by Jane Glenn | 27 November 2025
Baseball was the predominant topic of the night at the November 24 Saugeen Shores Regular Council meeting, as members of the ball community voiced concerns over inaccuracies and omissions in a needs assessment report of sports facilities and fields.
The assessment, conducted by Monteith Brown Planning Consultants, a firm based in London, Ontario, was on arenas and sports fields, "to set priorities for the next decade. This report summarizes the findings, outlines the work to advance in 2026, and includes future recommendations," as stated on the night's agenda.
The need for a partial update to the Recreation Master Plan had been highlighted in the 2025 Business Plan for Community Services. Monteith Brown, who has worked with the Town previously, was paid $25,000 to conduct the research and give recommendations.
During the Open Forum portion of the meeting, Adam Sachs spoke first of his "deep concern" over the potential closure of diamonds due to "factual inaccuracies" in the report. Sachs, president of Saugeen Shores Minor Ball Association (SSMBA) said the report isn't a "true representation of the demand we have here in Saugeen Shores."
In the report, it said that usage of ball diamonds was down 24% and possible repurposing of some diamonds was an option. However, Sachs said both baseball and softball programs "serve more children than ever."
"This report underestimates and underrepresents the participation levels, but also ignores the trajectory and continued growth in our town," said Sachs. He said the usage data "paints an incomplete, misleading picture" because diamond time for practices were not included.
He urged council to track statistics, and that "any claim that the demand for ball diamonds is declining is simply wrong."
Eric Dunn, the scheduler for SSMBA spoke next, echoing the same concerns. He highlighted the 11 to 12 tournaments hosted by Saugeen Shores each year, and more requests from places as far away as Sault Ste. Marie and Detroit. "Already we are at maximum amount of diamonds with current usage and that includes Lamont 5 and 6 and the hardball diamond," Dunn said.
Dunn expressed confusion, as he said the data needed had been provided to the Town already, but it did not seem to be used in the Monteith Brown study. Dunn said in 2025, they prepared a report which "gave a week-by-week breakdown of what diamonds were used...this info was passed onto Town staff to make an informed decision."
Former SSMBA president and former Town employee Laura Kranenburg also addressed council about the data. "The fact that the practice times were not included, to me, is a gross overlooking of data. It's just really irresponsible of the vendor, Monteith Brown. They are not new to municipal reports, they are not new to Saugeen Shores, they were doing reports when I was here and frankly I had higher expectations of this report."
Kranenburg also drew attention to a significant omission in the report. "No mention of our female softball league at all, which is equivalent in size to the male hardball team," she said.
After the Open Forum ended, Kristan Shrider, Director of Community Services and Operations clarified that the data used by Monteith Brown was from only whatever was entered into the Town's facility booking software and that diamonds booked for practices had not been included. She also stated that based on listening to the Open Forum and "earlier conversations," she wanted to emphasize that "before any diamonds are closed or built, additional data is required."
A representative from Monteith Brown, Anad Desi, was in attendance at the meeting and did a slide presentation of some of their study. The planner who authored the study was not able to attend but Desi acknowledged that the practice data wasn't used and said he would take feedback back to Monteith Brown.
Councillor Bud Halpin weighed in on the general reliance of consultants. "Anyone who knows me, knows I think we use too many consultants. This report and the recent healthcare report have only kind of hardened that belief. If we send this back, we spent almost $25,000 on it, if we refer it back to staff, are we going to be spending more money on this report?"
Deputy Vice Mayor Mike Myatt suggested the report should be deferred back, saying more consultation was needed and requested a recorded vote. He cited examples of discrepancies in numbers such as the Cameron Park diamond, with 0% usage being stated by Monteith Brown, but in reality was in use 95% of the available time.
However, Mayor Charbonneau did not support deferring the report, pointing out that the new Business Plan will come into effect on December 12, and "if it's deferred, it will be removed from the Plan and not discussed in 2026 at all."
Given that point, Myatt agreed a deferral was not necessary, if staff and Monteith Brown committed to meeting with user groups and integrate their data and feedback into the report.
Mayor Charbonneau finished by emphasizing Saugeen Shores' commitment to baseball, saying "we've invested more in baseball in the last five years than in the previous 150 years."
The next Regular Council meeting is Monday, December 8 at 6:30pm and can be viewed on the Town of Saugeen Shores YouTube channel.
