.

In fact, the average length of service of the eight firefighters who developed this recommendation was just under 30 years. Thirty years of training. Attending motor vehicle accidents. Responding to burning homes and farms. Long nights spent cleaning up—so that life can return to a form of normalcy when the sun comes up.

Thirty years of experience produces insight and understanding that most of us don’t have. They think about safety differently than you and I. Access. Assembly. Preparation. Training. Every time they head to a call—their lives are in play. Mistakes can be deadly. Shortcuts and half measures put lives at risk.

For the average person firefighters represent a safeguard against bad things in their lives. Firefighters live those bad things on every call. It’s a rather important distinction.

Yet a handful of councillors feel that they know better— better than the firefighting experts they appointed to advise them.

But then County council has a track record of irrational seat-of-the-pants decision- making—particularly on the big things. It has cost all taxpayers a great deal of money.

Case in point, Picton must surely be one of only a few places on the planet that has mounted its sewage treatment plant high above the town, on an escarpment overlooking its residents, from whom it gathers waste, processes it and pumps it back down the hill. The electricity bills alone to drive the pumps, is eye-watering. Who made that decision?

The municipality spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on experts and consultants. they hired folks who build sewage plants to advise them. A complex and elaborate decisionmaking matrix was developed and agreed upon. After many painful public meetings the “preferred solution” turned out to be on about four acres at the western edge of town behind the grocery store.

That did not sit well, however, with the folks on Sandy Hook Road. About 100 of whom said as much in a subsequent public meeting. Council dropped the “preferred solution” faster than spit. With it, went any semblance of rational decision-making.

Now, of course, Picton’s wastewater system defies gravity everyday. It’s a marvel of sorts. A living legacy to municipal decision-making.

Another example: last summer after six years of bitter wrangling, council hired a Queen’s professor, Jonathan Rose, and his team to conduct a Citizens’ Assembly to recommend a way through the size-of-council swamp. Twenty-three residents learned about the issue, deliberated and made a recommendation. But it was all for naught.

A majority of council rejected that too. They certainly knew better than ordinary citizens. Remember that many of these same councillors were reluctant even to respond to demand of 81 per cent of voters who directed council to review the size of council issue on the election ballot in 2010.

So, here we are again. Rational, informationbased decision-making has been tossed out the window once more. It’s now in council’s hands to figure out how many firehalls are needed and where they should go.

Some will be guided by the handful of folks who call them daily with their views and opinions. Others enjoy the certainty and clarity of a spotless mind. Councillor MacDonald will regurgitate the opinions expressed by the loudest voices at the coffee shop he frequents. Others will rely on their gut instincts, or variations of “what feels right.”

None of the opinions will be more than anecdotal. None will be knowledge-based. None of those ready to discard the fire plan are firefighters or have firefighting experience. None have offered any unique understanding or compelling insight to the debate so far.

Alas, that seems to be how big decisions are made at Shire Hall.

rick@wellingtontimes.ca