Regular Meeting of Council for St. George, March 8, 2021

The regular meeting of council for the Town of St. George on March 8, 2021 was a little less regular than usual. While reading each department's report into the record, Acting Mayor Faith Avery stopped to note that the RCMP had ceased attending town council meetings throughout Charlotte County in late 2019. 

“This past month we’ve had two serious incidents in our town, both without any conversations from the RCMP to town officials,” she said. The first incident occurred on February 8, when a 27 year old man was stabbed inside an apartment on Main Street. Avery says that she and council first heard about it from a Facebook post, and the only communication from the RCMP was a press release. 

For the rest of the meeting it was largely business as usual. For the month of February, the Fire Department responded to seven incidents, including three motor vehicle accidents, one alarm, two structural fires, and one vehicle fire. The public works department repaired some minor water leaks and completed regular maintenance on their equipment. 

One councillor recused herself for a conflict of interest during a motion to provide funding for a visitor information centre, which was a contentious issue with the four remaining members of council. Councillor Jenna Murray argued that a visitor information centre was a poor use of funds when the vast majority of visitors would use the internet to gather visitor information about the town. After some debate, council agreed that Murray’s argument was valid and they voted not to renew funding.