Last night was the first of many orientation meetings for the members of Milton Town Council. With the sheer number of “new” councillors around the table the orientations have been split up so that our heads don’t spin off of our bodies. Good luck with that.
I have to thank Milton Town staff for putting on these meetings and as someone who is somewhat familiar with the breakdown of the departments and what they do, it was still a good refresher filled with many “ah-ha’s” throughout the night. I’m really looking forward to more of these sessions so that when the council is inaugurated on December 6th, we can hit the ground running.
There are some members of council who were re-elected and what we referred to as “recycled” at the meeting and they will be a great source of information to help us “newbies” get on track. There is a lot to do in the coming weeks and many more pieces of paper to digest but its a challenge we are all looking forward to.
There are a lot of decisions to make before we get started and council members have to decide which sub committees they would like to sit on, from transit to trails to accessibility to economic development there are many to choose from. These committees will be populated not only by councillors but members of the public as well. Citizens are encouraged to apply for the open positions that are available on these committees and you can find a list of them on the Town of Milton’s website Please take a look at the list of boards and committes, see what you would like to apply for, and send your infomration in. Again…we want your input!
Here are just a few of those boards/committees to consider:
- Committee of Adjustment and Consent
- Community Services Advisory Committee
- Downtown Business Improvement Area
- Heritage Milton
- Milton Youth Advisory Council
- Milton Accessibility Advisory Committee
- Milton Public Library Board
- Milton Seniors’ Activity Centre Advisory Board
- Milton Transit Advisory Committee
- Municipal Election Compliance Audit Committee
- Trails Advisory Committee
There are also a few training courses put on by AMO (Association of Municipalities of Ontario) that new councillors and “older” ones are encouraged to attend. Then…the forms. Lots of forms. But that’s just par for the course.
I was also reminded last night that the first meeting of a new residents group took place (of which I will get an update on what happened) and that encourages me that we can have more involvement of the community in town affairs. I, along with many of my counterparts during the election campaign, made commitments that we would do what we could to keep you engaged in the process and look for feedback and ideas as well. This residents group will be a good start. Thanks to Steve and Annie and many others who got the ball rolling on this and I know that it will be successful. I will also do my part in helping out, so that way we can all do our best to make Milton a better place.
So my head goes back into the books, so to speak, but I hope that we can continue our dialogue started many years ago now and people will get involved in that conversation. Only with your help can we do this.
As always, you can email me mike@mikecluett.ca or call me by going to my Contact page (yes that is my home phone number 🙂 ) and I will do my best to answer any questions or concerns you might have.
I’m looking forward to hitting the ground running and I hope you join me on this journey.