Stouffville's bill from ice storm dwarfed by neighbours'

Town council also dealing with waste pickup problems

Stouffville Sun-Tribune
January 10, 2014
By Sandra Bolan

The preliminary financial fall-out of the ice storm for the Town of Whitchurch-Stouffville is between $25,000 and $30,000, according to Andrew McNeely, the municipality’s director of planning and building services and interim CAO.

That money includes staff overtime, additional staff and loss of revenue due to the power outage.

“We were very fortunate,” Mr. McNeely told The Sun-Tribune today, when compared to our southern neighbours, Markham, Richmond Hill and Vaughan.

The immediate clean up costs for Markham are pegged to be between $2.6 and $3.2 million, while long-term, the bill is expected to come in around $7 to $10 million.

Whitchurch-Stouffville has a contingency fund to pay for events of “exceptional circumstances” such as this, according to Mr. McNeely.

The cleanup is, however, not done.

There are still 15 to 20 business days worth of tree debris clean up to do. Roughly 15 to 18 very large trees will have to be cut down by an arborist because they are too tall for municipal-owned equipment. That cost remains unknown as town staff are currently gathering quotes, according to Mr. McNeely.

York Region has put in to receive provincial assistance in the event the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing declares the GTA a natural disaster zone.

The Dec. 22 ice storm that hit the GTA caused substantial damage to municipal property and infrastructure, a resolution to the province reads, adding the region and the municipalities received several reports of damage to private property.

The resolution went on to state other municipalities in the area were affected similarly by the storm and requests aid for York and its nine municipalities should the ministry declare a disaster area in the GTA under the Ontario Disaster Relief Assistance Program.

The motion was put forward by Markham Mayor Frank Scarpitti at a special council meeting Thursday and seconded by Richmond Hill Mayor Dave Barrow.

To qualify, a council position is required no more than 14 business days following the event, said Regional Chairperson Bill Fisch.

While no York Region-specific tally has been applied to the damage from the ice storm, it is believed the total for the entire GTA could exceed $250 million.

A full debriefing on the ice storm has yet to take place locally because just as the town was coming out of it, problems with waste collector GFL Environmental Corp. arose.

Between malfunctioning equipment, the ice storm, bitter cold temperatures and staffing issues with York’s northern six contractor, some Whitchurch-Stouffville residents had their recyclables and compost sitting curbside for almost a week.

“We should be back to the normal schedule next week,” according to Mr. McNeely.

Town council his holding a special meeting Tuesday at 9:30 a.m. to deal with provincial funding for damage from the ice storm and the GFL contract.

In order to catch up on collecting blue box and green bin materials, GFL will add trucks and staff with the “cost borne exclusively by GFL”, said Mr. McNeely.

For people with additional organic material to be collected, they can be placed beside the green bin in clear plastic bags.

A maximum of five more garbage bags will also be taken next week to accommodate additional material as a result of these delays, according to a town media release.

On Jan. 6, the municipality’s customer service department received 525 calls, with about 55 per cent of them related to the lack of recycling and green bin collection. Additional staff were called in to help handle the volume.

From Jan. 7 to 9, between 250 and 350 calls a day were handled by customer service with 85 per cent of them related to collection issues, according to Mr. McNeely.

A normal day has customer service staff fielding between 200 and 225 calls.

GFL’s contract with the northern six municipalities expiries Sept. 2017 but it will be evaluated later this year and the tender process will get underway likely in late 2015, he said.

The Town of Aurora is holding a special council meeting tomorrow at 9 a.m. regarding GFL.