I'm going to have to raise a Question of Privilege at the next Council meeting.
It's a means of resolving a problem before it sets into festering resentment.
This one seems to have already degraded.
I don't know why he swallowed a fly.
Councillor Abel has acquired a habit of casting aspersions against anyone who fails to recognize great wisdom when he speaks.
If any one of four Councillors takes a position different to his own. he puts it down to taking a position different to his own......like it's a thoroughly scurrilous, underhanded , mean spirited attack against all that is good and pure and courageous.......namely himself.
It's the attitude that spawned the Code of Cnduct in the last Council. I have come to believe it's a generational thing.
He'll say, I know why the Councillor is opposed. It's because he/she has been opposed from the beginning. I'm para-phrasing.
Last night the lofty sentiment went a step further.
Anyone who is afraid to make the kind of decisions he is brave enough to make, didn't deserve to have a place at the Council table , was the gist of it.
He's prepared to accept the advice of the professionals because they know,you know.
If a reports indicates a $12...$14...$20,,,$18 million project can be built without impact on the tax rate and the taxpayers won't even know it happened, that's good enough for Councillor Abel and anyone who doesn't agree, doesn't deserve a seat at the table.
Shades of the past.
It's such a simple unambiguous perspective of biblical proportions, on a clear night, one can almost detect a scintilla of something. .. yearning perhaps...for the good old days.
The presiding member is responsible to call a Councillor to order when he falls into error by impugning or assigning motive to another.
The Mayor seldom does . It seems to depend on who's motives are being impugned and whether he agrees with the impugnment.
Councillor Gaertner is a favorite target, myself quickly becoming an alternate.
Pinning my hide to the wall appears once again to be a universally admirable objective.
The object of the rule of order is to stop matters from descending into a name-calling. rabble-rousing, undignified, gutter level , mud-wrestling encounter.
Next step fisticuffs .like battling kangaroos.
Wednesday, 8 January 2014
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
7 comments:
Maybe he Councillor Abel missed the memo.
http://www.yorkregion.com/news-story/4279629-region-will-cut-amount-it-borrows/
Must have been an interesting night when Councillor Ballard in his tweets references your Blog. Is that a first? (i.e. that's how I got here). What's the saying: "Politics makes strange bedfellows".
We can all agree on one thing Councillor Buck;
A new Joint Operation Centre wouldn't even be up for consideration had the Town maintained the old Hydro Building.
That property and building is a perfect compliment to the Scalon yard.
On an aside. I thought the coffee was terrible last night. I couldn't drink mine.
During the last election. a number of candidates found themselves with a large un-earned pool of voters born of anger and frustration. It was pretty much a coronation. I'm not sure if those individuals realize that their halos have faded.
What, pray tell, has the deputy mayor been consuming lately?
When he first appeared on Council I thought he was fairly intelligent and was trying to understand issues in order to make an informed judgement and then a reasonable decision.
But there appears to be something in the air in the Council chamber that eventually turns reasonable people into idiots.
This was never more clear than during the hysterical debate on the three Heritage Trees, where Councillor Abel was apparently unable to grasp how a Heritage Tree was never such a thing, notwithstanding that there had once existed on the property a Heritage House that was subsequently relocated.
It was embarrassing to understand his logic, if I may use that word in connection with the stupidity of his rambling arguments.
I don't understand how a multi-million dollar capital facility can be built without an impact on the tax rate and the taxpayers won't even know it happened. Capital projects are supposed to be funded from taxes while operating costs are supposed to be funded from development charges. That's quite a simple statement.
Mr. Elliott, the town's Treasurer, has suggested that all sorts of funding could be found at the provincial or federal level in various and wondrous schemes including funding to cover the construction phase (an interim measure repayable), possible grants and even borrowings through a bond-like instrument on more favourable than commercial terms.
As a Canadian, an Ontarian and an Auroran, I feel that the federal government should fund items that are its constitutional responsibility, likewise the provincial government that covers such things as highways, health and education.
I do not want to see the two more senior levels of government called upon to finance those things that are the responsibility of the municipality.
If an interim loan is available during the construction stage, by all means call upon it. But recognize that it will have to be repaid on completion.
And why is the Hydro Fund sacred? What mammoth project(s) are we saving this for? And don't talk about a Cultural Master Plan, a Promenade Master Plan, a Trails Master Plan or any of the other Master Plans presently under consideration.
Councillor Abel should think before he speaks and before he condemns. Why should he feel that the opinions of councillors are inferior to those of staff.
12:26 - There are some councillors that like play the inferior to staff game when there isn't any residents yelling foul about something or another. When there are residents in council chambers looking to hang some councillors in noose...then council is superior to staff performance come forward.
@12:26
You said "Capital projects are supposed to be funded from taxes while operating costs are supposed to be funded from development charges. That's quite a simple statement."
Might you have that backwards? If not, the operations of the town will have to cease once we are entirely built out - i.e. no more new development charges.
Post a Comment