Innisfil court could be in session
By Chris Simon

Town staff are looking at two potential sites for hosting a provincial offences court in Innisfil.

The Churchill Community Centre and new Town Hall have been named as two potential sites for the establishment of a court within the municipality. Staff have been asked to investigate the feasibility of upgrading the Churchill centre, and will report back to council in early February. However, preliminary estimates have pegged renovation costs between $50,000 and $100,000, said community services director George Shaparew.

"This might be an opportunity for having the new Town Hall as a venue for a provincial offences court," he said. "The Town Hall is an excellent venue. They'd like to use the facility for a number of days each month, in one community room and any other room available they could book. We've also toured the Churchill facility as another option, it's doable.

"But they would need a carpeted floor, access to a judges' office, two separate offices for the prosecutor and defense attorneys and a private washroom for the judge."

If approved by council, court would be held every Monday, second Tuesday and the first, second and third Wednesday each month, starting in April. The province would pay $14,350 per year for use of the facility, while the town would be responsible for providing snow clearing, custodial, heat, hydro, internet, telephone and general maintenance services.

The plan would help significantly reduce the backlog of traffic court cases for South Simcoe Police and the Nottawasaga OPP detachment.

Currently, provincial traffic violations are handled in Bradford and Barrie. However, tickets are frequently thrown out, because of long delays between the offence and trial date, said South Simcoe chief Bruce Davis.

Since 2002, there has been a 47 per cent increase in trial requests, he said.

"We support (an Innisfil court house)," said Davis. "The Bradford traffic court will still be there, these are extra dates that are required because of the volume. Our service lays almost as many (traffic offence charges) as Barrie. If there's overcrowding and delays, a lot of those charges are thrown out."

He says the plan could be beneficial. It would help reduce the amount of overtime paid to officers, by keeping them close to their detachment while attending court.

It would also keep the officers within the town, allowing them to be called for service if necessary.

"We can make a significant savings to (Innisfil and Bradford). We try to schedule traffic court on the officers' working days. They (would) be within the municipality, available for us for use. If they're in another municipality, those officers are lost."

If the town does not approve the plan, another court house will be placed in Barrie. However, that could get costly for local residents, said Davis.

A Barrie court would be expected to cost South Simcoe between $223,000 and $639,000 in salaries, fees and other expenses per year, he said.

"There would be difficulties, from a police point of view, with doing that," he said. "If there is an additional cost, that would eat into the revenue that both (Bradford and Innisfil, which pay for policing costs) get."

Councillor Lynn Dollin prefers the Churchill site, rather than the new Town Hall.

"I'm not in favour of voting to take a new public building and putting restrictions on it. It puts a bad taste in mouths just after we're whacking the taxpayer with the dollars we are, in order to provide this building. We talked about providing free community rooms and this might interfere with that," she said. "I'm liking the idea of Churchill. Once this rec centre gets up and going, the programming that will happen at Churchill will decrease significantly. I can see it being used for other things (like court)."