By Cecilia Nasmith/Today’s Northumberland
While she agrees that the 600 volunteers who made Cobourg’s mass-immunization clinics possible for 28 weeks did heroic work, Cobourg Councillor Nicole Beatty wondered why they are the ones who get honoured on municipal property.
Speaking at Monday’s committee-of-the-whole council meeting, Beatty was referring to the Volunteer Wall to be installed on the southeast wall of the Cobourg Community Centre – an honour announced Friday at a big thank-you event for these volunteers and the other partners who administered more than 55,000 doses of the vaccine in the Bowl at the CCC.
“It’s on town property at a town facility,” she pointed out – “have the town’s policies and procedures been taken into consideration?
“It will be there in perpetuity. I am not saying we shouldn’t be recognizing this heroic group of volunteers, but this is town property and a town facility.”
There was some debate on exactly what policy and procedure would have applied – the naming policy, the banner policy or the volunteer recognition policy. There seemed to be no clear answer, though staff allowed that many of these policies are due for review and update.
“What about the hundreds of volunteers we celebrated during our Civic Awards? What about the health-care workers and the meal deliverers? Why this one group of volunteers? Why one community organization?” Beatty insisted.
“I have absolutely no problem celebrating our volunteerism. I live, work, breathe it, and I applaud every single Rotarian and volunteer who spent countless hours in this facility. But if we are talking pandemic recognition as a whole, I am very uncomfortable this has been decided.
“Is there an opportunity to extend that recognition to the other volunteers in this community during this pandemic?”
Mayor John Henderson related how the prospective Volunteer Wall had come about. It was initiated by the Rotary Club of Cobourg as a thank-you to what they termed the Orange Army, in honour of the orange T-shirts their many vaccination volunteers had worn. They consulted with Northumberland County Chief Administrative Officer Jennifer Moore and expressed their wish for the tribute to be located where the heroic work had been done – at the CCC. From there, Mayor John Henderson said, he met with Chief Administrative Officer Tracey Vaughan and Deputy Director of Community Services Teresa Behan to discuss the project, bringing in the fire department as well to make sure safety protocols were observed.
“It certainly could have been more framed in policy,” the mayor admitted.
“Is there enough space to allow for a Phase 2 of the volunteer-recognition wall, and possibly the town could do a call for nominations for volunteers?” Beatty suggested.
“So we really could celebrate the inclusivity of Cobourg – and every single person who went above and beyond their comfort level to help a friend or neighbour during the pandemic deserves recognition.
“So I am asking, is there an opportunity for space on the wall for Phase 2 to include other pandemic volunteers and organizations outside of the vaccination centre?”
“We could definitely add to it,” Behan said.
