By Mark Squibb/December 2, 2021
A resident of Witless Bay says council should reveal who requested council rescind four motions made by the previous council, all of which relate to blocking development off Mullowney’s Lane.
Anita Dunne said she’s concerned that council would rescind motions based on what amounts to an anonymous request, and she would like to see the community more involved in such decisions.
“What are their motives?” asked Dunne. “What is their agenda? Who is this person?”
Dunne was so bothered by it, she sent an access to information request to find out who had requested the motions be rescinded. She made the request shortly after the November 9 public meeting. She said Town Clerk Barbara Harrigan returned the request a few days later saying the town won’t be releasing the individual’s name.
“The reason given was that it would compromise the privacy of the person,” said Dunne. “So, they’re protecting the privacy of a person who made an anonymous request to change the town ordinances and rescind motions made by a previous council. In my world, that makes no sense at all. You would think that if someone wants something to happen in town that they would have to make a formal request to the town in writing or put something that would be a notice to people that are affected by these decisions.”
Two of the motions relate to 99 hectares of land surrounding Ragged Beach. Council voted to delay voting on whether to rescind them due to the heavy volume of information involved.
If the motions are rescinded, it would reinstate a 99-hectare Crown Land Reserve that would prohibit almost all development in the area.
Another request that came at the behest of the unnamed individual, which council complied with, was to rescind a motion that had given council the power to set its own road standards including for public Rights-of-Way. The change means the Town won’t proceed with an extension to Mullowney’s Lane that had been ordered by the previous council.
The final motion that was rescinded at the anonymous person’s request related to an approval that had been given for a septic system for a private property located behind Mullowney’s Lane. The previous council had made such applications contingent on approval from Service NL.
Dunne sees the rescindment of the motion as yet another attempt by certain individuals in Witless Bay to prevent several private landowners off Mullowney’s Lane from enjoying the use of their own property.
“There’s just no end to it,” said Dunne.
She said it’s been hard to contact most members of council, as their e-mail addresses and phone numbers are not listed on the Town’s website.
“I think the better way would have been for the town council to put on the meeting agenda that they had a request from this person, and say who made that request, and we should be able to ask that person why they feel this motion should be rescinded,” said Dunne. “It should have been put on the agenda to give people an opportunity to respond to it, and at the very least have an open meeting.”
Mayor Trevor Croft said the request was not anonymous, and council knows who the individual is. He said the request came to council almost immediately following the September election.
He said the town is simply following standard procedure.
“When people want to rescind a motion, they can e-mail us, or contact us in another way, and we can look into it, and put it on the agenda, and do our research on it, and find out if we can rescind it, or if we should rescind it, or if we shouldn’t,” said Croft.
As to the identity of the unnamed resident, Croft said again the town is following protocol.
“It’s anonymous to the general public, that’s just the way it works,” said Croft. “If people want to file an ATIPP request, they can get the information from the e-mail, but the name will be redacted.”
He said he understands people’s concerns, but assured council won’t rescind motions willy nilly or without doing its homework.
He said the decision to rescind two of the motions just made sense.
“We talked with the town engineer and the town planner, and that motion made no sense in their eyes, and the one about Service NL didn’t make sense to begin with, so those decisions were easy to make,” said Croft.
He argued that leaving road standards to council’s discretion can lead to dangerous situations that the town might be held liable for. He pointed out that a fire truck currently would have a very hard time trying to fit down Mullowney’s Lane.
One of the purposes of the extension of that lane, by the previous council, was to provide a turnaround for snowclearing and other heavy equipment that might need to access the lane.
Croft said it’s best to leave road standards to the provincial government.
“The Crown Land reserve, those were two of the motions that this guy had requested rescinding, and there’s a lot of information there, and it takes a long time to go through that information,” said Croft. “I’m still reading up about this Crown Land reserve, I don’t know a whole lot about it.”
He said he has three quarters of an inch worth of information to get through, and he does hope council gets to discuss the motion with folks in the area who will be affected, and that due to time constraints and busy schedules council may not be ready to vote on the issue by the December 14 council meeting.
Croft insisted he does not want to block access to any private land.
If folks have concerns about things that arise during the meeting, he said, the best thing is to e-mail the office directly, and Barb Harrigan will respond in time and get the necessary information.
Dunne, meanwhile, raised another concern relating to the votes cast for issues related to Mullowney’s Lane, and that’s the question of conflict of interest.
She argued that Deputy Mayor Lorna Yard, who has carried on a campaign against the private landowners off Mullowney’s Lane for the past decade, should declare conflict of interest and not vote on issues that relate to any development there.
“It’s getting old,” said Croft, when asked about the issue. “It really is. I do not really care much about this Ragged Beach fiasco. There’s so much more to this town than this one chunk. There are so many good things going on, there’s so much positivity going on in this town, and it just so happens that everything seems to fall back to this one area, this one problem, the one continuous issue.”
As to conflict of interest, Croft said Yard’s activism does not fall under the umbrella of conflict of interest.
“Conflict of interest means that you have a monetary gain, or someone you’re related to has a monetary gain,” said Croft. “I know there’s some issues going on because Deputy Mayor Yard voted on some stuff regarding Mullowney’s Lane, and some people are saying it’s a conflict of interest, and it’s not. People seem to like to make up their own version of what conflict of interest means to them.”
He pointed out that councilor Gerard Dunne does not vote on any tenders that Harbour Construction bids on because he works for the company, which his brother owns. That, said Croft, would be a clear instance of conflict of interest.
“But voting on something that you don’t like, doesn’t make it a conflict of interest,” said Croft.
Yard responded to the Post’s request for comment by saying media requests should be directed to Mayor Croft, as he is the official town spokesperson.
