It’s been a very busy year for councillors in the Township of Mapleton.
Over the past year, the Township has seen a number of accomplishments from a comprehensive service review in all departments to try and save money to a major construction project and refurbishment along Drayton’s Main Street from the fire hall all the way to the arena.
“We did that in conjunction with County Wellington so we used the same engineers, the same contractors and we did four side streets at the same time,” says Mayor Neill Driscoll.
But there’s still more to be done and Driscoll says it’s getting harder and harder to find the dollars to put toward other projects that need attention.
He points to roads and infrastructure throughout the Township that are in need of work and notes with only 10,000 residents, more than half of whom are farmers, he continues to struggle to find the needed tax dollars for future improvements.
“The biggest thing is the growth in population, there’s only one taxpayer and we collect all the taxes that go to all these other governments but a lot of the funding is based on population, it’s not based on actual kilometers of road or need of a bridge,” states Driscoll.
Driscoll says many of the roads throughout the Township are in need of some work.
“They may not need widened but they do need rebuilt because they can’t handle the heavy weights of the farm equipment and the truck traffic that’s on them today, and just finding those funds is nearly impossible.”
Looking back though, Driscoll says he’s very pleased with what Council has been able to accomplish over the past, another of those major highlights being the new Municipal Maintenance Facility built to replace the one that was lost in a fire back in December of 2013.
Driscoll notes community feedback has certainly helped them make decisions as a Council and they’ll continue to work to get the dollars needed in the New Year ahead.