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A self- appointed pay raise = better focus on issues?

There are mixed feelings in town when you talk to residents about our Council's self-appointed 43% pay increase. If there wasn't a line dividing public of opinion on our incumbents decision making, there sure is now!

There is something rather narcissistic about a council voting for their own raise. I mean, who would turn down a raise if you offered it to yourself? Well, Councillor Sue Hilton that's who! As reported in the Sun-Tribune ,  the Ward 4 Councillor  "took issue with the process and suggested enlisting the assistance of a compensation expert." Fair point. If you have read any of the letter's to the Editor in our local paper you will have seen 4 published outcries about this decision and only one in favour. If you missed them, you can read them here.

I think the residents of Stouffville need to realize we are no longer live in  a little town in the "Country close to the City" where a part time council could rather effortlessly govern. We are 38000 people strong now with projections of hitting the 50K mark in the next 8 years. With this tremendous growth, more attention is necessary from our Council on issues facing us everyday. Increased services, infrastructure, roads, public safety are only a few items that need to hit council agenda on a weekly basis. 3PM Council meetings every other week do not cut it anymore. I believe a part time schedule for part time councillors just isn't good enough for Stouffville anymore. If we want the proper, attentive governance for Stouffville, we need to pay our Council appropriately. 

My question is,  are we going to see 43% more time and attention to the issues facing us to coincide with their new $39,730 salary? For the town's sake, I hope so. Governing our town is quickly becoming, if not already a full-time job. I believe that we should expect a lot more from our elected officials especially now they are on their way to becoming well compensated for executing their elected duties.

 

Grant Denied. Outdoor Pool closed. No new Indoor Pool until 2019. Now what?

It was reported on Oct 28th that the Town was denied the Accesibility grant it was hoping for to build the new tank pool and water feature in Memorial Park. This is terribly dissappointing for the Town, the Mayor and Council because Federal grant money is exactly that, a grant- Free!

I guess the question now is, will the Mayor and Council still spend approved money despite not receiving the grant.  On Feb 24, 2011 the Sun-Tribune reported that Council had approved a new pool. From that article: "In the 2010 budget, council approved $4.3 million for phase two of Memorial Park’s redevelopment, with about $3.6 million for the water feature. The town was going to be on the hook for 80 per cent of the project’s cost, with the remaining 20 per cent coming from development charges. If the grant is received, the town will be responsible for $1.7 million."

Well we know the grant wasn't received so now what?

We also know that the Mayor and Council have pushed back any capital plans for a new Indoor Pool until 2019 as cited in this Sun-Tribune article from March 2011.  I was at that meeting when Mayor Emmerson told Council that it should be pushed back for the next terms Council and be their issue to deal with. Huh? The last time I checked, these projects take time to plan, budget and build. With the projected growth of our Town, why wouldn't Council take on the forward thinking approach and deal with this issue right now?

As quoted by the Sun-Tribune, Mayor Wayne Emmerson said Oak Ridges-Markham MP Paul Calandra “is still trying to see if some funding could be found for us.”“There’s no grey area,” he said. “We did say we would put an outdoor pool beside the current one.”
“I think we’re all disappointed we didn’t get it but we’re not going to stop trying.”
The Memorial Park master plan, which includes the pool, will be brought back to the public for consultation sometime before the end of the year. “We promised we would go back to the public to see if that is what they are looking for,” Mr. Emmerson said.

Back to the public? Really Sir?

I may be mistaken but I think the public may have already spoken! We need a new pool and to be totally honest, I don't think anyone really cares if it's outdoor or indoor.

It's is time for our Mayor and Council  to lead and show the residents of Stouffville they actually have a handle on the current and future needs of our community.  Town staff are projecting that Stouffville's population will grow to 55,800 people by 2021.

If you take the forecasted growth, we will expand by 17150 in the next 10 years and probably break the 40000 mark in 2012.

Our question should be, Where we all going to swim?

The Town seems to be doing it right?

Now that's a headline that will get your attention!

In early February, a coalition of concerned residents armed with a petition of 1200 signatures made their case to keep the outdoor pool in Memorial park open. Unfortunately, Council ignored the voice of its residents yet again and did not fund the required renovations to keep the pool open during one of the hottest summers on record. 

In a recent Sun-Tribune article titled Survey says: 96% satisfied with Stouffville the paper states that 96% of us are happy with how things are unfolding within our great town. There are over 33000 of us that call Stouffville home with that number growing weekly it would seem by the number of new homes being built.

"The survey, which was conducted primarily over the phone (670 respondents), but also online (21) and through the mail (10) was administered by DPRA Canada between May 9 and June 3."

In total,  701 people were surveyed. 701. That's it.

701.

According to the article, "Residents were satisfied with the town’s delivery of fire and emergency services, community special events, garbage/recycling/green bin collection, the Whitchurch-Stouffville Public Library and the arenas, according to the survey."

Interestingly, a delegation of residents armed with a petition presented a request to Council to bring funding to the Library up to provincial standards. Apparently there are a number of residents who feel the Library is falling short in its service to the community. Council moved to have the issue brought up at budget time. Your chance to be heard on the issue is Oct 25th.

So who do you believe in all this? Not sure if I am honest.

I would agree with the 701 survey respondents that we get great service from the hard working employees who provide the town’s delivery of fire and emergency services,  garbage/recycling/green bin collection but clearly there's a misunderstanding about the Library.

 

 

Our Under-funded Library Needs your Help!

 

It's not hard to fathom that as our town grows at the rate it has been, there wouldn't be an effect on some services Stouffville residents require and depend on.  It has been brought to our attention that our Library is severely underfunded. The information below has been taken from http://wslibrarypetition.blogspot.com This is a website that has been established by concerned residents of Stouffville who are petitioning Council and presenting their case to Council on September 20th at 3PM. If you believe our Library should at a minimum meet the provincial funding levels, please read on and visit their website. 

To see their presentation to Council, you can read it HERE. To sign their petition before their meeting, please click HERE.

 

Some Background information:

Our town is growing at an astonishing rate, and our library has not been given the resources needed to keep pace. Since 2006, the town has added 238 new residents every month (from a pop. of 24,290 to 38,650).  Impressively, 55.5% of residents are library card holders (well above the provincial average); that translates to 133 new library patrons every month for the past five years. This will continue as the town plans to grow to 55,800 by 2021.

Over this same period, the Whitchurch-Stouffville Public Library has fallen well below the provincial averages and guidelines in each of these three areas: staffing, materials, and space. Why is this alarming? A library is much more than just another leisure facility on a town's wish-list. Historically, public libraries in Canada (and in Stouffville) have played a crucial role in the formation of an educated and literate population. Fostering of literacy and life-long learning in turn strengthens and stabilizes the community. A healthy, thriving, creative community requires a library with: expert staff to find and interpret information; to provide professional assistance with research; to collect documents relevant to the community; to help people from different demographic groups (e.g., children, students, seniors) access relevant information, including information for a job search, for starting a business, and for much more;
leisure and informational resources in a variety of formats (books, digital archives, and electronic databases), accessible to all; space to read, to gather, to study, to research, and to experience.
capacities to address the digital divide and helping individuals transition to a global, knowledge-based economy. This is only possible with sufficient, predictable funding. Provincial performance indicators show that the Whitchurch-Stouffville Public Library has the lowest per resident funding in the province when compared to libraries in similar sized towns.

In 2009, the province-wide average “Operating cost for library services per person” for communities with a pop. of 20,000-50,000 was $44; Stratford was highest of these eleven communities at $66. Whitchurch-Stouffville was alone in last position at $25 per person (BMA Municipal Study, 2010, p. 124; next lowest was Georgina with $35/person), down from $28 in 2008 (click for summary). In 2010, our town's per capita contribution dropped another 8% to $23.44 per person, which takes us even further from the provincial average.

The 2009 Public Library Statistics published by the Ontario Ministry of Tourism and Culture also indicate that the Whitchurch-Stouffville Public Library has fallen well below the provincial average for staffing, materials and space requirements. For example,  whereas in 2010 the W-S Public Library had 9.91 staff (full-time equivalent), the provincial average for communities our size was 21. The ability to buy and house materials is also a serious challenge: while our library had a collection of 87,558 books in 2009, the provincial average for comparable municipalities was 143,500. (Note: only the 2008 statistics are available online currently). In 2007, our library had 4.73 titles per person, and today that number is down to 2.64.

As the town grows, so do its infrastructure needs. Between 2007 and 2011, the town budget increased 80%, and municipal office staffing increased  by 58.14% (or from 2006 to 2011: 64 new positions). Yet during this same period of growth, only one extra library staff position was added (2011; first new FTE position in a decade). The library proportion of the town's operating expenses dropped from 5.1% in 2004, to 3% in 2007, and now to an historic low of 2% in 2011.

These serious problems are compounded by higher than average use and program attendance. 

Thus, while our town's per capita funding for the library has been decreasing annually and is far below the provincial average, the percentage of residents that are library card holders and users is much higher than the provincial average!

Each objective municipal and provincial performance indicator available shows unambiguously that the Whitchurch-Stouffville Public Library has been chronically underfunded, and that there is a significant deficit in terms of materials, space, and staffing. This should be a concern for all people who care about the fabric of our community.

Please sign the online petition (or download the flyer, summary, and/or petition) to bring about a change and to support our library!

We, residents of Whitchurch-Stouffville, petition Town Council to develop and approve a plan to increase per person library funding to the provincial average by 2015, and to begin immediately to develop plans for a library expansion.

"Social Media not used by many people." - Stouffville Councillor Bannon

It has been a while since I have found anything to comment on politically in our great town of Stouffville. Now I was away on vacation but after reading the papers and town website it would seem that Council has been fairly quiet over the past 2 weeks.

Until now that is. An article in the paper this weekend on Councillor Bannon's defense on spending $4063.00 on ONE newsletter caught my interest. What was interesting was not that he choose to spend $4063.00 of our tax dollars on a full colour glossy card stock newsletter, but rather his seeming outright disregard for the use of Twitter or Facebook as an effective way to communicate with his constituents and Stouffville residents at large who may be interested in what is happening in the wonderful world of Ward 2.

Sun-Tribune reporter Sandra Bolan wrote "Would Mr. Bannon ever consider tweeting on, or posting to Facebook, an item coming up for discussion at a council meeting or provide notice of a resolution post-meeting? Not likely. “It’s more of a conversation network than anything else and not used by that many people,” he said.

Not used by many people? Really Phil? 

The fastest growing demographic on Facebook is Women 55+ as reported by insidefacebook.com. I am wondering how many Ward 2 residents are over 55 and women. Anyone know? The chart below from www.kenburbary.com shows total users of Facebook so far this year.

Checkfacebook.com is reporting that there is now a Global Audience: of 629,622,400 active Facebook users.

I realize these are big numbers and Ward 2 only has 2500 homes but I would be willing to bet that there's at least one Facebook account on a computer in 75-80% of Ward 2 homes. An effective way to reach Ward 2 residents. Mayoral Candidate Justin Altman used his Facebook account brilliantly in communicating to supporters in the recent election.

As for Twitter, there are some very notable Canadian politicians leading the way in using Twitter as a means for communicating to constituents. You may want to check out the following:

Prime Minister Harper: @pmharper  108,898 Followers

Industry Minister Clement: @TonyclementCPC   14,013 Followers

Ontario Premier McGunity:@Dalton_McGuinty   8,050 Followers

Liberal Leader Ignatieff: @M_Ignatieff  70,409 Followers

Markham Oak-Ridges MP Calandra:@PaulCalandra 892 Followers

All using a free, interactive tool to communicate with their supporters and constituents. Social media is being used by many many people. Maybe someday in the near future we will  see @mayoremerson or @pbannon on twitter?

 

Council? Are you listening? Do you care to comment?

It's great to see Letter's to the Editor like this one printed. My only question is do any of our elected officials care enough to respond?

I have yet to receive any word from Council about my letter to them asking for proof of my misleading or misrepresenting the facts opn stouffvillepolitics.com. You would think that my photo and request in last week's paper would somehow move someone... anyone from the town to point out my errors and my misleading of the residents of Stouffville.

Maybe they just don't read the paper.Unless of course there's a photo opportunity at a Winter Carnival or a Parade. Then I am sure they do.

If by chance, Mr. Bannon or Mr. Emerson, you do read this post or Ms. Van-Sickle's letter to the paper, it might be appropriate or at a minimum, a nice gesture to respond to Ms. Van-Sickle's comments. But what if she is right? What if it is you who are misinforming, misleading and misrepresenting the facts to the public! Then why would you respond?

 

A few minor "Official" Corrections

The Sun-Tribune printed a story today explaining about, according to the Mayor, the town's residents alleged confusion about "Unofficial" Stouffville websites.  There were a few statistics that Mrs. Bolan got bit wrong about Stouffvillepolitics.com in the article.

Stouffvillepolitics.com has received 6070 Unique pages views since its inception in September and averages 31 visitors per day. Our twitter feed @stouffvillepol has 32 followers. Up One since my interview thursday. Woot Woot!

Now to the unofficial confusion...

I sent a letter to council (see 2 posts below) 2 weeks ago and  included this paragraph "For the record, never have I said or written anywhere that stouffvillepolitics.com is in any way affiliated, related or part of the Town of WS. Stouffvillepolitics.com is a political commentary on the decisions and decision making process that you take which I fully understand you may not like. I believe it is a necessary tool for our community to have your decisions communicated quickly and I believe the 1800 residents who have been on the site in the last month would agree."

Thanks to the Sun-Tribune for bringing to light today.

 

 

Communication 2.0- Social Media Style

During the budget meeting last week, I Tweeted quotes from town officials and council as they were happening.You can see some of them if you wish to at http://twitter.com/stouffvillepol To continue the ongoing discussion about online communication and the instant transparency it brings to decisions council and town staff are making, as they are made in council meetings, I thought I would share a video my good friend Jenn put on her Facebook page.  It is a good reminder for those of us deeply entrenched in Social Media what it is we are actually a part of and a wake up call for those who think it's still a fad.

 

A Letter to Council

From: iain lovatt <stouffvillepolitics@gmail.com>
Date: February 25, 2011 5:01:07 PM EST
To: ken.ferdinands@townofws.com, Phil Bannon <phil.bannon@townofws.com>, clyde.smith@townofws.com, susanne.hilton@townofws.com, richard.bartley@townofws.com, rob.hargrave@townofws.com, mayor.emmerson@townofws.com
Subject: Letter to Council

Dear Mayor Emerson & Council,

There seems to be a lot of talk since Tuesday's budget meeting in the community about the appearance "of a very serious effort on your behalf to misinform, mislead and misrepresent the facts." as Mr. Bannon put it in an email to me on Monday evening.  This is obviously a large concern as you, Mayor Emerson, Mr. Bannon and Mr. Ferdinands all made a point to mention this misinforming, misleading and misrepresenting of the facts during your comments after Mr Raycroft's presentation but did not cite any examples.

If you all feel so strongly that I am doing this, I encourage you to email me directly or leave a public comment on stouffvillepolitics.com if you find anything that is untrue or misinforming, misleading and misrepresenting of the facts. I don't think you will but if you do, I will happily & publicly apologize on my website about the error.

For the record, never have I said or written anywhere that stouffvillepolitics.com is in any way affiliated, related or part of the Town of WS. Stouffvillepolitics.com is a political commentary on the decisions and decision making process that you take which I fully understand you may not like. I believe it is a necessary tool for our community to have your decisions communicated quickly and I believe the 1800 residents who have been on the site in the last month would agree.

I welcome your feedback and comments. Enjoy your weekend.


Sincerely,
Iain Lovatt

stouffvillepolitics@gmail.com
www.stouffvillepolitics.com
www.twitter.com/stouffville2010

A Lesson in missing the point?

Tuesday's Town Budget meeting was a very interesting lesson in the political process. It clearly was going to be a long day of presentations from every department head and an opportunity for Council and the public to ask questions about each budget line if they chose too. I was not there to ask questions, but rather listen as admonished by a Councilor who has taken offense to the writings on this website.

The first item on the agenda after the Treasurer's 2011 overview was the Director of Leisure services 2011 budget and the hotly council contested and passionate resident issue of the Outdoor Pool in Memorial Park. After Mr. Raycroft presented his budget, which council passed quickly (without a budget line for the outdoor pool), Mayor Emerson called for the the staff's proposal for the outdoor pool to be presented and discussed.  After the presentation, I witnessed the towns veteran councillors bring their "A" game as they maneuvered their comments, questions and their obscure jabs at the pool delegation representing 1200 residents who signed the petition to keep the pool which culminated with Councillor Bannon citing a "very serious effort on behalf (of the delegation) to misinform, mislead and misrepresent the facts."

It is quite disappointing for me,  as a resident who ran for council in Ward 5 in the last election, who truly wanted to listen and represent the issues and concerns of the people of Stouffville, see 1200 signatures thrown to the curb without a second thought and then be accused of misinforming, misleading and misrepresenting the facts .  With the exclusion of Councillors Hargrave and Smith, not once did the magnitude of a 1200 name petition seem to dawn on the other members of council.

I learned through this process that as elected officials, Council can and will push through their own agendas despite what the residents of Stouffville really want.  I am not talking about a few passionate residents who wanted to save a 50 year old pool. I am talking about 1200 people! 3.5% of the town- more people than councillors Ferdinands, Hilton, Bartley or Smith received votes in the last election. 

It appears that the issue of the Outdoor Pool is really only an archetype of how Council operates. Council took the better part of an hour in the meeting to "discuss" issues surrounding the outdoor pool when clearly they already had their minds made up. This first became apparent that Council had no intention of keeping the pool in the Feb 15th meeting.

If there's one main take away from the Save the Pool  proceedings that Council need to realize, it is that residents of Stouffville want to be heard and not given lip-service. I understand that it may not necessarily be this councils fault that no one on staff in the past 30-40 years thought of budgeting to cover the depreciation for a town asset like the pool,  leaving us in this situation but unfortunately as elected officials, I do not believe it absolves them of responsibility. For whom much is given, much is required comes to mind.

At the very minimum, Mayor Emerson, as our leader and CEO of the town, an apology on behalf of councils past for the neglect of Mr. Latcham's gift should be in order. All I believe the Pool Delegation wanted was an open and honest conversation about why the pool is in the shape it is, what can be done to save it (if anything), and what the plan to resolve the problem could be. What they received from council was political rhetoric and posturing that has left 1200 residents disenchanted once again at a council that seemingly doesn't care what residents think. Of course until the next election rolls around.

Maybe the most cost-effective and best decision for Stouffville is to decommision the pool and build a new one, but acknowleding and engaging 1200 residents with care and respect may be a wiser approach next time. Just a thought. The Sun-Tribune has reported that there's a new tank pool in our future. I guess time will tell.