The good news out of Huntsville last week left many to wonder if Bracebridge missed the boat.

After just over a month since the closure of the Cequent Towing plant in Huntsville and the layoff of more than 160 people, good news was buzzing last week when Aero Defence Products Ltd. announced it is purchasing the plant and the new operations hopefully should be up and running by April.

This is certainly great news for Huntsville, and Muskoka, but it has left us to question what the status is of the Dura plant in Bracebridge. It has been sitting empty since the end of October.

Word is that a purchaser is in place, and the deal, if everything goes well, should be completed in the next 60 days. This is great news, however there is a catch. The purchaser is looking at leasing the building, and will not be setting up a manufacturing business themselves.

Apparently a few businesses are already interested in leasing space in the Dura building. But it could take a while before the entire building is bustling again, if these prospective lessees don’t want to take all of the over 100,000 square feet available.

While we remain optimistic that the building won’t sit idle for long, we also question whether whatever replaces Dura will come close to replacing the workforce displaced.

It is imperative to get the Dura building fully utilized. Hopefully with some significant industrial business, we can replace the hundreds of jobs that were lost over the past couple of years.

Certainly everyone involved recognizes this, and while it’s great that Huntsville has the obvious support of Parry Sound-Muskoka MP Tony Clement, we would surely like to see his same efforts being put forth in south Muskoka.

Clement said last week that Canadian military contracts will be coming to Ontario, and we can only assume he means the new Huntsville plant. But what about Bracebridge and Gravenhurst?

Is Clement working on bringing industrial business to south Muskoka, so we too can benefit from large government contracts?

KF