Owen Sound Sun Times

After a third independent investigation, and with 18 Bruce County meetings now deemed improperly closed to the public since 2016, Ontario’s ombudsman has been asked to take a close look at Bruce County’s practices. Bruce County council received a Dec. 31 closed-meeting investigation report by the firm Aird & Berlis on Jan. 14 and asked […]

January 23, 2020

A shop and truck in Georgian Bluffs were destroyed by fire overnight Thursday, but firefighters managed to stop it from spreading to a nearby home. The fire at the property on Grey Road 170 was the second call of the evening for the Inter Township Fire Department, Deputy-chief Andy Redmond said Friday morning. Crews had […]

School officials in Grey-Bruce are confident in the measures they have in place to ensure a safe return to school on Monday. The Ontario government announced late Wednesday afternoon that seven health unit regions in the province, including Grey-Bruce, had been given the OK to resume in-class learning on Monday. The Bluewater District School Board […]

Seven new cases of COVID-19 were reported to the Grey Bruce Health Unit Thursday, bringing to 34 the number of active cases of the novel coronavirus in the region. Two of the new cases were from Grey Highlands, while Arran-Elderslie, Chatsworth, Kincardine, Saugeen Shores and West Grey each had one new case, according to public […]

The Tom Thomson Art Gallery advisory committee is to decide next week whether the city should again start exploring a potential expansion of the city-owned gallery. Council supported a motion Monday by Coun. John Tamming, the committee’s chair, to ask gallery director and chief curator Aidan Ware to present a report to the committee on […]

Grey-Bruce’s medical officer of health spoke up Wednesday about what he views as unwarranted concerns that local Amish and Menonnite communities aren’t following COVID rules. Dr. Ian Arra issued a news release in which he called for “calm” after hearing public concerns last weekend and this week about religious gatherings of the groups. Arra says […]

Students and teachers in Grey-Bruce will be heading back to the classroom on Monday. The Ontario government announced late Wednesday afternoon that Grey-Bruce was one of seven health unit regions in the province that would be returning to in-class learning next week. Both the Bruce-Grey Catholic District School Board and Bluewater District School Board confirmed […]

A new community group has been formed to support and encourage women in municipal politics in Grey-Bruce. The electHER group officially kicked off on Tuesday with a goal to increase the number of women elected to municipal office in Grey-Bruce in 2022. The organization is made up of a group of women from across the […]

Violence Prevention Grey Bruce has formed a subcommittee and launched a new violence prevention campaign in an effort to shine a light on elder abuse. Grey Bruce Elder Abuse Prevention (GBEAP) started earlier this year by producing a poster and educational campaign highlighting elder abuse resources in Grey and Bruce counties. “We wanted to create […]

The province’s Special Investigations Unit has terminated its investigation into the arrest of a man in Hanover in October after evidence showed an injury to his pinky finger occurred before he was taken into police custody. The 42-year-old man was arrested by Hanover police on Oct. 18 at the Travellers Inn in Hanover and taken […]

The West Grey Public Library will hold a virtual public meeting via Zoom conference call Wednesday evening to discuss the closure of the Elmwood Resource Centre. The meeting is scheduled to start at 7 p.m. Meeting details and Zoom conference login information can be found by visiting the West Grey Public Library website or Facebook […]

The Grey Bruce Health Unit reported just one case of COVID-19 on Tuesday. The lone case was in The Blue Mountains, bringing the total confirmed cases to date to 654. A total of 35 cases remain active, with 103 high-risk contacts associated with active cases. In Grey-Bruce, 576 people confirmed to have the virus have […]

Owen Sound has extended until Jan. 29 the commenting period for its draft $64.8 million 2021 budget, which includes an overall property tax hike of just under two per cent. Council received written questions from only one person during a public meeting on the spending plan Monday. Comments received by the clerk by 4:30 p.m. […]

An attempt by users of the Owen Sound Billy Bishop Regional Airport to persuade the city to cancel its plan to introduce landing fees at the facility failed to get off the ground at the council table Monday. Council passed a bylaw to approve the fees – which will start at $35 for aircraft under […]

The Grey Bruce Health Unit reported five new COVID-19 cases on Monday. According to the health unit’s daily situation report, there were five municipalities with one new case each. They were in Owen Sound, Brockton, Grey Highlands, Hanover and West Grey. There have now been 653 confirmed cases of the virus in Grey-Bruce since the […]

The West Grey Public Library is teaming up with the Alzheimer Society to offer a pair of programs aimed at supporting those with dementia and their caregivers. Alzheimer Society Grey-Bruce executive director Stephen Musehl said the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent shutdown measures have been hard on the more than 1,000 Grey-Bruce residents who are supported […]

Police are seeking the public’s help in identifying a man who reportedly committed an indecent act in the presence of a teenage girl in Owen Sound on Friday. Just before 4 p.m. along 3rd Avenue West at 11th Street West, a 16-year-old girl was walking past a parked truck when the driver got her attention, […]

A Meaford man has been charged with impaired driving after a vehicle was found in the ditch on Thursday evening. Just before 7:30 p.m., Grey Bruce OPP were dispatched to the vehicle in the ditch on the 3rd Line near Sideroad 7 in the Municipality of Meaford. Police spoke with the driver, who failed a […]

The Women’s House Serving Bruce and Grey is accepting nominations for its women of distinction awards. Nominations are being accepted for both the Woman of Distinction Award and the Young Woman of Distinction Award in advance of the International Women’s Day Celebration, which will be going online this year. The event is slated to be […]

Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound MP Alex Ruff will hold a virtual information session for local businesses on the Canada Summer Jobs Program. The session with Service Canada, which will be held on Wednesday at 3 p.m., is aimed at educating employers about the application process and best practices for a successful application, it said in a news […]

A Barrie woman has been charged with impaired driving after a minor collision in Walkerton on Sunday evening. Just after 7:30 p.m. South Bruce OPP received a call about a single-vehicle collision in a parking lot on McGivern Street. Officers found the vehicle with two tires off the ground after running over a parking lot […]

A Collingwood woman has died after a crash near Craigleith on Monday morning. The investigation is continuing into the two-vehicle head-on collision, which occurred around 8 a.m. on Highway 26 near Fraser Crescent. A 60-year-old woman from Collingwood, who was a driver of one of the vehicles, was pronounced dead at the scene. The other […]

There were four new cases of COVID-19 reported by the Grey Bruce Health Unit Sunday: two in Meaford and one each in Southgate and Blue Mountains. At present, two people are in hospital as a result of the pandemic virus. No one’s death has been attributed to COVID in Grey-Bruce. Those four new cases brought […]

Seniors, staff and essential caregivers in care homes who’ve received their first dose of the Pfizer-BioNtech COVID-19 vaccine will still get their second shot within 21 to 27 days despite an anticipated shortage of the drug, Ontario’s chief medical officer of health said in a statement Saturday. But the timing of the second dose of […]

An Alexandra Community School student in Owen Sound is among an elite group of Grade 3 and 4 students who scored 100 per cent in a worldwide math test. Nived Menon competed against high achievers in Canada and other countries including China, Iran, Russia and Turkey. Alexandra teacher and math competition co-ordinator Greg Fullerton said […]

After government officials said in news reports that police don’t have authority to randomly stop people to check if they’re following pandemic stay-home orders, the Ontario Provincial Police issued a statement Friday. OPP officers will focus on non-compliance in businesses and restaurants, complaints from the public and outdoor gatherings of more than five people to […]

Eleonore Kueber made history Friday. The 93-year-old Maple View Long Term Care home resident is the first person in Grey County to receive a shot of the Pfizer BioNtech COVID-19 vaccine. She’s already had a run of luck to say the least. She never caught the pandemic infection even though most residents and many staff […]

Eleonore Kueber made history Friday. The 93-year-old Maple View Long Term Care home resident is the first person in Grey County to receive a shot of the Pfizer BioNtech COVID-19 vaccine. She’s already had a run of luck to say the least. She never caught the pandemic infection even though most residents and many staff […]

Grey County will be using just over $1.2 million in provincial relief funding to help three organizations create a combined 11 new transitional housing units in Owen Sound as well as to assist people with rent arrears and boost mental health and emergency shelter support. Warden Selwyn Hicks said each of the initiatives is “very […]

Hospitals in Grey-Bruce have started to review the province’s new standard on how to decide who gets an intensive care unit bed if COVID-19 patients begin to overrun the system. “We’re preparing for making some of the toughest decisions we’ve ever had to make, and hoping, of course, we never have to do that,” said […]

Grey County council has chosen the members of a new committee that will oversee the planning stages of projects to redevelop and expand both Grey Gables and Rockwood Terrace into 128-bed long-term care homes. Along with Warden Selwyn Hicks, the members of the long-term care redevelopment task force will include Grey Highlands Mayor Paul McQueen […]

The Grey Bruce Health Unit reported eight new cases of COVID-19 Thursday while announcing the first COVID-19 vaccines in the region will be administered Friday. Two residents at long-term care facilities in Grey and Bruce counties will receive the first doses of the COVID-19 vaccine Friday morning. A resident of Golden Dawn Senior Citizen Home […]

Ontario’s latest COVID-19 control measures, which started Thursday and run to at least Feb. 11, prompted some local municipalities and others to announce their own plans. Provincial law requires people to remain home except for essential reasons, which include work (though everyone who can work from home must do so), to get food, for a […]

Grey County council supported in principle a plan to increase the county’s tax levy by one per cent annually and dedicate those funds solely to boosting affordable housing. The plan, which would add about $610,000 in 2021 to a proposed new affordable housing fund, still requires council’s final blessing during budget deliberations. But it received […]

City police will still exercise discretion but they’ll lean toward laying charges to enforce new provincial stay-at-home orders which took effect Thursday, Owen Sound Police Chief Craig Ambrose said. Police themselves faced a steep learning curve amid a new provincial emergency declaration aimed to tame the worsening COVID-19 pandemic, Ambrose said in an interview. He […]

A new initiative by the Georgian Bay Centre for the Arts is aimed at helping people escape the pandemic through food, crafts and music. The centre has started offering Craft Dinners, where they are preparing home-cooked meals for curbside pick-up, complete with a craft and a suggested musical selection to go along with it all. […]

The Grey Bruce Health Unit is putting the finishing touches on a plan to vaccinate the staff and residents at two long-term care homes. Dr. Ian Arra, Grey-Bruce’s medical officer of health, said he expects 200 doses of the Pfizer vaccine to arrive at the health unit this week. The vaccines will be stored in […]

With files from Rob Gowan Grey-Bruce’s top public health official said the province’s stay-at-home order and imminent state of emergency are necessary measures to curb climbing COVID-19 numbers. The direction is coming from the province, and the fine details haven’t arrived yet, so Dr. Ian Arra commented with a level of hesitancy on the specifics […]

The Grey Bruce Health Unit reported 14 new cases of COVID-19 Wednesday, including five in South Bruce. The other cases were found in Brockton (3), Kincardine (2) Southgate (2) West Grey and Owen Sound. There are now 63 active cases of the virus confirmed in the region with one probable case and 153 high-risk contacts […]

If people are supposed to stay home, why are non-essential small businesses allowed to stay open for curbside pickup under the new pandemic emergency order, some businesspeople themselves are wondering. Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced Tuesday a new emergency order effective today would let essential businesses remain open as they have been – but also […]

The Women’s Centre Grey Bruce will soon launch a program aimed at helping and supporting youth victims of human trafficking and raising awareness – both in schools and the community – about the problem, which officials say is growing in the region. The anti-human trafficking project, set to run until March 2025, will include an […]

Premier Doug Ford said the “system is on the brink” as he introduced restrictive new protection measures – including a stay-at-home order – and declared another state of emergency Tuesday. The new state of emergency and stay-at-home order will go into effect at 12:01 a.m. Thursday. People will be required to remain at home with […]

Grey-Bruce hospitals are preparing to support a “seamless provincial hospital system” and respond to capacity challenges due to surging COVID-19 numbers throughout Ontario according to a joint media release distributed Tuesday. It means that in the coming days and weeks Grey-Bruce residents requiring hospital care may be admitted to a hospital that is not in […]

Wiarton Willie will soon be making his annual prediction in these unpredictable times. But this year, the weather-prognosticating albino groundhog will be foretelling whether an early spring is on the horizon or six more weeks of winter lie ahead without a live audience, due to the ongoing pandemic. “COVID-19 has been affecting nearly everything we […]

Purple Valley’s Taylor Chegahno is the latest in an increasingly long line of field lacrosse players from the Grey-Bruce region who will play in the NCAA. Chegahno has verbally committed to play Division I field lacrosse at St. Bonaventure University in the state of New York beginning in 2022. The Grade 11 student at Peninsula […]

Farmers shared their views on how to make the food production system sustainable during an online Grey Bruce Farmers’ Week panel discussion Monday. It was Ecology Day, one of eight themed days that were part of the all-virtual 55thannual event which ended Tuesday with Crops Day. Organizer Lorie Smith said by email the technical production […]

The economic region that includes Grey-Bruce continued to hold the lowest unemployment rate in Ontario last month. Stratford-Bruce Peninsula saw its unemployment rate climb by 0.2 per cent in December to 5.6 per cent, well below the 8.5 per cent provincial unemployment rate for the month. Gemma Mendez-Smith, executive director of the Four County Labour […]

The Grey Bruce Health Unit reported nine new cases of COVID-19 Monday. The newest cases were found in Huron-Kinloss (2), Arran-Elderslie, Kincardine, Meaford, Owen Sound, Grey Highlands, South Bruce and Saugeen Shores. There are now 53 active cases in the region along with one probable case and 154 high-risk contacts. Two people with COVID-19 are […]

A multi-million dollar home was completely destroyed by fire early Monday morning. The Artisan on Lora Bay – as it was called in the Sotheby’s Canada listing – was listed for $7 million. A sale was set to close in May, according to the Town of Blue Mountains Fire Chief who had spoken with the […]