Carleton Place won the annual “mayors” challenge again this year against Smith Falls’ mayor, Dennis Staples, and Perth’s mayor, John Fenik.

Mayor Dennis will be wearing the Canadians’ hockey jersey for one day as stipulated by Carleton Place’s mayor, Paul Dulmage.

Staples together with John Fenik, his counterpart in Perth, issued a challenge to Dulmage to see which municipality, in a set number of hours, could raise the most funds as volunteers for the Salvation Army Christmas kettle campaign.

Carleton Place was able to raise $1,636; Perth raised $893; And Smith Falls fell short with only $659. The three municipalities raised a total of $3188.

At a council meeting held last December 21, Staples announced the municipality that won the challenge, noting that the real victor was the Salvation Army.

On December 22, Dulmage concurred and said that it was the Salvation army that really won that deal.

Carleton Place also won the challenge last year, as a consequence, the flag pole at Smith Falls’ Town Hall flew Carleton Place’s flag for a day.

The money raised will be used to fund the Salvation Army programs in that area.

The Salvation Army once donated $6000 to the Christmas Basket program of Carleton Place.

Brian Fuller, A Smiths Falls Salvation Army Major, said that the support gained for this year’s Salvation Army campaign was awesome. He added that given the economic hurdles, the community really stepped up — volunteering, donating financially and everything.

The Carleton Place Jr. A Canadians hockey team lost to the Ottawa Jr. Senators last Wednesday night, December 16, 2009. Carleton Place lost their lead early in the game and had to struggle to recover in the third. However, their efforts were futile as the Ottawa Jr. Senators grabbed the 6-4 victory.

Tyler Kotlarz, benefiting from the assists of Richard Stethem and Brock Plouffe, put Carleton Place first on the board as the game started.

A few minutes later, Carleton Place scored another goal when Martin and Rodier fed Samuel Coyne for the score. This put Carleton Place up 2-0.

Before the period was up, Ottawa’s Pierre-Michel Legare gave his team their first score of the night when he was able to get an unassisted goal.

From then on, the Jr. Senator’s gained their momentum when they were able to score two more additional goals to seize the lead in the second period.

In the third period, Ottawa’s Nicolas Belleville scored a goal increasing the Jr. Senator’s lead.

Carleton Place tried to come back as Coyne made his second goal of the game courtesy of the assists from Rodier and Hannah. But the Senators refused to yield as they scored another goal four minutes later.

In the last two minutes, Plouffe scored for the Canadians reducing the Jr. Senator’s lead to one. But the Jr. Senator’s Matt White sealed the Canadian’s fate by scoring the game’s coup de grace with only 2 ticks left on the game time.

Surely everyone is ecstatic for this coming Sunday’s line of activities with the Olympic Torch passing being the no-brainer highlight in the morning. However, the festivities will surely not end with the torch’s passing. No sir. Not when the Carleton Place Community Christmas concert is set to kick off on the afternoon of the same day.

So what gives for this community concert? For starters, it’s FREE. Pretty sure that grabbed your attention huh? Well, come to think of it, it does sound like it should be free otherwise it would be a little hard to call it a “community” concert.

The free admission notwithstanding, everyone in Carleton Place is assured of a grand community time to get them holiday stress off the nerves. Music from folk, country, light rock, and of course Christmas carols should be expected coming from the likes of Lyle Dilabough & Friends, Jack Denovan, Darlene Thibault, Pat Willbond, Kirk Armstrong, and Katheen Stroud among others.

The venue for this year’s community concert will be on top of the Carleton Place Cinemas and its set to run from 2 in the afternoon till 4 PM.

December 1, 2009 — Carleton Place’s budget for the incoming year was presented during a meeting at the town hall. Carleton Place’s total projected expenditure for the year 2010 is estimated to be 31.7 million dollars, that is, capital and major spending included. The majority of the projected expenditure will go to environmental and transportation services.

The projected 31.7 million dollars had taxation and government grants, both provincial and federal, as major revenue sources. For the last couple of weeks, it has been known that payers here will face a 2.64 percent increase in their property taxes for the year 2010. A breakdown of all the details and other aspects about the budget was also revealed with 46.5 percent of the apportionment of the total tax dollars going towards the town.

In spite of the efforts of the Carleton Place Town Council to publicly present their financial data, and the fact that majority of the average taxpayer’s money goes to municipalities, the budget presentation didn’t elicit any significant public response; which seems a bit surprising in a town where there is so much local political discussions taking place.

Budget statements can by obtained by the public at the local Town Hall. This is the first time ever that the mayor and individual Councillors can be seen and/or heard giving comments regarding a town budget.