johnnyboy
Active Member
New candidate for mayor alert:
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- Thread starter Airboy
- Start date
policyenthusiast
Senior Member
Ron Billingsley, now infamously the guy who showed up drunk to the Edmonton Centre MP debate as an independent candidate, is running too.
https://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/edmonton-centre-debate
"The independent candidate called for a trilingual super-country created through the union of Canada, the United States and Mexico."
What a dangerously insane human being.
SarcasticMarmot
Active Member
I always appreciate and tend to vote for folks with actual policy recommendations (although I have noticed it is usually a losing strategy). But I thought these begged a few key questions:
- 500 new police officers over four years. How is he going to pay for this? Big money promise.
- Adding 125 officers per year focused on community policing, beat patrols, and rapid response.
- Transit safety overhaul. Same, how is he going to pay for this?
- Provide additional arrest and detain authority training for peace officers.
- Renovate LRT stations for improved safety. Good idea that's proven effective, but with what money?
- Install turnstile gates at all Capital and Metro Line stations. Same
- Clean and secure streets initiative.
- Expand CCTV coverage in high-crime zones (Entertainment District, Chinatown, Coliseum). Then what? Cops don't do squat with camera footage.
- Boost police foot patrols in parks, transit areas, and business corridors in partnership with social service agencies. Council doesn't have the power to direct the Police, can only ask nicely, as they have been doing for years. EPS has a litany of effective partnerships that they just need to expand (PACT is one of the most effective projects I have ever interacted with, and yet EPS insists on only fielding one team for the whole city).
- Increase pressure washing and garbage removal in downtown to combat visible disorder. Love this idea, but again, with what $$. Hire Good has been begging to do this cheaply for years, but I believe the union objects. So if its union jobs that's another big $ promise.
- Integrate 911 with 211 to ensure the appropriate resources are being allocated to the right places. Potentially a good idea, but 2-1-1 is massively overwhelmed and a lot cheaper per staff than 9-1-1. I am assuming he is just talking about the Crisis Diversion Team and not the whole resource call center that is 2-1-1. Not sure he realizes how much more this will cost and will need to be really well structured so emergency calls don't get drowned out by non-emergency calls.
- Advocate to the province to double the beds at the Edmonton Recovery Community. Very few of the planned Recovery Beds are currently available, so this is going to happen anyway.
- Form a coalition with like-minded cities to advocate for federal bail reform. What's stopping him from doing that now?
ntt1
Active Member
Jennifer Rice losing re-election is pretty high on my wishlist.
TAS
Senior Member
Did anyone see Aaron Paquette on Real Talk - he was going to run for mayor, but family tradegy earlier this year with loss of son ended that plan.
This gets people's backs up but he talked about how Edmonton is at a real disadvantage to Calgary in terms of our regional set up.
Calgary has 90% of their region's population paying taxes in Calgary to cover their bills (services and infrastructure costs etc), he said, versus 70% in Edmonton paying ours because we are much larger region and have a lot more people using Edmonton services yet paying their property taxes elsewhere.
So in essence - at a dinner party for 10, there are 9 people splitting the bill in Calgary versus 7 people in Edmonton - meaning we pay more.
He says he's not making a judgement - just stating reality. He says of course people in the region come in and shop here and spend money here, but simply put, the city does not recover enough from the region to offset the costs.
He said Edmonton has to get a lot more competitive. His idea for dt is to use CRL money to offer developers 0 tax increases on the base right now that would last 5-15 years. That he said would unlock significant development by de-risking the projects.
That, he figures, would bring 20,000 more people calling dt home which then snowballs for other business growth and overall dt attractiveness.
He also talks industrial growth and greenfield development. As Puneeta McBryan stated on Real Talk today, the city is losing out significantly in industrial growth to the benefit of the region and the city is at a disadvantage in this competition given our size and all our other needs that we must look after compared to the region. (She noted the key ingredients for industrial is land, roads, water and power and the region is awash in those).
Anyway, here is link to episode for more more details.
This gets people's backs up but he talked about how Edmonton is at a real disadvantage to Calgary in terms of our regional set up.
Calgary has 90% of their region's population paying taxes in Calgary to cover their bills (services and infrastructure costs etc), he said, versus 70% in Edmonton paying ours because we are much larger region and have a lot more people using Edmonton services yet paying their property taxes elsewhere.
So in essence - at a dinner party for 10, there are 9 people splitting the bill in Calgary versus 7 people in Edmonton - meaning we pay more.
He says he's not making a judgement - just stating reality. He says of course people in the region come in and shop here and spend money here, but simply put, the city does not recover enough from the region to offset the costs.
He said Edmonton has to get a lot more competitive. His idea for dt is to use CRL money to offer developers 0 tax increases on the base right now that would last 5-15 years. That he said would unlock significant development by de-risking the projects.
That, he figures, would bring 20,000 more people calling dt home which then snowballs for other business growth and overall dt attractiveness.
He also talks industrial growth and greenfield development. As Puneeta McBryan stated on Real Talk today, the city is losing out significantly in industrial growth to the benefit of the region and the city is at a disadvantage in this competition given our size and all our other needs that we must look after compared to the region. (She noted the key ingredients for industrial is land, roads, water and power and the region is awash in those).
Anyway, here is link to episode for more more details.
TAS
Senior Member
Rice didn't show up for first ward forum. Principe didn't show up in her ward either. All other incumbents attended in their wards. Janz's ward is only one that didnt have first forum yet.
Gronk!
Senior Member
archited
Senior Member
I am thinking Michael Walters is the best of a sad bag of choices.
thommyjo
Senior Member
I think Walters should have gone for a councillor. Would have been easier to win, equal voting power, then make a move for mayor in the next election. Wouldn't he have been up against Rice and an easy W?
policyenthusiast
Senior Member
tastawiyiniwak, sipiwiyiniwak, and pihêsiwin (likely in that order) would be quite a lot easier to win than the mayoral seat.
Principe is in a precarious seat, but there are no real contenders.
Gronk!
Senior Member
According to Who's running, the losing incumbents are predicted to be Anne Stevenson, Jennifer Rice, Keren Tang and Jo-Anne Wright. Just guessing here, but the candidates for Mayor and City Council are ordered by the predicted number of votes on October 20. Naturally, this may change - Erin Rutherford was losing last month but is now in first place.
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David A
Senior Member
He already has the experience from being on council before, arguably one that was better than the current one. I don't think being a credible candidate running to be mayor should just be limited to current councilors.
While it is often current councilors who run and become mayor we have also had some notable mayors in the past who had experience of being councilors but were not current councilors when they ran for mayor.
fjordgard
Active Member
Where are these predictions? I do not see any predictions on that page. And what could they be based on other than vibes?
David A
Senior Member
Also, I suppose we could also try "predict" the weather a month or two ahead. Those predictions may or may not turn out to be correct.
I feel many people don't start paying closer attention to the civic election in early to mid September.
TAS
Senior Member
There's a prediction we can take to the bank!