{"id":4949,"date":"2013-12-18T10:51:34","date_gmt":"2013-12-18T15:51:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=4949"},"modified":"2013-12-22T16:40:00","modified_gmt":"2013-12-22T21:40:00","slug":"lawyer-advises-council-to-keep-mum-on-mavrinac-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/lawyer-advises-council-to-keep-mum-on-mavrinac-park\/","title":{"rendered":"Lawyer advises Council to keep mum on Mavrinac park"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Aurora residents east of Bayview Avenue will have to wait for the foreseeable future to find out all the details discussed by Council behind closed doors on a six acre plot of land they are fighting to turn secure for parkland.<\/p>\n

Councillors voted against a motion last week by Councillor John Gallo calling for all non-confidential information discussed in closed session by Council to be released to the public. Their decision followed strong words from Town Solicitor Warren Mar recommending Aurora keep their cards close to their chest given what could transpire on this land in the future. <\/p>\n

Earlier this month, Council ratified a decision to exercise its right of first refusal on the six acre parcel of land previously reserved by the York Catholic District School Board in the 2B Development, which is roughly the neighbourhood radiating out of the northeast corner of Bayview and Wellington.<\/p>\n

After the school board shifted gears and decided they no longer needed the land, a 2007 subdivision agreement says Aurora has the right of first refusal to purchase the land from Minto Communities, the current landowner. Minto, however, represented by lawyer John Mascarin, vehemently opposed Council\u2019s view at a recent meeting, stating Aurora had no right of refusal whatsoever. <\/p>\n

Given the adamant stance of Minto, Councillors have predicted the Town might be bound for a legal fight on the matter. <\/p>\n

\u201cAt some point we should let the residents know as much as we can and it is up to Council to figure out whether now is the right time or not,\u201d said Councillor John Gallo on releasing the information to the public. \u201cI have no issues with releasing all of the [non-privileged information] we have discussed in closed session regarding the issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Councillor Michael Thompson, it was a matter of \u201chonouring commitments\u201d made to the public to make this information public, but asked Mr. Mar if he had any \u201cconcerns\u201d about making the follow through. He replied he had serious reservations on taking that next step.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t want to put the Town\u2019s position at risk in relation to this particular matter,\u201d said Mr. Mar. \u201cI don\u2019t believe any of the materials or the reports are appropriate for release to the general public at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council, however, pressed on. In response, Councillor Thompson said Mr. Mar\u2019s view presented a particular challenge.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven though many of us expected it to go in the way it seems to be going \u2013 could go, potentially go \u2013 there were all these promises made to the residents about getting information out, even though a lot has been said behind closed doors. \u201cI do hope all the information needs to come out because I still don\u2019t feel the residents have the whole picture.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taking an alternate route, Councillor Chris Ballard questioned whether there was another way forward, including having Mr. Mar release a redacted version of the file.<\/p>\n

\u201c[We want something that] can\u2019t damage the Town, but at some point I want to make sure the correspondence and reports we have discussed behind closed doors are available for the entire community to read.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr. Mar, however, was unmoved and said he had concerns about \u201ceverything\u201d discussed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would advise Council strongly not to release any information because I would consider it, especially at this time, all solicitor-client privilege and I expressed to Council my concerns relating to that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Closed session confidentiality, he added, governs land sales and similar transactions, and solicitor-client privilege is an extra layer in that regard. He added he would not advise any privilege be waived as doing so \u201ccould be to the detriment\u201d of Aurora\u2019s position.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are items in there that are non-privileged materials, such as reports,\u201d countered Councillor Gallo.
\nThat\u2019s not the case anymore, advised Mr. Mar.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were items that may have been discussed that were simply covered by closed session confidentiality,\u201d he said. \u201cI would suggest to Council now, based on events, could now be covered by certain levels of solicitor-client privilege. They have transitioned themselves into that based on circumstances I have discussed with Council in closed session. I can foresee a time when I think it will be appropriate to release that information, [but] I can\u2019t say when that would be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Councillor Gallo\u2019s motion was defeated, with only himself, and Councillors Ballard and Wendy Gaertner voting in its favour. Those voting against the motion said they were convinced by how \u201cstrong\u201d Mr. Mar advised against releasing any information.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would respect our residents and the taxpayers and I would heed the advice of our Town Solicitor,\u201d said Councillor John Abel. \u201cI think we can confidently say when the matter is closed, all the information will be released at that time and it is a fairly common sense approach.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aurora residents east of Bayview Avenue will have to wait for the foreseeable future to find out all the details discussed by Council behind closed doors on a six acre plot of land they are fighting to turn secure for parkland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1hP","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-06 06:30:48","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4949"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4949\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}