Council Minutes Dec 7/05

December 7, 2005

INCORPORATED VILLAGE OF HILTON BEACH
Council Meeting
December 7th, 2005

The meeting was called to order at 7:30 p.m. Present were Reeve Hore and Councillors Crack, Hope and Sullivan. Councillor Stevens was absent with notice.

The meeting was called to discuss an insurance issue.

05-165 Moved by J. Sullivan Seconded by L. Crack
Resolved to go into closed meeting.
Carried

05-166 Moved by R. Hope Seconded by J. Sullivan
Resolved to return to open meeting.
Carried

05-167 Moved by J. Sullivan Seconded by R. Hope
Resolved to agree in principal to the retroactive assessment as invoiced by ROMA with terms to be agreed upon by both parties.
Seconded

The retroactive assessment resulted from a deficit by the ROMA Insurance Reciprocal in previous years. They had invoiced all participating municipalities in mid 2004 for previous years. The Village was no longer in the program but had been for several years.

When the reciprocal was initiated, it resulted in lower premiums and thus there were cost savings. Jardine was hired as the administrative manager of the reciprocal and this enabled the Village to participate in the reciprocal for liability insurance and maintain the property insurance with Jardine. Effective January 2004 ROMA ended the relationship with Jardine and as ROMA could not provide property coverage, the Village moved all coverage to Jardine.

When the municipalities received the invoices, there was a tremendous outcry and several attempts to determine the validity of the statements. Jardine advised the municipalities not to pay the invoices based on their records. In September 2005 all municipalities were sent another invoice and in November those that that had not paid were served with a Statement of Claim. Information was sought on what other municipalities were doing and some were fighting it and others paying. Because of the tremendous cost of fighting such a complex claim and because each municipality would have to defend separately although the same legal, accounting and actuarial team could work for more than one, Council decided that it would be far less expensive to pay the $16,227.07 plus interest of $1,627.78 and costs of $1,000.00 than to even begin to fight it. These costs were offset by the savings enjoyed by participating in the reciprocal. As stated by several municipalities, they were not in agreement with how the deficit amounts were determined and resented the fact that there had been no indication to the municipalities over the years of this deficit but that they did not want to spend valuable resources to fight a court case that they were not likely to win. Payments can be made in instalments.

A portion of this deficit is for amounts that may have to be paid out in years to come for incidents that happened during the period in question. There are assurances that as it becomes apparent that these amounts do not have to be paid out, a credit will be given to each municipality. They have accounted for the maximum payout and this may not happen but the true cost will not be known for a considerable period of time.


Notice had been just received from the Great Lakes Cruising Club that they would not hold their Rendezvous in Hilton Beach because the Village could only provide thirty 50-amp services when they had requested a minimum of fifty. Inquiries to bring in additional power for the event indicated that this would be far too expensive. Council was disappointed with this decision knowing that all other aspects of the event would have been successful. When the GLCC were in Spanish in 2003 they had eight 50-amp services. However, their requirements have increased significantly in the past couple of years and this community cannot provide the fifty to seventy-five 50-amp services that are now being requested.

The Village will work to bring in smaller rendezvous earlier now that GLCC will not be coming. These smaller events with thirty to fifty boats will require fewer 50-amp services and will bring significant benefits to the community.

05-168 Moved by R. Hope Seconded by L. Crack
Resolved to give first, second and third readings to By-law #864 being a by-law to confirm the proceedings of the Council meeting held December 7th, 2005 and confirm the taking of any action authorized therein and thereby.
Carried

05-169 Moved by J. Sullivan Seconded by R. Hope
Resolved to adjourn again on December 14th, 2005 or at the call of the Reeve.
Carried