Waste of money.

The vast majority of city tax revenue comes from property taxes, one would assume to service the properties. So why is the city in the business of fishing for economic opportunities for the private sector?

These sort of things at minimum should be classified as an employment benefit.

At least have the holiday employee pay the income taxes on the benefit; because lets face it these ‘once in a life time’ trips rarely produce actual returns, and mostly are just paid holidays.

Senior Communications Officer Mike Kellet ?

Where is Rob Van Absenticum ? How many people does the city employ to tell us nothing ?

The City says over $12,000 was spent on the trip which included airfare, travel, accommodation, and food.

Kellett says the decision to go on the trip was strictly an administrative decision made by the city manager.

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Awesome! $12,000 of taxpayers money for a vacation. How many trips to China has the city made now? I’ve certainly lost count. And what have we gotten in return other then the bills? Nothing. Nada. Zip and Zilch.

Really, another trip…and the Mayor and councillors forgot to mention it!
Today is Nov. 18 nine days after the fact! A vacation on taxpayer’s money and the end results …nothing! And the city manager made the decision which of course included her on a free trip!

have they ever heard of skype?

I think China already knows where we are. Don’t they have interests in most of the oil and gas and mines in BC? Wasn’t it China that was bringing in TFW for their mine because they couldn’t find qualified Canadians?

Another thing to think about..is while they were on their tax payer vacation we kept paying their salary.. doesnt get any better than that.

The City has signed a number of MOU’s with China over the years. This is just another wonderful trip to China, at taxpayers expense.

We already have Chinese students at UNBC and CNC plus from many other Countries. China imports Lumber, Pulp and Paper, from our local sawmills and pulp mills and has been doing so for over 20 years. In addition they import coal, and other mineral goods such as gold, copper, moly, logs etc;

In other words they are already heavily invested to BC and this area of the Province, and have been for some time. This was done I might add without any input from any of the various Municipalities.

The job of Municipal Government is to look after their Cities, not travel around the Country butting their noses into areas where they have no jurisdiction or influence.

I would have expected better from the present Mayor, Council, and Administration.

Lets get off the gravy train, and get to work for taxpayers.

When I shop I specifically check the label and tags to see where the product is manufactured. If it is China I don’t buy it as 99% of the time it contains hazardous material and/or it is an inferior product. I, and I hope everyone, buys things “MADE IN CANADA”, to support Canadian workers.

So how many other trips have they taken without the taxpayer knowing anything about it. I see they are travelling with the FOI specialist Christy Clark so one will never know. Do we still have some more cities to twin?

Have to agree with Palopu! Hopefully they took some pictures of vital infrastructure such as proper level safe sidewalks, the ones we are still hoping for in some subdivisions!

“He adds it wasn’t intentional that the City failed to publicize the trip prior to take-off or at Monday night’s council meeting.

“Quite honestly after we got back from UBCM we were moving forward with some things we thought the ministry staff could help us with and then all of a sudden we got the invitation and this all happened within just a week or 10 days.”

“Talktober” (to foster greater relations between residents and City Hall) could have been a perfect time to let the residents know. You would have had at least 2 opportunities.
This smacks of the 3-5yr behind closed door conversation that Councils had about the park name change, but only informing the residents 4 days before voting to change it. (6 of the current council members would have participated in those discussions) The focus is HOW not WHAT.

And then there was the time that Lyn Hall as Chair of the school board missed a meeting in Mackenzie to “engage” the parents as they wanted to discuss the reopening of a school. He was to attend with the school board Vice-chair AND the Superintendent. When asked why he missed the meeting? “We have to pay closer attention to out day-timers”

What happened to all the benefits from the twinning of PG and a Chinese city that took place under the watch of Shari Green.

The usual story. New council and mayor. New propaganda.

And you guys were upset about painting the bike lanes. At least someone in PG uses them. Oh well, it’s only $12,000. I mean really, what else could you have spent it on – like say, supporting the Hart Ski Hill – utilized by hundreds of PG children. Filling the cracks on the shoulder of Foothills and Chief Lake. Painting some road lines so we can see where the shoulder is at night. Give some cops some overtime to cut down on speeding in school zones. Pay someone to shovel out senior’s driveways. Hire an ESL teacher for 3 months to help the Syrians settle here. I sure miss the days when I worked for a multi-national and I could travel on someone else dime. There’s no money easier to spend, than someone else.

My big concern is we are going to have to construct another building just to house all the gifts from our twin cities ;)

Perhaps it time for the Mayor and Council to give us some specifics about their plans of growing a more diversified and vibrant economy.

Anyone can string a bunch of fancy words together such as **growing a more diversified and vibrant economy** but what does this actually mean??

Where are their plans? What are their goals? When will it get started? Who’s in charge,? etc; etc; etc;.

The time for double speak is over. We are being taxed to the limit, with no end in sight, and those responsible for our fiscal well being are running around the world pretending that they have a role to play in international trade, etc;

The basics of running a city are pretty well established in this Country and there really is not a lot new in that area. We know that fixing sewers, paving roads, plowing snow, etc is not the most exciting topics in the world, however its what we pay these people for, and its time they become experts on the running of the City, rather than experts on how to get to and from China.

Perhaps the Mayor and Council could explain to us why our garbage rates are being increased when the **new** garbage system was supposed to actually reduce costs. This would just be one small item they could spend some time on.

An incredible number of posts on here with an equally incredible number of supportive thumbs up.

It is all dealing with a $12,000 item ….. it is the optics of this that are terrible.

I am going to give the order of responsibility for this happening without the public’s knowledge. It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that this particular type of activity is going to get negative reaction from a significant number of people who follow city politics no matter how the news is broken to the general public.

Number one person who botched this is the City Manager. Communications reports to her and if communications botched it up by not sharing this before the event, and even after the event, the buck stops at the City Manager’s desk. She is the one who knew virtually from the start. She is the one who should have known how sensitive this is in the public’s eyes. She is the one who should have advised communications how to handle this.

Number two is the Mayor, for similar reasons, but it was supposedly not his decision to go, not his job to follow up details. He trusted staff, as he should have. But, after this, perhaps he knows he has to be more vigilant.

There may be people lower down the pyramid who also botched it. That is not for the public to determine. That is the City Manager’s job.

I am starting to wonder how Rob fits into all of this. He started in September. He has been on the job (whatever that job description is we still do not quite know) for some 2.5 months. He has been around this city long enough to know how sensitive an issue these kinds of trips are.

We have a number of serious problems in North Central BC that no one in our City or the outlying areas seem to want to talk about.

As an example. We had the closure of Endako Mines last December which resulted in some 400 people being laid off. These people will now be running out of EI payments. The company that owns Endako Mines kept their American operation running. Hmmmm.

Conifex recently announced that it would spend millions of dollars upgrading their mill in Arkansas, and would not be spending any money on their closed mill in Mackenzie until some time in the future.

The pulp mill at Chetwyn BC that closed in Sept for maintenance will now not open until sometime in the new year.

A number of coal mines have closed down in the Tumbler Ridge area this year and there seems to be no discussion on when they will resume operation (if ever)

The Rio Tinto Alcan upgrade to their aluminum plant in Kitimat finished this year which resulted in some 2500 construction workers being finished. Where are these people going to find work.

There were numerous mills closed in North Central BC in the past few years ie; Clear Lake Sawmills, Bear Lake, The Pas Lumber, North Central Plywoods, Rustads, just to name a few.

Enbridge seems to be dead. We will have a moratorium on oil vessels on the BC North Coast. Whats happening with LNG???

All the closures, etc; need to be put on the table and discussed to ascertain where we are headed in the next 10/20 years. This is an area where out Mayor and Council and Regional Districts could spend some time , rather that looking for solutions in foreign lands.

The Kitamat Moderization Project was done not by locals . They built a camp for their workers most of which were yanks and others . Few locals got anything . When they ran out of room for their workers in the camp they hired a cruise ship for the overflow . So you can subtract 2500 from your excuses .

On an ironic note . You mention aluminium in the context of China . Did you know that China is our biggest competitor ? China produces vastly more aluminium than does canada and has always done so . They also set the price because of their volume .

I would have to agree with Palopu about the senior levels of government.

Taking care of foreign affairs.

Maybe once we have some worthwhile trade agreements in place,

that the City of PG could stand to benefit from.

Then send a sales team over to promote the city.

Check this link in regards to the Australian Cattle Industry.

http://bloom.bg/1QnBaVB

The City should be asking the BC government to start pressuring the

Federal government about reducing landing fees at YXS.

It was Colin Kinsley that started this colossal waste of money. The others are just following in his foot steps. Hopefully the bar bills won’t be as bad when Colin use to go

Here we go again. I thought things had changed after the last election. Mayor Hall, I thought better of you. I’m obviously mistaken.

Ataloss. You don’t have a clue as to how many local workers were at Alcan, or how many Americans, or others,. You are just blowing smoke up a dead mans butt. I suspect many of them were from North Central BC, including Prince George.

The cruise ship you keep harping about left Kitimat months ago, mainly because there was no other major project in the area, that would need this ship to house workers.

Regardless of the number of workers or where they came from, the end result is that they have left Kitimat and thus will not be spending money, or working there. Furthermore with the upgrade complete the new plant will operate with 400 less full time employee’s, so this is a major loss of jobs to Kitimat.

Have a nice day.

You don’t know what you are talking about Palopu except for the numbers running the new plant and the cruise ship leaving . The camp and ship workers left very little in town . They had their own bars / entertainment with everything that implies , nudge ,nudge , wink , wink . They had their own food company . It was as if they weren’t even here . Except for all the U.S. Licence plates in the middle of the winter .

An incredible number of posts on here with an equally incredible number of supportive thumbs up.

It is all dealing with a $12,000 item ….. it is the optics of this that are terrible.

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It was $12,000 this time. How much was it last time? And the time before that? And the time before that? etc, etc. How much staff time is spent before and after the junket? That’s not included in the $12,000.

Optics is right. All I see is a couple of people bellying up to the public trough.

Ataloss, were you at KMP for any length of time? Just curious.

They claim they were invited to participate on short notice! The one who extended the invite should pay the bill!

The Premier’s Trade Mission included representatives from six BC municipalities and more than 140 companies. Who were the other five municipalities? Why the secrecy?

Particularly given the fact that you’re going with the premier and a large number of organizations and companies, it does open doors.”

You can say that again– The only door that was opened for them was when they climbed on the plane.

Oldcoot I know people that worked as shop runners , chauffeurs , close relative from Vancouver on the inside . They said it was a little like prison with all the checks to get in and out . When I was working ( years ago ) I was in and out of the place and still know many that work or are retired from the place . So I think I know a little more than Palopu would imagine but we all know what a fervent imagination he has . Most of the people that were displace went through attrition or transfers . The cruise ship was brought to kitimat for that one purpose by ALCAN for ALCAN . Not the spin that our pal is trying to put on it .

Ataloss says, but we all know what a fervent imagination he has

Just like your imaginative solar system.

Well local company Houle Electric did all the electrical for the new smelter in Kitimat and they hired local workers first, followed by regional, provincial, then national from those call up lists. They only went to the international call up list if the national call up list was empty. Which for a time it was, but locals always had first hire rights.

Ski, you make too much sense, nobody at City Hall will understand…LOL
Don’t get the trade with a communist country at all.

Your right Eagleone and of course there were many other BC Contractors working on this project.

The company that brought the ship to Kitimat had hoped that there would be an LNG project on the go so that they could continue to use this vessel, however that never happened.

Ataloss. I was at KMP from Aug 2013 to Dec 2014. My experience was quite different from what you are saying. Look me up on Free for All Friday .