LETTER

The $5,000 Tree Massacre

 

After reading Robillard-Cardinal's story about Brigil's clear-cutting in North Aylmer I recalled an item in the Bulletin about a resident fined for removing an borer-infested ash tree. I felt the resident was fined too severely for an action in the best interest of the community and that would have been approved with a simple request.

As overly severe as that punishment was for a lone citizen, it’s clear the “maximum fine” of $5,000 is ridiculously low for a corporation that appears to flaunt the rules, allegedly destroying acres of trees. This low fine can be budgeted merely as a cost of doing business.

Considering the relentless onslaught of new housing inflicted upon our community, with the full approval of the anti-Aylmer municipal cabal, it may be time some councillors stand up and recognize the wholesale destruction of old Aylmer. I have been a proud member of the Aylmer community since 1999 and what I have witnessed in these 16 years has been disheartening. I can only imagine the sadness within Aylmer’s multi-generation families who have witnessed the theft of their community’s professional and maintenance services, its new, debt-free equipment, and its budgetary surplus, only to see our taxes raised for the benefit of the cabal and its minions.

This continued abuse of our community by such corporations is an affront to the decency of our community, and an indictment of the mega-city of Gatineau and its kowtowing to the anti-Aylmer cabal.

Ronald Temchuk
Aylmer