Bill Vrebosch makes 'hard decision' and resigns from Cassellholme board

Another resignation has hit the Cassellholme Board of Management, this time It's North Bay councillor Bill Vrebosch who says he's not a quitter but this just isn't the right fit.

Vrebosch didn't even get to attend a single meeting. He was appointed before the last meeting, but the Board forgot to invite him, and they haven't had a meeting since.

Now he says, he can't in good conscience stay on the Board if he has to put that obligation before his duties on Council and the taxpayers of North Bay.

"It can't be that way because there are times you just can't do that," he told BayToday. 

So the veteran councillor got some independent legal advice.

"The Board is totally in flux right now, if there even is a board right now. The lawyer said 'You're better not to take this on right now. You can do more as a councillor to represent the people at Cassellholme and North Bay, because your hands will be too tied.' Too many people told me it's not a good time."

The lawyer told Vrebosch that if he votes as a councillor in opposition to decisions made by the Cassellholme Board he could be personally liable or charged by the Integrity Commissioner for not doing his job as a board member.

"I'd have to vote against all of this stuff. He (lawyer) says that 'this board is going to implode on itself. You don't want to be any part of this.'"

He says he believes local mayors joined together last week and wrote a letter to the Minister of Long Term Care asking that the Board be reconstructed. That letter has not been made public yet, but BayToday has made calls to area mayors for confirmation.

Vrebosch says East Ferris isn't even going to appoint a replacement for their recently resigned member Terry Kelly, nor is Mattawa appointing a replacement for Mayor Dean Backer.

"There's not one member in any of the nine participating municipalities that don't want Cassellholme to go ahead," he emphasizes. "But we have a responsibility to the taxpayer.

"It bothers me to no end. I like to carry things through but there's too much stuff going around the table and under the table as far as I can see, and I've never felt that way in my life,

"I don't believe it was done right. It's like going to buy a Ford and somebody gives you a price on a Cadillac and you say 'I can't afford a Cadillac,' Maybe we can only afford the Ford. Maybe we could have built for 90 million if we had got more than one tender,"