“I was first elected in 2008 when I championed better roads. I’m very proud that this year’s budget for road paving is three times what was spent in 2008,” says Stolz.”

That was 6 years ago and the only reason the spending has increased is due to the winter games. Duh!
Another thing, stop being so proud of spending our money.

Did you pay your taxes Cam?

As you can see from his announcement Stoltz has no vision other than to tear down and build new at a horrendous cost to taxpayers.

If you look at his BS line about roads what he saying, is that he is responsible for the horrific roads we have encountered since 2008. It was only this year that we had some significant work done on roads, and it wasn’t because of Stoltz. In fact it was during his term that money that could have been spent of roads was spent on the community energy system, which I might add to this point in time has been a dismal failure.

We finally got some work on roads for the following reasons.

1. Citizens of Prince George bitched and bellyached long and hard, and finally got the attention of City Hall.

2. They finally decided to use funds from the Federal Gas Tax Fund and spent approx. $3 Million gas tax money plus the single line item tax of $6 Million for an expenditure of roughly $9 Million this year. In other words we the taxpayers paid for the road repairs, and Stoltz is trying to take credit.

3. The Winter Games actually have a bearing on road repair, as we are trying to put our best foot forward. What happens after the games??

In my opinion, its time for Stoltz to move on. He has caused nothing but grief to taxpayers since he has been in office. Whether is was parking, garbage disposal, taking away the incentive for paying your utilities early, and generally increasing taxes and services over and over since he has been in office.

PS. Let not forget that Stoltz pushed real hard to build the River Road Dyke, and it was only the alternative approval process that stopped that project from going forward.

Dear Cameron, it would be in your best interest to pursue another line of work in my opinion.
You have been nothing but a puppet and a follower as far as I am concerned, and the fact that you failed to pay your taxes is of great concern to the people of Prince George. Imagine, here you are in charge of finance for our city and yet you failed to take care of your own personal situation!
Do we really want 4 years of you sitting as councilor? I think not!

There are a lot of reasons not to vote for this guy.
Too many to count actually.
Especially the political crowd he hangs with.

I remember the statement that if the AAP falls ONE vote short the dyke will go ahead, not there is significant portion of taxpayer’s against this, maybe we had better take a second look.

Of all the councillors seeking another term, Stoltz is the least deserving and should be turfed out on his ear. The biggest problem with this is if there will be enough viable candidates to place him in 9th(or worse. Unless a few more people step forward in the next week I think I will be going more with a few councillor x”s in my pocket. Guess the Friday Free for All Manifesto Man has ruled out a run, would have liked to hear all the conspiracy theories about city hall.
Cannot see myself voting for a wide eyed newbie whose biggest issue is transportation, a businessman whose website leaves more questions than answers or an unemployed person without more info.

Munoz can fill the seat vacated by Hall and will likely get more votes than Stoltz but still will not drop hom below the cut off line, this might be the perfect time to downsize council to 6.

Possible lyrics for re election campaign song:

“I could while away the hours
Conferrin’ with the flowers
Consultin’ with the rain

And my head, I’d be scratchin’
While my thoughts were busy hatchin’
If…..” Wizard of Oz

^^drop him below the line

Stolz the dike man. OMG, surely we can do better than that. He is now taking credit for road improvements. There is no end to the BS from this guy. A finance committee chairman who doesn’t pay his taxes. Please let’s not have a repeat of Stolz on council.

This is one of the people that I will not be voting for. He and Wilber are joined at the hip and neither has the sense that god gave a flea. Time for a change.

Stolz is so up on himself, have to wonder how he ever got elected in the first place, however not for another four years.

This guy definitely doesn’t have my vote. Shari’s puppet, and loved to increase property taxes at the table. Also pushing for the storm drain tax. Remember voters, even though you can vote for 8 councillors, you only have to vote for the ones you like. You don’t need to cast all votes. Don’t water your vote down. The only councillor running for re-election that has my vote is Albert.

We should release/reconfigure him so he goes straight to Ottawa.

So why have we not heard a perp about the PAC from any candidate yet ?

Unfortunately, this fellows actions take away from his integrity and credibility. To me, past actions equal future actions.

On July 7th they all voted yes on the “Administration’s Review of the Prince George Regional Performing Arts Centre Society’s Proposed Regional Performing Arts Centre (PAC)”

Read into that what you may. I do know that Munoz is on the PAC’s board of directors so you can pretty much guess her position.

What makes Stolz think he is “the most qualified to find solutions” to our aging infrastructure problem? What really did he achieve in the last 3 years?

Does anyone know if Dave Wilbur is going to run again?

Dave (Rubber Stamp) Wilbur is part of the Green, Stoltz, team. Hopefully he will not run, however I expect he will.

Any previous votes on the Pac and if a person is on the board does not prevent them from giving an honest answer on where they currently stand on the matter. They are asking for a new mandate and how they answer may affect if an x gets put by their name on the ballot. Green has shown that what a candidate says before an election has little to do on what happens once the ballots are counted, but you would think that a person with a bit of integrity would at least try to follow up on what they promised.

They question should not be only if the support buliding a PAC but on the steps they intend to take to move the project forward. Will it be put to referendum? Will it be build with borrowed money and have to pass a potential AAP? Will it be snuck in through the back door via land sales and using money earmarked for debt repayment leaving taxpayers with a half a million a year in upkeep costs?

So the most important question would be is how the opinion of a majority of taxpayers will affect their decision. Not to late to add a line on the ballot below the fluoride question and put the issue to bed one way or the other!

I’ve never thought of Dave Wilbur as a “rubber stamp.” He strikes me more as a consensus builder. He was also (I believe)one of the first councillors in the province to challenge the restrictive use of funds in the federal gas tax rebate.

They should have a “how many would have not voted for Shari Green” ballot question. That would be interesting and funny.

I would call Dave Wilbur a rubber stamp also. Whatever the issue, you knew he would always vote with Green and Stolz. Also, after watching a number of council meetings and interviews, there have been a number of times I have wondered if Dave ever does any research into the topic at hand.

Ibear. Other Provinces in Canada were using the gas tax fund for road rehabilitation for years before BC, and Prince George figured out how the program works.

I think that Prince George did not try very hard to use the money for roads, because they had plans to use it for other purposes like the Community Energy System, and perhaps the Dike.

Wilbur made the remark that the UBCM’s left hand did not know what it’s right hand was doing when it came to the Federal Gas Tax money, and what it could be used for. I discussed this with the Manager who looks after BC’s gas tax money in Victoria, and he basically said that the first step was to make application and present a project for the funds, however insofar as Prince George went this wasn’t done for roads. He wasn’t overly impressed with Wilburs comments.

In 2010 the gas tax program was revamped which made is easier to get the money for road rehab, however Prince George continued to use it for other purposes, and it was not until sometime in 2012 the stated publically that it could be used for road rehab, however they made it look like this was something new, when in fact it had been in place since 2010.

DI & P – thanks for the enlightenment ;)

Wasn’t it the Mayor from Quesnel that actually read the thing and challenged where it stated that the gas tax refund couldn’t be use for roads ? Wasn’t our city council under the belief the money could only be used for transportation such as bike paths and bussing ?

Storm Drain Tax? Business Licenses for basement suites? Anyone who supported these two issues will not be getting my vote. Desperate attempt at a money grab. Poor decisions in my opinion.

Thanks for the reminder BYOB I forgot about the Storm Drain tax, and the business license for rental units.

Wilbur was a bust!

I was reading some of the information about the gas tax on the web and it was required to be spent on projects that would improve the environment or reduce green house gas emission but the federal conservatives changed the deal in the last year and basically said the money could now be used for filling pot holes or paving roads.

What Stolz and others on Council are staying quiet about is that the city had millions in a reserve that was targeted to be spent to improving transit, enhancing our parks, and addressing air quality but instead earlier this year the power brokers at City Hall decided to say the hell with improving the environment and instead drained the reserve and spent it all on paving roads just in time for the election.

Now that the reserve is gone, the one time funding that Stolz is so proud of patting himself on the back for spending, will not be available next year so the budget will have to be reduced substantially or our taxes and user fees will be jacked up even more. He seems to be a master at spinning a partial truth to promote himself and his own political agenda.

2 terms is enough! Actions speak louder than words.

Palopu I disagree with your read on the gas tax. The way I read the info on the web the gas tax was indeed set up to fund projects to improve the environment and reduce green house gases. The City of Kamloops as an example used most of their funds to improve transit and improve water quality. Regardless of the past intended focus of the gas tax funds, the deal was changed in the last year to allow the money to be spent on repaving roads.

I did notice that once that green light went on stolz and council decided to drain the reserve that was holding millions of gas tax funds to beef up the road budget this year. Wouldn’t you know, just in time for the election but that of course wouldn’t have influenced their decision.

Stolz wastes no time patting himself on the back for draining that reserve and crowing about how much money was spent on roads this year though he isn’t telling the whole truth. What the self proclaimed finance champion isn’t saying is that unless there is a big tax hike next year the budget for roads will have to be reduced in 2015 because the funds from the reserve are no longer available.

Skakun is the only one currently employed by us taxpayers that will get my vote.

To bad there was not a system where the candidates had to receive a vote of 50% of the eligible voters. The AAP the city is so fond of using has high standards when it applies to the taxpayer attempting to overturn council’s decisions at wasting money on expensive projects so why not raise the bar for Councillors. Rather than get elected with 30% of the votes that 20% of the electorate cast set a bar a bit higher.

Different Perspective.

The use of the gas tax money for road rehabilitation was always subject to some controversy, however as I stated previously other Provinces were using this money for roads for years before BC got on board. In a letter to the UBCM in 2010 the Federal Government clarified this issue and made the road rehabilitation portion clear by giving it stand alone status in the legislation. Even so Prince George still did not use any of this money for roads until 2013.

The Government extended this program for another 10 years, and Prince George is now eligible to receive approx. $3 Million per year for the next 10 years. In addition we pay the City a road rehabilitation tax of some $6 Million per year, so in effect the City could if they wanted to spend another $9 Million on roads next year.

Lets keep in mind that the Federal Changes also allowed this money to be spent on other projects one of which was entertainment and culture, which means to me that it could be directed to a Performing Arts Centre.

So we have lots of money coming in, its just a question of where it gets spent.