Dear editor,

Here we go again, chosen as citizen of the year for 2018, but, more importantly, a real estate developer, Rainer Hummel is again trying to help himself out of the pockets of the overburdened resident taxpayer.

Having his earlier $500,000 lawsuit against the Town of Niagara-on-the-Lake dismissed by Ontario Superior Court Justice James Ramsay (in other words thrown out as a frivolous claim), he is having another go, as to be expected, by appealing this decision.

He is claiming costs as a result of the town's building pause that took place in 2019, and was made necessary by developers like him (although he likes to blame just one other developer for all of this).

It seems to me that his real estate holdings, like those of most others, have probably increased substantially since that time and are worth a lot more today.

Since any costs incurred by the town in connection with this appeal ultimately come from the pockets of the resident taxpayers (who are already overburdened) perhaps he can explain in detail to them why he should be compensated for an alleged cost to himself as claimed.

Derek Collins

NOTL