Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Communication
Lines Are Open":
Have you got some ideas about new KPI's -- let's
hear them and should they be as comprehensive as say , the KPI's for other Town
operated facilities or the arboretum or the seniors centre or the AHS Or the 150
anniversary celebration -- we don't know what those are , do we?
More
citizens may have walked through the door at Church Street in 2012 than all the
years combined since it was school -- great use of a town owned facility in my
view
Council is NOT giving "them" money -- council providing Cultural
programming at Church Street
**************
As far as I'm concerned, Key Performance Indicators are just a bunch of jargon to make "experts" sound like they know more than the rest of us.
The words are used with equal non- effect in presentations of business plans by town department heads.
We haven't had the Sesqui-Centennial celebration yet ,have we?
How can we know how the key performance indicators have performed when they haven't had a chance to perform at all?
I hear heritage calenders created for the event were ready before Christmas But they were still sitting in boxes in the communication department, waiting to be distributed in January.
The town hall was closed for two weeks.
How could anybody measure how many citizens have walked through Church Street School since it was a school and before it was a culture centre.
In the fifties, it was leased to Remington Rand as a training centre for their employees for several years.
After that, it housed several classes from Regency Acres because of overcrowding.
Then the town used the space for programs like art classes and band practice and such when we had an Aurora Recreation Commission.
From 1969 to 1976 , it was the York County Board of
Education headquarters. A board room was upstairs and people came from all over the Region to headquarters and board meetings and conferences.
Then we had a museum upstairs for twenty-five years and a seniors centre downstairs and a youth club and Big Brothers and Big Sisters and Boy Scouts offices and probably other stuff I don't know or have forgotten about.
I sure don't know how anybody would go about counting all the feet that traipsed about in the building during all those years.
I'm not sure who else might , including Paul Pirri who has lived in Aurora all of his life.
He still hasn't lived here as long as me. I was older than he is but not much, when I arrived and had a husband and four children and a house to pay for, as well as taxes.
The commenter is right though. Council is not "giving them money" If Council was giving them money out of their own pockets, I would be thrilled about that.
But Council is taking money out of my pocket that I don't want to give.
The town can provide cultural programming as we have before, without an autonomous board made up of people we don't know. who make their own rules and conduct meetings behind closed doors and receive hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars and decide in secret,out of sight and sound , how they will spend my money.
Furthermore, this Council did not ask the people in the community for a mandate to use taxation that way.
In fact, the Mayor, when he was a candidate, vowed to say :
"What part of No is it ,you don't understand?"
It's the only promise I heard him make . And apparently he didn't even mean to keep that one.
That he attends secret meetings of the board and holds secrets close to his vest does not assure me, my interest is protected.
Far from it. I think piano concerts may be the only thing that matter to the Mayor. .
Thursday, 17 January 2013
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8 comments:
KPI's are set before the action takes place so that said action can be measured -- the 150 year celebration should have some so that we know if the money was well spent
The attendance at those secretive meetings makes me very nervous. What is it about A Conflict of Interest that Mayor Dawe does not understand? I can't understand all of the fine print of the law but the Solicitor did advise him to avoid such meetings. Surely all the COI cases before the courts must make him cautious. No? Mayor Ford goofed. And it has been dreadful for Toronto. Why take a similar risk in Aurora?
I’m the Jan 16 2:14pm Anonymous who originally posted about the lacking KPI’s from which this post was now created from the guest commenter. (Thanks Evelyn, as I’ll continue my comments here instead).
So the guest commenter states: “Have you got some ideas about new KPI’s –let’s hear them…”
Gosh, that sounds like a challenge. It sounds like you want me to do the work of the Town and the ACC. Perhaps after reading my comments you can forward my post to both organizations.
If I was the ACC and I was applying to the provincial or federal government for a grant (or for arguments sake let’s say the Town of Aurora – I’ll get my tongue out of my cheek now) I am sure those governments would want to know the current status or success of my operation. I would need to “sell” or “market” my operations to them to justify my needs for the grant.
I would need to get establish my "current numbers" and tell them how I'll improve with their money into my program.
How would I do this? Sure, I’d tell them we deliver high quality programs, we are “hub of activity” (whose true meaning is undefined), but every other centre out there vying for money is saying the same thing to get a grant. I need to establish some base numbers of users and measure that as my KPI’s (and yes I agree KPI is corporate-speak).
So tell me how many people are paying for programs, how many are utilizing the free programs, how many quilters, artists, musicians are using the facility. How many are children, youth or adults? How many are “members” and volunteers? How many are unique visitors and on average how many times does the average user come back? It may be hard work to get these numbers but that’s what you need to justify getting the grants (and I’m sure the Board of the ACC) already knows this. But with these hard numbers you are equipped to justify your needs. What is the ACC going to do next year when they present their budget to the Town. We want XX dollars? Why? … Because we “served” XXXX number of Aurorans!! That’s why. But no, these numbers are not asked so why provide them. I don’t like the example but it has it’s place in advertising/marketing when the McDonald’s restaurants always state as they have done for years “XX Billions Served”.
If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.
Your comment of “More citizens may have walked through the door at Church Street in 2012 than all the years combined since it was a school…” doesn’t truly hold water. The operative word is “may”. It may be true but how do we know, it may be false but how do we know. Do you think provincial or federal money granters can bank on “may”. The Aurora Youth Soccer Club (AYSC) keeps touting their membership numbers & soccer players every time they speak to Council asking about new sports fields.
Why? Because it’s their numbers that justify their needs. So yes, maybe these other organizations need better KPI’s to justify their “grants”. Perhaps ACC should talk to AYSC and ask them about their marketing and their success.
And NO, the Town “gives” the ACC, and the ACC “gives” the Town cultural programming. Do you want me to say the Town “provides” money as the ACC “provides” culture. Same thing! Give & provide are synomyns – as my father would always say – “Look it up!”
As to the current 1:44pm commenter, I agree that KPI’s should be in place, but just having KPI’s doesn’t guarantee a measure of success and a judgement whether the money is well spent if they are the wrong KPI’s – just look at the new ACC draft agreement.
and continuing my above rant...
Yes, perhaps all of the other organizations need better KPI's or perhaps the Town needs some standard set of KPI's to justify the level of support it gives to various organization. My parents would always say to my siblings and I "what we do for one, we do for all". It's got to be fair all around. And that's why there is such emotion to this issue because both sides don't think it's fair!
3:54 PM
Welcome to the Blog. We are getting to so tired of repeating the same old arguments that seem to accomplish nothing. Perhaps your infusion of enthusiasm is just what was needed. If we should offend in some way, and some will certainly try, please don't blame Evelyn. Keep feeding her solid information.
It must get very lonely for her at times.
To 4:50pm Thank you for the welcome, but I have in fact been around this blog almost from the beginning when Evelyn started.
Perhaps one of our collective problems (though many different opinions are presented at times) is that we are in general "preaching to the choir" and what has to happen is to take the arguments beyond the blog and to the Mayor and other Councillors.
I don't always agree with Evelyn but I admire her energy & tenacity to follow through with what she believes is right but she can't go it alone and needs the support of others on Council who may place next election votes ahead of current issues or who grandstand for attention.
"It must get very lonely for her at times."
Huh?! I thought she had scores of followers? What about all those "in the community" that she supposedly hears from? Doesn't she claim to represent so many of us?
To 7:45pm.....
Evelyn Buck (elected) 5,322 7.20%
No - she represents 7% of us.
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