A Resounding ‘No’ To Borrowing For River Road Dike Project
Prince George, BC – Prince George city residents have said a resounding ‘No’ to borrowing $3.6-million to finance the River Road Dike Project…
The results of the Alternate Approval Process have been released, and as of Tuesday’s 5pm deadline, 9,271 residents had submitted signed Elector Responses Forms indicating they were not in favour of a loan authorization by-law that would have gone towards financing the city’s portion of the $11.5-million dollar project. The response far surpasses the number needed for the AAP to be successful – it was 10-percent of eligible voters, or 5,351 city residents.
In a report that will appear before City Councillors on Monday evening, the City’s Manager of Legislative Services, Walter Babicz, says there are two options in light of the AAP results:
- to discontinue the River Road Dike Project in the form that is currently proposed
- to proceed with a referendum for the loan authorization by-law to seek approval from the electors
Babicz says a referendum would involve Council authorizing a budget for the vote, and appointing a Chief Electoral Officer and Deputy Electoral officer to conduct the referendum.
City Councillors originally chose the Alternate Approval Process as the least costly option trying to secure electorate support for borrowing the funds. In an earlier report to Council, Babicz estimated the cost of a referendum to be similar to that of a general election, in the $55- to $65-thousand dollar range.
Comments
17% is not a resounding, no. Only a referendum would bear that out.
what have you been smoking. people have to go and get a ballot give their name, take it to city hall and you have other than one councillor get more ballots on the matter, and you say it isnt significant.
whow….
Sine Nomine, 17% is HUGE, when you consider only something like 27% even bothered to vote in the last civic election.
http://www.opinion250.com/blog/view/22176/1/prince+george+voter+turn-out+down
from the link: “City officials say there were a total 15,266 ballots cast this year (2011)”
So, from the above “9,271 residents had submitted signed Elector Responses Forms”
That means that the “turnout” for this AAP was 60.7% of the turnout for the last civic election. 35.1% was needed.
Pretty chit hot if you asked me sine nomine. Let’s see you do better than that, eh!!!! ;-)
Hey sine ….. you don’t spin your stories very well, do you? I mean you could drive a freight train through your spins …. are you a City Councillor by any chance …. they are pretty bad at it too … LOL
Sine I just gotta ask, if 9200 is not a resounding no… what is the yes that gave Green the nod as mayor?
Uh–I think we won!!
If the cost of a referendum is similar to that of a civic election, why was this issue not dealt with during the recent civic election?
They knew about it before the election, and tried to push it through shortly after. So why not just deal with it then?
I wonder mayor and city council will be able to do the math?
27% of eligible voters cast ballots last civic election. 17% of eligible voters gave resounding no to the borrowing of 3.6 million.
Assuming the same turnout for a referendum would mean only 10% of eligible voters would cast a ballot in favour of borrowing the funds while 17% of eligible voters would be against the borrowing.
Pretty clear spending 60 grand on a referendum is a pure waste of taxpayer dollars and would just solidify the perception the mayor and city councils have absolutely no ability to manage or spend taxpayer dollars wisely.
Prince George tax payers are fed up! City Hall, Mayor and Council, please take note of the first sentence here. We are fed up with your tax increases and out of control spending.
Mayor Green, get control of the public purse like you promised you would do.
First off Eric and all of you people who pushed hard, good job and congratulations.
Shari Green got 6969 votes in the 2011 election. So, if this was considered a referendum on the mayor…….
Absolutely right Cougars fan. The referendum on the borrowing could have been held on the November ballot, without additional cost. As Krause said oh ya we knew about it before the election. So any of those blowhards that throw the “now look at what you’re going to cost us to hold a referendum” crap out there, go tell it to the people at city hall who are responsible for the situation.
Scrap the dyke as the people obviously wish. Or is public engagement just one big pothole.
And No Name, what a joke.
“Mayor Green, get control of the public purse like you promised you would do”
Those backing Mayor Green now and during the election do not understand controlling the public purse, other than controlling it for their special interests.
They have never had to do that. Mayor Green has never had to do that either. She was, after all, part of the group who promoted the Administration to come in with the budget they came in with. She had the capacity to rally councillors around her to take a whole different approach to budgeting. Instead it was the same old approach. There are no miracles. She did not have them before the election, during the election, nor after the election. People do not turn on a dime. Mayor Green is no different.
Prince George the democracy……..
If we didn’t get the needed votes to shoot this down then the City would go on its merry way and proceed with the project. Then if anybody didn’t like it, they could say, “well you didn’t get the needed votes, so don’t complain”.
Now because the shoe is on the other foot, the City figures we should think about going to a ballot. Haven’t the people of the City already voiced their opinion???
I think if the City & City Council are still confused, hold another AAP process and ask the opposite question, “do you support the City going ahead with this dike project?” You would get the feedback your looking for and save the City $60K in the process.
I would be willing to bet that this second process wouldn’t get 9,000 votes. So there you have it.
I think we should hold a vote on City Councils & the Mayors wages!
The City likes to spend money, borrow money, and raise taxes. It seems that, that is their number one priority.
Its time for them to change their ways. We have some new councillors, and a Mayor who are expected to make a difference. We know what happened to Rodgers because he did not take the bull by the horns, and make some necessary changes.
It the present Mayor and Council hope to get re elected in November of 2014, and therefore be around for the Winter Games, then they need to start looking out for the interests of the citizens of this City.
That means NO MORE TAX INCREASES, REDUCE SPENDING, FIX THE ROADS, TEND TO THE BASICS AND FORGET THE PIE IN THE SKY PROJECTS.
The suggestion that we should pay a gas tax to fix our roads is ludicrous. We already pay the highest rate per litre for gas than most areas in BC, mainly because every politician Federal, Provincial, and Municipal will not go after the oil companies, to stop them from gouging us.
I strongly recommend that the Mayor and Council drop this idea of a gas tax, or their days at City Hall are numbered.
Its time to come up with some innovative ways to get the job done. Increasing taxes, or implementing a gas tax, is in my opinion a **non starter**
Have a nice day.
It would sure be nice if we could write only nice things about our mayor and council. Pat ourselves on our backs and congratulate ourselves on our wise choices that we’ve made at the poling stations. Why can’t this be the case?
So whe are they going to start digging?
I don’t think it over yet, as Walter Babicz said that the City has two options and not one of those options was to forget about building the dike. I don’t think the City got the message that the majority of taxpayers are against the dike & it costs. Considering that for every person that signed there 3 or more taxpayers that were against the dike & it costs but were afraid to sign.
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