A quaint quarterly newsletter circulates in our town, a paper pony which has grown legs through its three decades providing municipal updates and public notices to McIvers (pop. 538).
A folded 8x11-inch sheet of office paper printed on both sides and an environmentally-friendly halfsheet center insert, the six pages which make the spring edition of “Our Town” on release from Mayor Susan Park-White and her town council comes complete with quarterly financials, and a backside colour-by-numbers page to entertain and calm children and the young at heart.
There is good news, like the rhythms of a visiting Scottish dance troupe slated to perform at the Golden SeaBreeze 50-Plus Club Wednesday afternoon; and, some news not so good.
Delinquent property owners stand reminded that payment arrangements on taxes outstanding are required to be brought before council by June 1, after which extended collection and recovery measures will be taken, including disconnection of water service, court action, wage attachments and property auctions.
Council reports arrears of $23,159 from 2017.
With the annual municipal spring cleanup set for the last week of May, council also encourages residents to avail this month’s remaining free Saturday dumpsite openings at the Western Newfoundland Region Landfill in Wild Cove to discard extraordinary refuse without charge.
Meanwhile, owners of unkempt and dilapidated property will receive a personal mailing addressing matters found in breach of requirements until any identified problems are rectified.
The newsletter offers a somewhat educational contribution on how regional trash pickup is expected to be dealt in pending waste management plans that are to go into effect in McIvers, as elsewhere, this summer. Co-operation from residents is sought to respectively sort and separate recyclable and privacy-protected household garbage into blue and clear curbside disposal bags.
The newsletter quotes Josh Carey, chair of the Western Regional Service Board offering waste managers will give home owners and businesses “lots of notice” so that local transition from opaque garbage bags to clear ones may go as smoothly as possible.
A public education program will be launched by Sort It-Western in advance of collection of two-tier disposables.
The town of McIvers additionally makes $25 compost bins available for purchase by residents who find the wormy practice useful for turning biodegradable kitchen waste and table scraps into a fertile soil beneficial for enhancing flower beds and other plant growth, instead of sending it to landfill.
Print works.
Love nests repopulating
The pressures of survival and rebirth in the natural realm become more and less apparent with the advance of the season.
Wednesday’s morning deadline was greeted by the loving tweets of returning salmon swallows, one-ounce families of which return to nest and breed in homemade birdhouses long a feature of homesteaders by the beach. They hatch and parent their young here, thriving and surviving year to year.
From songbirds and birds of prey to beachbirds, kingfishers, hawks, eagles and dastardly gulls, minks and weasels and the like, nature has its way by the seashore.
McIver’s much-hallowed “Terns of the Millennium” are survivors of many generations repopulating the near-shore McIvers islet may themselves need to relocate their colony sometime soon.
Fewer annual re-terns are evident in recent years as herring gulls and blackbacks encroach on every corner of nesting space there in recent years, leaving fledgling mortality suspect.
Life-mate terns normally demonstrate their annual appearance in McIvers on the second weekend of May. They fly south in August.
Happy Mother’s Day, moms!
Dave White welcomes your Bay of Islands news and events information at 660-5712, or email at: [email protected].
