The Township of McMurrich/Monteith is considering applying for a federal government grant to update the current municipal office.
The grant is the Investing in Canada Infrastructure Plan (ICIP), COVID-19 resilience stream, and would give the municipality approximately $100,000, which can be used for retrofits, repairs, upgrades as well as COVID-19 response measures to support physical distancing.
Coun. Lynne Zemnicky stated that she would like to see the money utilized to make the municipal office safer for staff.
“My wish list would be a space where staff is separated properly for COVID from the public,” said Zemnicky during the Nov. 24 council meeting. “I also think there should be staff washroom as opposed to the public.”
Separating the computers further apart and a separate break room for staff were also mentioned as addressing the resilience against COVID-19, said Zemnicky, adding she wasn’t looking for an extravagant upgrade.
Coun. Dan O’Halloran worried about potentially having to upgrade the septic system.
“One of my main concerns is that as soon as we start doing this that we’ll have to increase the septic system,” said O’Halloran, adding that council and staff needed to make sure the retrofit/repair aspect of the grant covers building an addition to the office building.
“If that’s the case then we’ll need numbers and someone to come in and design it for us,” he said.
For Coun. Alfred Beilke, functionality and staff safety were most important.
“It’s nice to have all the fancy stuff but I think we need something that’s functional (and) serves the purpose for the people we employ,” said Beilke.
“We need to keep staff safe and happy and (what we have) is not doing it — it’s crowded, it’s cluttered and it doesn’t give you the separation you require from the public.”
The deadline for the grant application is Dec. 21, 2020 and the deadline for project completion needs to be Dec. 21, 2021 with a year extension given to remote communities.
Council advised staff to move forward on the grant application and to find out if a new building would fall into the upgrade category of the grant.
- Sarah Cooke, Local Journalism Initiative, Parry Sound North Star and Almaguin News
