The situation we are presently experiencing in relation to the management of the public beach continues to amaze, to exasperate even. Since this spring, the municipal administration seems to have decided to substitute itself, in a coercive and paternalistic way, for its adult and mature citizens and their personal sense of responsibility regarding safety at the beach. In recent months, the administration has become more and more authoritarian, to the point of removing an association of volunteers that had been managing the beach for 50 years.

From the very beginning responsible adults were entrusted with the preservation and management of the beach and the organization of water activities. 

At a certain point, the beach was fenced off. By whom and why? Some volunteers from the recreational society have reminded us that the purpose of the fence was to protect children from street traffic or to prevent cars from being too close to the beach. Whatever the reason, the fence has gates, which, in the past, remained open to all adults who needed access to the lake, either for their physical and mental well-being, or for picnics. 

Recently, this fence has formed a barricade, restricting access and ensuring that users have paid the required fees. There is no longer the possibility for people, including residents, to have access to the beach outside the summer months and hours determined by the municipal authorities. 

It is worth remembering that the recreational society, responsible for the beach for 50 years, managed it without incident during all that time. It lost management of the beach when an understanding could not be reached with the municipality on new rules relating to security and pricing, rules the society considered unacceptable but which the municipality stated were non-negotiable. The administration of the town refers ad nauseam to restrictions imposed by the insurer. However, what follows is an excerpt from what the insurer actually stated in an email to the village on May 10, 2018, obtained by Paul St-Pierre:

“Hello Mr. Bélisle, 

“As discussed over the phone, there is no requirement to fence off a site near a beach. However, the municipality should verify and analyze why it had fenced off the site at one time, for what reasons. 

“If the municipality decides to remove the fence or to leave the gate open, it should put in place the means to protect the municipality in a context where people could bathe outside the hours of supervised swimming. It should prohibit swimming outside the hours during which there is supervision and properly inform the public of this. Among the means of informing the public, we would advise you to act preventively by publishing press releases in local newspapers, on your website and in tourist brochures.”

This clearly demonstrates that the insurers are proposing a way for the municipality to act that does not involve or require coercive action to insure security. Rather, it provides simple and sensible ways in which the municipality can comply with its obligation to maintain a safe environment, regardless of whether or not there is a fence. There are other examples in Quebec, of notices, instructions or recommendations that release municipal governments from any responsibility “outside the hours when children generally require additional supervision to that of their parents.”

The stubbornness on the part of the town administration relates more to an attitude that considers citizens too immature to be able to look after themselves. As if they were students in a school or functionally-dependent people in a home! Worse still, citizens can be lied to and, in the end – or so this administration seems to believe – they will calm down and keep quiet. This is insulting! 

Two sessions of Council did not provide answers to the questions and objections raised by a large number of citizens who are more and more offended by the situation. Always the same objection from the mayor, the only one who responds to questions and objections: no other choice, it’s because of the insurance company and the government! We all understand that this is not true and that the municipality has known for more than a month now that this is not true. So why still blame this policy on the insurance company? What is behind taking the beach out of the hands of the volunteers? What is behind these limits placed on the use of the beach and this confrontational attitude towards citizens? The answer most likely lies in plans and intentions that are not yet known to us. Or worse still, in a poorly-functioning municipal administration in which elected officials are no longer listening to their constituents but are merely the mouthpieces of a town management obsessed with security and taking an active role in what are political decisions. 

In conclusion, it is important to remember that this difficult problem our community of some 600 inhabitants is presently facing poses in a more general way the question of access to the shores of our magnificent lake, Lake Massawippi. The authorities should take this into account when they establish the tax bills each year. And it poses the more general problem of all other bodies of water whose shores have suffered the effects of privatization. 

Vincent Ranallo , Citizen

Translation by Paul St-Pierre

The opinions expressed on this website are those of their authors. Space on the website is provided as a service to the community and FANHCA, its administrators and host cannot be held responsible for any of the opinions expressed thereon.

(English follows)

La question de l’accès à la plage publique a été au centre des préoccupations de nombreuses personnes à North Hatley et dans les villages environnants au cours des deux derniers mois (et pour certains, même beaucoup plus longtemps). Deux pétitions demandant la tenue de négociations entre la Société récréative de North Hatley et la ville de North Hatley, ainsi que la plage publique reste accessible 24 heures sur 24, ont reçu quelque 500 signatures, et quelque 120 et 80 citoyens ont assisté aux séances régulières du conseil de mai et juin, la plupart d’entre eux exprimant leur désapprobation eu égard la décision du conseil municipal d’interdire l’accès au lac sur la plage publique en dehors des heures de baignade surveillées.

Lors de la réunion du conseil en mai, le maire a justifié cette décision en ces termes: « Dans le contexte public qui nous interpelle, ce n’est plus possible … les lois ont changé … les assureurs sont attentifs … »

Mais qu’en est-il vraiment de la situation? La loi québécoise prévoit-elle l’obligation de fermer l’accès à la plage? Les assureurs de la ville insistent-ils pour que la plage soit fermée pendant les heures non surveillées? La réponse à ces deux questions est la même: NON. En effet, l’assureur de la ville – la Mutuelle des municipalités du Québec – a répété dans un courriel en date du du 10 mai 2018 ce qu’il avait déjà dit le 1er septembre 2016: Il n’est pas nécessaire de clôturer la plage. [Nous soulignons.]

Pourquoi le maire laisse-t-il croire le contraire aux gens qu’il est censé représenter? Et pourquoi écrit-il que « Les statistiques de noyade au Québec ont connu une hausse exponentielle au cours des dernières années », alors qu’en fait, les chiffres les plus récents (pour 2013 et 2014) montrent qu’ils sont à leur plus bas niveau depuis quelques années (voir « Rapport sur la noyade. 2017. Québec »)? Il semblerait que l’on puisse invoquer n’importe quel argument – vrai ou faux – pour justifier une décision qui est presque universellement impopulaire.

Les choses ont pris une tournure désolante quand nos élus agissent en présumant qu’ils savent mieux que quiconque et sont prêts à induire en erreur ceux qu’ils représentent. Mais alors, la plupart des membres du conseil ne souffrent pas de la fermeture de l’accès à la plage publique, du fait que la plupart d’entre eux ont soit un accès privé au lac soit des piscines dans leur cour arrière. C’est peut-être la raison pour laquelle ils ne semblent pas avoir compris pourquoi leur décision a été si mal reçue. Beaucoup de gens – en particulier les jeunes familles (qui, le maire l’a souvent soutenu, sont une priorité pour le conseil municipal) – déménagent à North Hatley spécifiquement avec l’idée qu’eux et leurs enfants pourront profiter de l’emplacement de la ville sur le beau Lac Massawippi. Malheureusement, une décision arbitraire et inutile du conseil les a privés – et nous a privés tous – de cette possibilité.

Le maire n’a cessé de situer la décision du conseil en termes de           « prudence », mais ceux qui souhaitent avoir accès à la plage publique ne sont pas des imprudents, des gens qui prennent des risques inutiles. Ce sont plutôt des adultes responsables, prêts à assumer la responsabilité de leurs actes et de ceux de leurs enfants. Les membres du conseil semblent vouloir se placer dans le rôle de « parents     hélicoptères », un rôle que la population de North Hatley et des villages environnants ne leur a pas demandé d’assumer, et ne veulent pas qu’ils assument.

– Paul St-Pierre

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The question of access to the public beach has been at the centre of the concerns of many people in North Hatley and surrounding villages for the past two months (and for some, even much longer than that). Two petitions asking for negotiations between the North Hatley Recreational Society and the Town of North Hatley, and for access to the public beach to remain open 24/7, received some 500 signatures, and the regular council sessions of May and June were attended by some 120 and 80 citizens respectively, most of them vocal in their disapproval of the decision by the town council to prevent access to the lake at the public beach outside supervised hours for swimming. 

At the council meeting in May, the mayor justified this decision in the following terms: “Today, in the public environment we have to deal with, the old ways are no longer viable. The laws have changed. Insurers are watching more closely.” 

But what in fact is the situation? Is there any obligation under Québec law to close off access to the beach? Are the town’s insurers insisting on the beach being closed during unsupervised hours? The answer to both these questions is the same: NO. In fact the town’s insurer – the Mutuelle des municipalités du Québec – repeated in an e-mail dated 10 May 2018 what it had already said on 01 September 2016: It is not necessary to fence off the beach. [Emphasis added.]

Why is the mayor letting us, the people he is supposed to represent, believe the opposite? And why does he write that “Drownings in Quebec have risen exponentially in recent years,” when, in fact, the most recent figures (for 2013 and 2014) show them to be at their lowest point in recent years (see “2017 Drowning Report, Quebec Version”)? It would seem that any argument – true or false – can be called upon to justify what is an almost universally unpopular decision.

Things have come to a sorry pass when our elected officials act on the presumption that they know better than, and are willing to mislead, those they represent. But then, most members of council suffer nothing from access to the public beach being closed, since they have either private access to the lake, or pools in their backyards. Perhaps this is why they do not seem to have grasped why their decision has been so poorly received. Many people – in particular young families (who, the mayor has often maintained, are a priority for the town council) – move to North Hatley specifically with the idea that they and their children will be able to take advantage of the town’s location on beautiful Lake Massawippi. Unfortunately, an arbitrary and unnecessary decision by council has deprived them – and us – of this possibility.

The mayor has been constantly framing the decision by council in terms of ‘prudence’, but those wishing to have access to the public beach are not imprudent risk takers. Rather, they are responsible adults, willing to take responsibility for the actions of themselves and of their children. The members of the council seem to have cast themselves in the role of ‘helicopter parents’, a role the population of North Hatley and of surrounding villages have not asked them – and do not want them – to assume.

– Paul St-Pierre

The opinions expressed on this website are those of their authors. Space on the website is provided as a service to the community and FANHCA, its administrators and host cannot be held responsible for any of the opinions expressed thereon.