The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
By Jonathon Naylor The present Flin Flon City Council came into office promising to bolster openness and communication with the public. It was a welcome and necessary pledge. Rationally or not, too many citizens felt out of the loop on what their municipal government was doing and, in particular, planning to do. Council should be applauded for taking some positive steps in this regard. They are overhauling their website to make city data and meeting minutes more accessible. And Mayor George Fontaine has been concluding meetings with updates on municipal matters, such as the budgeting process and the status of plans to rename part of Third Ave. in honour of veterans. But last week, when this council made the most significant (and contentious) decision of its four-month tenure, there was no advance notice. From the public's perspective, council's vote to remove fluoride from our drinking water next year came out of nowhere. There was no chance for citizens to research the matter and speak to their elected representatives about this obviously divisive issue. No experts were called to appear before council, at least not that the public was ever made aware of. If that weren't enough, Coun. Skip Martin's motion for more time to study fluoridation Ð he wanted to gain a proper understanding of the issue Ð found no support at the council table. The actual vote was to choose not to include a fluoride distributor in the new water treatment plant expected to come on line in the late spring or early summer of 2012. The treatment plant is a $13.2-million project. The fluoride distributor costs $18,000. It is difficult to see the rationale for refusing to grant Coun. Martin just a couple more weeks to do his due diligence as an elected official, even if the rest of council had the votes necessary to quash fluoridation. Publicized Delaying the vote would have also publicized the fact that council was considering this major move. A community conversation around fluoride would have been sparked, and council would have gained a better sense of where Flin Flon stands on the cavity-fighting compound. But this never happened. Unless council backtracks, fluoride is coming out of our water. When naturally occurring fluoride is factored in, we will have less than one-seventh the level of fluoride recommended by both Health Canada and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Many experts see benefits to fluoridation for the populace as a whole, but particularly for underprivileged children. And contrary to what some might believe, Flin Flon has its fair share of poverty and neglected kids. "We would say that fluoridation for community water systems is a good way to reduce the inequalities for dental health for lower income groups," Dr. Hai-Santiago, a practising dentist and oral health consultant for Manitoba Health, told The Reminder this week. "It also benefits an entire population, but it is a way of reducing the disparities between lower socioeconomic groups, racial and ethnic groups [and the rest of the population]." No matter how one feels about fluoridation, council's vote was not minor. It will, depending on which side you believe, either harm or benefit the health of the populace. Given that, both Coun. Martin and the public at large should have been granted time to ponder the impact of this decision. Motions like this should not just come out of nowhere. Local Angle runs Fridays.3/14/2011
