Four Year Civic Terms Bad Idea
The provincial government legislation to move the term of civic elections from three to four years raises the question of just how much damage can be done in four years as opposed to three?
If the province moves ahead with the four year term , you can make a great deal of mistakes in the first two years . The only way that the new proposed legislation is palatable would be for the province to attach recall legislation to the four gear term . That at least would give the voters in a municipality the ability to recall a mayor or a council member during that period.
As the legislation now sits, just what is afforded the local taxpayer?
Case in point, while we were promised savings of up to 10% in every department by the incoming Mayor, looking at the utilities bill that you have recently received will quickly dispel that myth.
For those with a medium sized garbage can the rate climbed from $439.28 last fall to $497.73 in the utility bill that you have just received. That is much more than a 10% "increase" and what is afforded the taxpayer who is forced to sit around and wait for the upcoming civic election this November?
In the meantime we are being told that our home taxes may not go up because of the increase in assessments, problem is it simply is taking it from one pocket and putting it in the other.
If the intent of the province is to have a more open and accountable form of government in BC, putting into play a four year civic term is not the way to do it.
I'm Meisner and that's one man's opinion.
Comments
All it does is make us stuck with bad people longer, if they do a good job they will be re-elected. If there are lousy, like the ones we have now, we can’t get rid of them for a extra year.. Yikes
Perhaps they whined long enough and loud enough (using JB terminology) for the government to cave in to their demands for an additional year.
The publicity on municiple elections has been over the length of the term. Are there any other changes proposed? Other changes about election financing, conflict of interest, in camera council meetings, …. are more important in establishing a real democratic municiple governance structure.
Meisner: “For those with a medium sized garbage can the rate climbed from $439.28 last fall to $497.73 in the utility bill that you have just received. “
We are paying for the sins of past administrations, some of those people are still there today. At the end of the day, the amount we pay has to sustain the system. Clearly it has not been doing that. Costs are going up, from equipment to wages and benefits and the money has to come from somewhere.
So P Val, get off your butt and throw your hat in the ring so that we can be stuck with one less “lousy” person. If you aren’t willing to run and take the chance to improve things than you shouldn’t have the right to bitch either.
I agree….no four-year term!
Vincent. Your idea that if you are not prepared to run to change things, then you shouldn’t have the right to bitch is bogus.
We elect people to represent us on Council, and if they do not do what we expect them to do, of course we have the right to bitch. Our system is based on electing people to WORK FOR US. If they do not do a good job, then we bitch, and throw them out.
That’s how the system works.
Vincent has a point. There are a lot of people in this town who don’t vote, and don’t get involved in any way. They have no desire to contribute in any way to make the system better, other than to bitch anonymously on this site and others. It has about the same effect as a fart in a windstorm.
“Case in point, while we were promised savings of up to 10% in every department by the incoming Mayor, looking at the utilities bill that you have recently received will quickly dispel that myth”
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Not saying I think that four year terms are a good idea, but a 10% saving in every department doesn’t mean a 10% saving on your utilities bill . . .
Please, somebody prove to us that those who came out to vote are not a close sampling of the total eligible voters; that had they come out to vote, the outcome would have been different.
You may also want to convince us that had the outcome been different and Dan Rogers had been re-elected he would not have been faced with the same issues which pretty well have the same solutions.
Dan likely would not have said if you do not like it here, you can move to some other place. But the winter weather before and after Xmas would have been exactly the same, since it is not influenced by voters, and Bill Gall would still have been in the same seat, even if Bates had not quit, and have gone about business as has been normal for a long time.
The taxpayer must cut a check every month for taxes whether they are utilities, that include snow removal, sewer , water, garbage, all of which used to be on your general taxes .
It doesn’t matter how you want to add it up, what counts is the check that you cut every month to live in the city, that is the cost, or simply put, the tax to live in the city plain and simple.
You may recall at one time, roads were a part of general taxes, so was snow removal, and soon storm water , do you really think that because it has been moved over to utility, it isn’t a tax, or you can opt out if you like.
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