(ABOVE: Photo by April Boomer, via Facebook.)
Kanata councillor Allan Hubley commented on this week’s deer incident in Glen Cairn on the Glen Cairn Residents Facebook group today. Some residents were concerned about the amount of time it took officials to help the deer, which ended up being put down. Here’s the text of Hubley’s Facebook comment.
“Hi Folks. Time to clarify a few points. Each level of government has areas of responsibility and legislative authority. This is not just to ensure accountability on issues but also to keep costs as low as possible for taxpayers. The provincial government has the responsibility for wildlife and the city is responsible for domestic animals. Given that wildlife dont stay within a municipal boundary and can roam all over eastern Ontario, I would hope we can all agree council shouldn’t be looking at getting involved in wildlife matters.
I called for the police on Wednesday morning when a resident pointed to the children chasing the deer in the ball diamond because I was worried about the safety of the children. I also asked the dispatcher to notify the Ministry of Natural Resources as it was clear the animal would need to be calmed before it could safely be helped. letting it run out of the ball diamond would only raise the risk of more injuries, more property damage and provide no positive outcome. NCC had someone closer and they arrived as quickly as possible.
Professionals took the time to make the right decision on how to safely restrain the animal so its injuries could be assessed and I for one am thankful they took the time to make the right decisions instead of jumping out of their cars and start shooting as bystanders including the many children in the area would not know the difference between shooting a tranquilizer or shooting a bullet which could have made the situation much more troublesome.
No, the city is not looking to take over this responsibility from the province as most people would not want to pay taxes to cover having a unit to deal with this type of situation that very rarely happens. One unit for eastern Ontario works fine most of the time.
To suggest that wild animals should get the same or similar service you do when you call 911 is really not supportable. The cost to have ambulance type service, officers all over the city trained to handle such calls and some sort of hospital to take these animals to would be in the millions if not tens of millions of dollars and I can assure you there is no support anywhere to do what is suggested by those remarks.