People seem to forget that our municipality is a representative government. Council has been hired by the voting public to represent their local interests. All that notwithstanding, some of these Council members are completely ill-suited for the job and a waste of money, but nonetheless, they have been endorsed by the people until they’ve been removed by those same people.

I believe Council has exercised its due diligence in informing the public and giving them time to respond. This core review nonsense has been going on for over a year now and in my personal opinion, it has done nothing but cost us a lot of money. Anything that they tried to implement out of the recommendations has either been overturned or had the legs cut out from underneath it before it even got going. Some of those items should have been implemented from a purely cost benefit perspective. Time to stop pandering to special interests and to do what’s in the best interest of all citizens, to the best of their ability. The end.

Some people whine ceaselessly about municipal tax and my personal opinion about that is this has more to due with the proximity of local government vs the other 2 levels than any other single thing. Local governments get 8% of the total tax pie, and the demands on that 8% are ever increasing. Somethings got to give. I know local government is the favourite whipping boy of the disenfranchised and disgruntled, but I think it’s time to let them do their job and just let the little doggies bark.

Just like Ms. Bigelow is doing her job and trying to save the jobs of those who fund her union. Her arguments don’t make sense or hold water to me, but union arguments are seldom about logic, but rather intransigence in the face of it.

There will come a time, that cost pressures force us to choose parks, recreation and culture over streets, water, sewer and bridges. I don’t think we’re there yet, but it’s coming. For me, this is a no brainer. We live in the middle of the wilderness, with an abundance of lakes, streams, forests and mountains. I’ve never needed artificial recreation, because the natural variety is all around us, but each to their own. There will come a time though when necessity will force us to choose essential services or to continue to subsidize people’s recreational activities. We spend $20 million annually on parks recreation and culture. To me, these are niceties that could come once we have solid core infrastructure underfoot first.

So what if new items have been added to the list of the core review. Council has been charged with shaping the decisions of local government. If you don’t like that, vote with your feet and move yourself outside of the municipality. Either that, or stand for office yourself if you think you can do a better job, but stop ceaselessly sniveling. It’s undignified.

Sine Nomine. Your arguments make some sense in some area’s however they fall short in others.

Lets not forget that it was the City Administration, and past Councils who were the representatives of the people that advocated the need for these swimming pools, hockey arena’s, and Civic Centre, along with the Pine Valley Golf Course, and the CN Centre.

Many people were opposed to some of these projects, however as usual they were steam rolled by the Council of the day.

You are now suggesting that after we pay huge money to build these facilities, and huge dollars over the years to maintain them, that we should now turn them over to private business to run. Lets not kid ourselves. They only way that they could be run privately and make a profit would be for us to subsidize them as we presently subsidize the Northern Sports Centre. ($600,000.00) per year.

I agree that we need to take a good look at how these facilities are run, and make necessary changes to staff and management, however there is no need to get rid of these assets.

I think that we need to come to terms with the fact that we do not (by any stretch of the imagination) have the best people representing our interests at City Hall. We have for all intents and purposes over the past 10/20 years been taken to the cleaners.

Reducing operating and maintenance costs, management and staff, and increasing utilization of these facilities would go a long way to ensuring they are available for all the citizens of Prince George into the future. This is the way to go, and this is what the City should be looking at.

To give you an example of City spending, they are proposing a **cosmic** makeover for the Civic Centre Plaza, prior to the Winter Games. The idea itself is ludicrous, especially when you consider that the Plaza is frozen solid and snowed in, in February. The cost for the make over is $500,000.00. or put another way One Half a million, or put another way the amount needed to maintain the Civic Centre for One year.

Do they care about how our money is spent. I sincerely doubt it.

They are taxing us to the tune of $15 Million for the Winter Games, and you can rest assured they will spend every cent. It would be nice if they spent say $12 Million only, and put the balance toward reducing costs.

That’s not likely to happen.

“People seem to forget that our municipality is a representative government. Council has been hired by the voting public to represent their local interests.”

I have not forgotten that they are representatives. I also know that through taxes we hire them.

So, when we hire someone to maintain our gardens, build our custom home, fix our car, we have a representative to work and make some decisions for us after they promise to do a certain number of things for us rather than us doing it ourselves. They are experts we hire, just as someone hires people to run the City for us.

In the latter case, we have the right to observe any of the work going on over time. We can see how the garden is being worked on, we can see how the house construction is coming along, we can enter the shop at pre-arranged time to look at how they are fixing the engine compartment, etc. etc. When the job is done, or at some key stages of those jobs, we have the right to input comments. In fact, we have the duty to do so because otherwise we will risk getting comments from our agent workers/contractors that we should have spoken up earlier. By not speaking out, we have de facto accepted the work, its amount and its quality.

So, back to governments. We have the same duty, as citizens, to monitor what our representatives are doing because otherwise the same thing will happen. Not only that, but our representatives, just as our contractor workers have the duty to allow us to monitor. We have a special word for that these days. It is called transparency in government.

I think you can figure out how the rest should work on your own. You may not understand how it is supposed to work, but I think once you are on this fork of the road rather than your fork, you can see why those people who do not have your mindset, including senior governments when it really goes wrong and basic rules are not followed, as well as courts when the social contract may have been breached, will speak up.

It is their right and it their duty. Democracy does not stop at the voting booth. Something too many people do not understand.

With respect to the core review, some forget that the KPMG review was supposed to point to areas where some savings may be made or some changes could be made for more effective/efficient service. It was an overview.

Several commented not only in the case of PG, but also other core reviews taking place across the country, that the first look is not the full look. That additional work and costs had to be incurred in order to make informed decisions on the key recommendations made. In the case of Toronto, the original expense was multiplied many times for those additional detailed evaluation reports.

I think the City forgot to read the fine print on the last page of each and every segment of the KPMG report.

I quote: “No one should act on such information without appropriate professional advice after a thorough examination of the particular situation.”

I had asked at the original public meeting with KPMG, what the credentials were of the people who were about to conduct the reviews. That information was not divulged, after some discussion at the presentation table. The reason given was that the City selection committee had done that.

Well, if those kinds of answers do not raise a red flag, I do not know what will. Other sites from other cities on their review had such information right up front.

Of course, the key people were not exactly anonymous. In fact, a few minutes on the net quickly resulted in the info I had asked about. People seem to forget that. Makes them look rather unknowledgeable of today’s world when they try to hide such information.

In case anyone wonders why the review had no depth, it was because, unlike KPMG review processes I have been involved with in the forestry sector, they did not have anyone, in my opinion, who had the relevant professional expertise required to oversee any municipal functional operation on the administrative side.

I like the comment about Kelowna’s pool costing $10 for a swim. I have been to this pool in Kelowna. It has 4 waterslides, a wave pool, olympic size lane pool and enough exercise equipment to make your head spin.

In other words $10 bucks is a pretty good deal for what you are getting. Sure, if I was charged $10 for what I get in PG I might think it was a bit pricy, but I don’t think the unions are telling the whole truth.

I agree with most of the comments above, let’s get the main infrastructure working properly. Parks and recreation in this town may need to have some cuts here and there to make this city work properly.

Reset the city limits to 1965. Let the rest go to the regional district. Both would be better off.

mwk, I think you missed the point. Kelowna had the same pool, city owned and operated, but when the city of Kelowna sold out, the same buildng rate changed:
Adult $4.90 went to $10.10
Child $2.79 went to $5.75
Senior $2.70 went to $7.95
Family $10.35 went to $25.00

Nice to know mwk can affor $10 a swim, but most middle income and low income families cannot pay that rate.

” but I don’t think the unions are telling the whole truth.”
SHOCKING!! Lol
The unions don’t even tell the truth to their own members during contract negotians, what hope does the media or general public hold?

You should all realise that municipal and regional governments, just like their provincial and federal counterparts, currently HAVE TO continually spend money on all the seemingly inane things they spend it on.

It is how necessary “new” money enters the economic system.

Necessary, because without the continual infusion of this “new” money, (which comes from BORROWING ~ if that’s what the banking systems’ creation of credit ‘out of nothing’ can be called ~ when any bank lends or spends, for any purpose, it is creating entirely “new” money, not simply ‘lending’ some that’s already in existence), EXISTING bank loans would be unable to be fully amortised. And we would be in a full scale Depression, far worse than was experienced in the 1930’s.

It is quite understandable that those who correctly recognise the inanity of wanton and seemingly wasteful spending the way all governments are currently wont to do make the call for reining in the profligate in a desire to limit future taxes.

That would certainly be the right and proper thing to do in regards to our own personal or business financial affairs.

But we make a grave error when we equate conventions that are factual in the money matters of individuals and businesses as being exactly the same for the money matters of government. They are NOT.

Until we recognise this vital difference, and make moves to correct it, no amount of better management, increased ‘cutting and gutting’, or even full scale ‘austerity’, will ever hold any hope of long term success. EVERY so called ‘saving’ in any area will be more than matched by a greater ‘taking’ in some other. And if you don’t believe me, just look back at the history those currently in government refuse to learn from, and what came out of their efforts, often sincerely well-intentioned, I’m sure, to be ‘lean and mean’ fiscally in the finances of government. In every instance, all that’s done was to INCREASE the costs of EVERYTHING. Including government.

MWK wrote regarding the or a Kelowna pool: “It has 4 waterslides, a wave pool, olympic size lane pool and enough exercise equipment to make your head spin.”

Sounds like you have never been to our Aquatic Centre off 18th, mwk.

Some of the facilities

1. Various diving boards up to 10 metre with a diving pool

2. 50metre lane pool with a moveable bulkhead.

3. wave pool

4. large hot tub pool

5. sauna

6. exercise equipment room

Here are the rates at the H20 facility, which is operated by the Y and has several more facilities than just an aquatic centre.

http://www.h2okelowna.ca/admissions-membership/drop-in

The City of Kelowna has other facilities as well, including a 25m pool at Parkinson Recreation Centre which has toonie swims ….

Plus the Y has its own 25m pool.

The rates at the Y, which include the use of the pool, are about 25% lower than the H20 facility.

http://www.ymcaokanagan.ca/kfy/schedules/drop-in-fees

So … back to the union …..”They privatized it and it now costs over ten dollars to go for a swim in Kelowna.”

This is one of those typical statements which has half truths in them.

Yes, the fees may have gone up. I have not seen what the rates were before the Y took over operations. BUT, I am sure that the city had a say in the fees.

The false part of the statement is: “it now costs over ten dollars to go for a swim in Kelowna”

Kelowna has several pools. There are choices. Those choices include how much one is willing to pay for a swim which can be had for less than the $10 adult fee. Even the H20 facility has lower fees for different categories of individuals.

thanks gus…… good to know some people realize the point I was making.

alwayswatching….I just have to laugh at those rates…$10 is expensive to go for a swim. Gee, I look at the rates for everything nowadays… $1.4/litre of gas, $2/pop. etc etc. $10 for 2 hours(on average) of entertainment…..sounds right to me.

What is the typical wage for a person lifeguarding at the pool….oh that’s right $22/hour.

http://princegeorge.ca/careers/Lists/Job%20Postings/Attachments/294/11036_Lifeguard_Instructor_1_IRRPT_External_Job_Posting_Apr2011.pdf

And you want to drop by and pay $2 to go swimming. I think people need to wake up and realize it’s not the 1970’s anymore. Prices have gone up because costs have gone up as well.

Tired of driving through potholes….well while we keep paying $22/hr to have someone watch your kids at the pool that paid $2 to get in then we will continue to drive through those potholes….. It’s as simple as that.

No, mwk, it’s NOT quite “as simple as that”. Prices have gone up because costs have gone up as well, there’s no denying that. But they have ALSO gone up MORE because many more of today’s costs are ALLOCATED costs and not DISTRIBUTIVE ones. This creates the interesting phenomenon where we’re continually working with ‘bigger figures’, but more and more are actually getting less and less ‘prosperous’in terms of what they own relative to what they owe.

Lets not forget that in Kelowna you can walk to public beachs and swim in the lake.

What I don’t like is that my taxes built and ran the pools, civic centre, etc. and now they want to turn them over to private companies to run. If they turn them over will they charge a heavy price for them. If we use the concept it is like my home, when I sell my home I want a good profit, if I rent my home I also want to make money off it. But knowing the record of the council and past council some friend or friend’s organization will just be handed the pool, civic centre, etc. and we the tax payers will still have to take care of the maintence.

As for the tennis courts, I have one near my place that they plan cutting and I can tell you that it is used by all ages. We don’t want to have to join the Tennis Club and that is what the City has done with all the sports centres (except for the pool, track and neighbourhood tennis courts)that they built. The public can no longer use the BMX track like they did years ago and the speed skating oval looks terrible in the summer now that the horse can no longer use it.

Interesting comments from both sides of the fence here. When they decide to build a mega outlet store where the soccer fields are, we will then hear from the folks that watched their children and grandchildren enjoy this great community asset. No different than the pools, the ballparks, Tennis courts, Pine Valley or any other community asset that truly make PG a Community.
There is nothing more exciting that taking your grandchildren for a Sunday stroll through the Car Lot that used to be your community playground.
Time to research recall options at the municipal level.

Well, some very diverse comments. While we’re talking about money, lets talk about the insane organization call Initiative Prince George! The cost to operate, staff and maintain the offices for this city council’s ‘inbred’ IPG 1.2 to 1.8 million PER YEAR!!
Why would you endorse a company that is supposed to encourage development of outside companies, and encourage people to move to PG, and at the same time cut public services to the people you’re trying to entice to PG?
Come, move to PG, with closed tennis courts, privatized aquatic centres, ridiculous transit fees, understaffed park maintenance, no curbside recycling.

Move to PG and your teen who is saving money for university can work at the privatized aquatic centre for minimum wage.

Move to PG where people think its okay to sell out public services to private companies, who take their profits and head out of town!!

Get rid of IPG and all the funding problems are solved!!

We tried to get IPG on the Core Review as one of the things that should get the boot, however not a chance.

Anything that IPG does can be done for a third of the cost or less by City staff.

If the City was serious about reducing costs, IPG would be the first to go.