Next Municipal Election - Oct 27, 2014 - contenders

[Cre47]

Looks like no one will be getting a free pass. Two candidates registered in Kanata South, meanwhile an 8th candidate is shown for the mayoral's race.

Also we have Perry Marleau (another name we are seeing a lot in the blogs, forums, comments) who just registered in Ward 18 trying to replace Peter Hume.

[waterloowarrior]

http://ottawa.ca/en/city-hall/your-city-government/nominated-candidates-2014-elections

full list of candidates

[rocketphish]

All candidates are not created equal

Joanne Chianello, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: September 11, 2014, Last Updated: September 12, 2014 4:39 PM EDT

There are more candidates running for council in this election than any since amalgamation — or any election in the history of Ottawa, for that matter.

It’s a record of which we should be proud. That everyone has the right to stand for elected office is a core tenet of a democratic society.

And yet, the sheer number of candidates poses certain pragmatic challenges for us folks in the media. No news outlet has the resources to sit down with every single candidate to talk local issues over coffee for an hour.

Frankly, covering them all equally isn’t just impractical. It’s also dishonest.

Because while everyone does and should have an equal opportunity to register as a candidate, that does not mean all candidates are equally viable.

So how do we decide who the main contenders are?

It’s not an exact science, but we look for a number of criteria.

For those running for council, we look at their history of community involvement and their knowledge of the issues, both local and city-wide. How organized are they? A serious candidate has a website where voters can read their platforms.

Do they have supporters? Being a serious candidate does not require a campaign comprising of an army of volunteers in matching T-shirts (like some certain mayoral candidates can boast), but we look for some sort of following.

For the mayor’s race, we demand all these qualifications and more.

What sort of leadership role has the candidate had in any sphere, be it business, government or as a volunteer? Does he or she have a serious grasp of how the city works? How the budget is structured? A vision for the future of the capital?

Call me an elitist, but I’d like my future mayor to understand the difference between a deficit and a debt, and to know a fair amount about the light-rail plan under construction, as well as have well-considered ideas about the proposed second phase of LRT — whether for or against.

Standing for public office isn’t just a right, it’s a responsibility. It is not too much to ask that candidates know what a city government does. At the very least, candidates who are proposing measures outside municipal powers — such as reducing your hydro bill — should have some sort of plan for how they’d address that challenge.

This is not to say that candidates must memorize the Ontario Municipal Act, or have a deep knowledge of the rules of procedure governing council meetings.

But if you’re interested in running for council, you should actually have attended a council meeting or two. (Or, as they are held during work hours, at least watched them online.)

What we don’t do in our election reporting is pick winners, or tell you who to vote for. But we do make judgements about who’s emerging as the major challengers. A number of wards have many viable candidates — as many as four or five — while in other areas, the race is between the incumbent and one strong opponent. And naturally, we watch for changes in the race dynamic as the campaign progresses.

That’s not to say that we ignore the other folks who are running.

All candidates will have a chance to speak for themselves. We’re sending detailed surveys to all registered candidates (or at least those who’ve included their contact information on the city’s website) and we’ll post them in their entirety at our municipal election site, ottawacitizen.com/tag/ottawa-votes.

Every candidate will be included in ward profiles that will be published in the Citizen in the coming weeks.

And we’re always open to hearing new ideas, no matter who puts them forward. When Rebecca Pyrah, who registered just Thursday to run for mayor, finishes ironing out her platform — as she put it in an email — we’ll be more than happy to speak with her.

Whether her ideas are well-considered, interesting and in the realm of possibility will determine how much consideration we give her campaign in the future.

Because paying attention to candidates who add to the ruckus — like one who libelled incumbents with no evidence — actually detract from real discussions and debates about the issues we all care about.

[email protected]
twitter.com/jchianello

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/0913-col-chianello

[rocketphish]

Ottawa gets great city council fights for the first time since amalgamation

David Reevely, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: September 13, 2014, Last Updated: September 13, 2014 8:26 AM EDT

Nothing improves a city councillor’s performance like a credible threat. At last, Ottawa has a bunch of them.

After an election in 2000 that pitted numerous regional councillors against their lower-tier counterparts, the winners mostly hung on and hung on and hung on. And why not? They were making sure their neighbours had champions in the bigger city government, plus building it at the same time. For a politician, that was pretty exciting work.

Most of them were pretty good at it, if we judge by election results. Even in 2006, the year of the freak election that took outsider Larry O’Brien to the mayor’s office, every single councillor who ran again was re-elected.

For 10 years, we had hardly any change on city council. Lots of council races were acclamations in all but the technicalities, with veteran councillors curb-stomping single opponents who had no relevant experience or political chops.

Not this year. Only three of the councillors elected at amalgamation are trying to keep seats.

Maybe it was the unexpected turnover in 2010, when some incumbents’ weariness after four years of O’Brien battles sent them home by choice and voter exasperation turned others out against their will — and we got 10 new city councillors, showing that renewal is possible. Maybe the more civil tone Mayor Jim Watson has set in public meetings has convinced responsible adults that four years in local politics wouldn’t be awful. Or maybe more people are fed up.

This fall we’ll have the best set of races for Ottawa city council we’ve seen since 2000.

Rideau-Rockcliffe’s Peter Clark, elected in 2010 with just 26 per cent of the vote, has multiple serious challengers, including past Overbrook Community Association president Sheila Perry and public servant Tobi Nussbaum.

Rideau-Vanier’s Mathieu Fleury, who beat the experienced Georges Bédard last time in a 46-45 squeaker, faces a well-organized community association president in Marc Aubin and a PR executive in Catherine Fortin LeFaivre.

In Kitchissippi, opposition to another first-termer, Katherine Hobbs, has largely coalesced around the ex-president of the Hintonburg Community Association, Jeff Leiper, but challenger Michelle Reimer has also made a name for herself fighting City Hall (and winning) over redesignating her street as a higher-traffic road.

Kanata North’s Marianne Wilkinson is up against teacher Matt Muirhead and tech entrepreneur Jeff Seeton, both of whom have run for city council before and both of whom got in early.

In Bay, Mark Taylor faces a rematch with Alex Cullen. Cullen’s had a bad run since Taylor knocked him off four years ago (losing an NDP nomination in Ottawa Centre and then fruitlessly repping the party in Ottawa West-Nepean) but he’s no novice.

This incomplete list doesn’t even touch the open wards. Somerset has at least six candidates who’d make competent councillors. Other races feature multiple community-association types, school-board trustees, thoughtful public servants, journalists who’ve covered City Hall, even a renowned veteran in wounded sniper Jody Mitic.

Some of the incumbents will beat their challengers, of course, and crowded races tend to go well for the best-known candidate. But they’ll still have to work for it. They’ll have to deserve their wins.

The challengers certainly have been. Serious ones realize that running for council isn’t something you do on a lark or at the last minute, at least not if you hope to win. Even understanding the issues isn’t enough. You have to be out banging on doors, selling yourself, gaining an understanding not just of what you want yourself, but what your neighbours and people who live on the other side of your ward want.

It’s exhausting work. For most people, it can’t be a spare-time activity: it means taking leave from a job or cutting their hours way back, accepting a real hit to their personal finances. A whole lot of candidates have done it this time. They’re invested.

We don’t have a well-funded, well-organized challenger for Watson. His experience and wiles will give him an early advantage in dealing with new councillors. But ultimately, as O’Brien learned the hard way, he has only one vote. The rest of council matters, and it’s good for Ottawa that the damp miasma that suffocated real competition for most council seats for years has lifted.

[email protected]
twitter.com/davidreevely

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news...ts-for-the-first-time-since-amalgamation

[rocketphish]

If re-elected, Jim Watson sees sports commissioner and more for tourism in city's future

Carys Mills, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: September 14, 2014, Last Updated: September 14, 2014 5:48 PM EDT

More money should go toward attracting visitors to Ottawa and city council should try to land big sports events for the capital, Jim Watson said Sunday.

If re-elected as mayor, Watson said he’d also ask city council to appoint a councillor as a sports commissioner, to pitch Ottawa as a host for high-profile events.

The city now contributes $900,000 annually to a “bid more, win more, host more” event strategy but Watson said he wants to increase that to $1.5 million and ask the private sector to match the money.

“A focused and co-ordinated strategy can mean full restaurants, hotel rooms and jobs,” said Watson, one of eight candidates who will be on the mayoral ballot for the Oct. 27 election.

The city’s funds would come from “upload” money Queen’s Park directs to municipalities, which Watson would also use for his first pledge of the campaign, an extra $2 million each year toward housing and homelessness programs.

For Ottawa’s 2017 celebrations, to mark the 150th anniversary of confederation, Watson said he wants the capital to host an NHL outdoor classic, the Grey Cup and the Juno Awards. He said Ottawa has a right of first refusal to host the Junos, based on an agreement made when Ottawa hosted the awards in 2012, and the NHL and CFL are aware of the 2017 goal.

“I’ve certainly been lobbying the commissioner of the CFL,” said Watson, who previously set a goal of having eight million visitors in 2017.

That target, a 20-per-cent increase over the average, should become the “new normal” in the years following, Watson said.

He said he hasn’t had discussions with council candidates about the commissioner role, which wouldn’t pay any extra but would require the individual to travel throughout Canada as an “ambassador,” trying to secure events, such as the Canadian Open golf tournament. Travel costs for the commissioner could be up to $20,000, Watson said.

“We need to tap into that very lucrative market, in a much more systematic fashion,” Watson said. “These events are big for our city. They fill a lot of hotel rooms, they attract a lot of national and international attention that would be good from a marketing point of view, and we think we’ve just scratched the surface.”

Mike Maguire, another mayoral candidate, said that if elected he’d also want to increase tourism. But he’d focus on asking the province, which also has tourism programs, to treat Ottawa as its own region rather than bundling it with Prescott Russell.

“No disrespect to Prescott Russell but they’re not the National Capital Region. We need to be treated separately,” Maguire said, adding he’d try to make Ottawa a more hospitable place by improving downtown parking, and cleaning up graffiti and weeds.

[email protected]
twitter.com/CarysMills

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news...ner-and-more-for-tourism-in-citys-future

[1overcosc]

Yes, because changing the boundary of provincial tourism regions will totally improve tourism in the city.

Maguire is practically a human facepalm at this point. And what's sad is he's still the most credible opposition to Watson.

At this point, I think the only question is just how much of the vote Watson will capture. My money's on 70% or higher.

[1overcosc]

Interesting race emerging in Rideau-Vanier. Fleury, himself a young man who defeated an incumbent, may potentially be ousted by another young man: Marc Aubin, who has proven himself a very strong candidate.

Among his goals are:

-Better winter clearing of sidewalks
-More segregated bikeways
-Support for LRT Phase 2
-Support for improving interprovincial transit
-Reduce crosswalk wait times and change timings to be more pedestrian-friendly
-Reduce surface parking lots
-Getting rid of strip malls & not allowing new ones to be built
-Create BIAs for Uptown Rideau & Laurier Avenue East
-For the city to give an official apology for the 1960s/1970s era 'urban renewal' schemes
-Ensure new development is street-oriented
-Preserve heritage buildings by promoting their integration into redevelopment schemes

I'm voting for him, and I hope he wins and then runs for mayor whenever Watson retires. He's the kind of urban visionary Ottawa really needs in my opinion.

[eternallyme]

The biggest concern could be rural alienation again - no wonder many there want partial de-amalgamation. Most likely Maguire will dominate in the rural areas, but that only makes up 3 seats on Council. The anti-LRT position will be devastating in areas in line for it especially.

Is there anyone to the left of Watson that could siphon off votes downtown?

My prediction by ward (for Watson)

1 Orleans - 78%
2 Innes - 82%
3 Barrhaven - 61%
4 Kanata North - 58%
5 West Carleton-March - 34% (Maguire wins)
6 Stittsville-Kanata West - 55%
7 Bay - 71%
8 College - 75%
9 Knoxdale-Merivale - 68%
10 Gloucester-Southgate - 71%
11 Beacon Hill-Cyrville - 84%
12 Rideau-Vanier - 80%
13 Rideau-Rockcliffe - 78%
14 Somerset - 75%
15 Kitchissippi - 74%
16 River - 77%
17 Capital - 83%
18 Alta Vista - 79%
19 Cumberland - 63%
20 Osgoode - 40% (Maguire wins)
21 Rideau-Goulbourn - 26% (Maguire wins)
22 Gloucester-South Nepean - 53%
23 Kanata South - 58%

[1overcosc]

Watson will do better in Kanata North than in Kanata South. Kanata North is rather progressive (comparable to Orleans politically) while Kanata South is a lot more similar to their rural neighbours politically (still a lot more moderate than them obviously).

There's nobody to the left of Watson in this election really. There's nobody in this election at all really if you think about it, even Maguire's not a very strong candidate.

The council races at least are quite engaging this time around. I do have a sense that next term of council might be a bit more challenging for Watson. With a whole swath of councillors retiring and the strong possibility of two major Watson allies (Fleury and Hobbs) being defeated, we're probably going to see a more active council instead of a group of 24 people rubber stamping the mayor that we had this term.

[rocketphish]

Watson vows not to raise taxes by more than 2 per cent a year

Joanne Chianello, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: September 19, 2014, Last Updated: September 19, 2014 6:22 PM EDT

Jim Watson is vowing not to raise taxes by more than two per cent per year over the next term if he’s re-elected mayor on Oct. 27.

Calling his tax plan “both reasonable and responsible,” Watson’s pledge this time around is lower than that in his 2010 campaign platform, which called for a maximum increase of 2.5 per cent.

Before the last budget process, Watson walked a motion onto the council floor to limit the 2014 tax increase to just two per cent instead of 2.5. Council followed suit by approving a tax-rate jump of 1.9 per cent — the smallest increase since 2007, the only year former mayor Larry O’Brien was able to achieve his “zero-means-zero” promise of the 2006 election — although Watson’s move angered some councillors who were not consulted ahead of time about limiting the tax increase.

The local inflation rate has been hovered above two per cent in the past few months. Should that trend continue, it could make it difficult for the city to keep up with the increase in costs for services.

“That’s one of the challenges when you set a number,” Watson told reporters after his lunchtime announcement Friday at the Ottawa South Community Centre. “If you look at the (Consumer Price Index), it’s gone anywhere from 1.2 to 2.7 per cent. It’s been up and down all year … But I believe that choosing a number is not an arbitration exercise. It’s a discipline exercise for me and members of council. If we all agree that we aim for two per cent, then we have to bring (in) a budget that reflects two per cent, and not one that reflects five or six per cent.”

Mayoral candidate Mike Maguire, on the other hand, questions the “unshakable expectation that tax increases are inevitable.

“I’ve spoken to thousands of people over the last four years, and they’re telling me, ‘Don’t ask for more tax, there’s nothing left to give,'” Maguire said.

“My tax proposal is that we approach each budget with the mindset that an increase is inappropriate and you construct the budget from there. This seems to be the hardest point to get across to the political class … the taxpayer is under a full assault from the provincial and municipal levels of government and it’s time to start talking about living within our means — and that means no more increases.”

Maguire said he is also focused on reducing the city’s debt level.

“Watson promised a cap of 2.5 per cent four years ago and then went ahead and more than doubled city debt from $700 million to over $1.65 billion,” Maguire said.

Soon after taking office in December 2010, Watson convinced councillors to unanimously support his pledge not to increase property taxes beyond 2.5 per cent per year. He did not say whether he’s asking councillors for that sort of support again — or whether a new council would all go along with the move, as it did last time.

As he did last term, Watson said that if re-elected he’d formulate the draft budget in conjunction with the city manager’s office — and after one-on-one meetings with councillors. As well, he promised to stick to his practice of making any councillors who wanted to spend additional money find an equivalent cut elsewhere in the budget. This has proved beyond the capabilities of most councillors, and not once in the past four years has the final budget looked dramatically different from the draft version.

Watson also said he’d make the audit subcommittee a “full-fledged standing committee” so that councillors and the public could hear from Ottawa’s auditor general more often.

As well, Watson said he would direct one of the deputy city managers to undertake a comprehensive city-wide strategy for energy retrofits for city facilities and vehicles, as well as to sell off excess city property.

[email protected]
Twitter.com/jchianello

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/0921-watson

[rocketphish]

Mike Maguire unveils plan to lower hydro rates in Ottawa

Don Butler, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: September 20, 2014, Last Updated: September 20, 2014 7:18 AM EDT

Mayoral candidate Mike Maguire released a four-part strategy Friday for lowering hydro rates for Ottawa residents and businesses.

Maguire noted that electricity rates in Ontario have doubled since 2002 and are expected to rise a further 42 per cent by 2018.

“This is a desperate situation,” Maguire told the Citizen. “The next mayor of Ottawa needs to do something aggressive and immediate.”

Maguire outlined four priorities to reduce electricity costs, beginning with a pledge to use city-owned Hydro Ottawa’s profits, which were $32.1 million last year, to lower electricity rates. He estimated that would produce an annual saving of $160 for hydro customers.

In response, Ryan Kennery, a spokesman for Watson’s campaign, released a statement accusing Maguire of bringing “simplistic slogans to complex challenges,” saying some of the mayor’s opponents “simply don’t understand the way electricity transmission in Ontario or in Canada works.”

Last year, Hydro Ottawa paid a $19.3-million dividend to the city. Losing that revenue, said Kennery, would require a tax increase of about 1.5 per cent or an equivalent reduction in city services.

However, Maguire said the city could make up the loss of the Hydro Ottawa dividend through spending efficiencies.

Maguire’s second priority was high-efficiency incineration of garbage. Not only would that reduce the need for a new landfill, it would also generate enough electricity for 25,000 homes, he said.

Maguire said the city could build a high-efficiency incinerator for about $270 million — roughly what a new landfill would cost. The electricity generated as a byproduct of incineration would further reduce hydro costs for all, he said.

As a third priority, Maguire said he would ensure that Hydro Ottawa serves all residents and businesses within the city limits. Currently, 40,000 mostly rural city residents pay a premium to be served by Hydro One.

Kennery said Hydro Ottawa has been trying to purchase those customers for a decade, but Hydro One isn’t interested in selling them at an affordable price.

“City council would not support purchasing these customers for an unacceptably high price,” he said. “That would only drive up rates for all existing Hydro Ottawa customers.”

Maguire, who himself pays higher fees as a Hydro One customer, said Ottawa needs to use the political leverage of the city’s 640,000 voters push for a solution.

“This is something that should have been done during amalgamation and it was sloppily missed. That has to be corrected and it’s absolutely incumbent on the mayor to get this done.”

Finally, Maguire said major savings could be generated by convincing the province to allow Hydro Ottawa to buy electricity from Quebec at roughly half of current rates. “I want to get the City of Ottawa off the Ontario grid completely.”

Kennery said Hydro-Québec currently sells power to U.S. states at a significant profit. “To suggest that Hydro-Québec would subsidize Ontario residents on power prices shows a complete lack of understanding of the way this complex system currently works.”

Maguire said the cost of electricity is the No. 2 issue he’s hearing at the door, behind complaints about garbage. But he insisted he wasn’t “trying to beg for votes” by putting forward his proposals. “I’m saying it because I believe it. If it resonates, people will vote for it.”

[email protected]
twitter.com/ButlerDon

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/mike-maguire-unveils-plan-to-lower-hydro-rates-in-ottawa

[1overcosc]

^ Wow, Maguire literally is a complete idiot. He seems to have no clue how electricity works in Ontario.

1) First of all, Hydro Ottawa's rates are regulated by the province. He can't just lower them on a whim.
2) Local utilities can't generate electricity and give it away for free to their customers. Energy has to be sold back to the province, who in turns sells it to the people.
3) The Ontario government has said a billion times that it has zero interest in expanding Hydro Ottawa's service area. Why the heck would Ottawa "640,000" voters sway over a province that has 11 million voters?
4) Hydro Ottawa is part of the Ontario electricity market. He can't just buy power from Quebec without being part of a province-wide deal.

Municipal candidates should campaign for issues of municipal jurisdiction! Not try to play Premier.

[JeffB]

When a political outsider like Maguire runs for a major office, I suspect they do so not realizing just what the job really entails and what the limitations are on what they can do. O'Brien had that to a large extent too, as he ran on a zero tax increase pledge, wanting to run the city like a business. As everyone in the city found out, that is easier said than done.

[1overcosc]

"Running the city like a business." That is an instant refuse-to-vote-for-you for me. If a candidate says they want to run a government like a business, I'd rather die than vote for them. Governments aren't businesses, they serve completely different purposes in our society.

[rocketphish]

Ottawa Votes: Poll says taxes, transit and jobs top priorities

Carys Mills, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: September 21, 2014, Last Updated: September 21, 2014 5:40 PM EDT

Property taxes are the No. 1 issue for Ottawa voters heading into next month’s municipal election, according to a Forum Research poll released Sunday.

Of 1,096 Ottawa voters polled last Thursday, 22 per cent said property tax was the issue that would most influence their vote, 17 per cent chose transit and 16 per cent picked jobs and growth. Lesser priorities were ethics in government, eliminating waste and waste collection.

“You really have to be on the right side of property taxes … also on the right side of transit and jobs,” said Forum president Lorne Bozinoff. “Those are three things people seem to be looking at right now.”

In the mayoral race, Bozinoff’s poll found 44 per cent of people surveyed intend to vote for incumbent Jim Watson. His closest competition is Mike Maguire, who had support from 17 per cent of those polled.

Mayoral candidates Darren Wood and Anwar Syed were also named during the phone survey, Bozinoff said. But Wood and Syed and four other hopefuls who were grouped under the “some other candidates” option drew few votes, he said, although 30 per cent of those polled were undecided about who they’d vote for on Oct. 27.

Watson had an “impressive” approval rating of 63 per cent and was particularly popular with female voters, the least wealthy, best educated and provincial Liberals. Maguire had an approval rating of 73 per cent among those who have heard of him and was particularly popular with older voters, mid-income groups and provincial Progressive Conservatives.

“Maguire has a higher approval rating than Watson. But not as many people, unfortunately, know about Mike Maguire. He’s really got to become better known,” Bozinoff said, adding four in 10 voters had heard of Maguire.

The poll, which has a three-per-cent margin of error, found three-quarters of people think expanding light-rail transit to the west, south and east is a key civic initiative. One of Maguire’s platform planks is to scrap the second phase of the LRT in favour of using existing rail lines for a commuter-style service, while Watson wants to continue with the second phase of LRT, which is contingent on funding from each level of government.

Although the poll didn’t ask what property taxes residents are willing to pay, Bozinoff said that based on other research, it’s clear the tolerance for municipal tax is low.

Last week, Watson promised not to raise property taxes more than two per cent annually. Maguire’s response was that each budget should be approached “with the mindset that an increase is inappropriate and you construct the budget from there.”

Given that polled voters said property taxes are the No. 1 issue, Bozinoff said that could be an opening for Maguire or another candidate. “(Voters) kind of want no tax increases. That’s the optimal thing,” he said. “If that can be delivered in a credible way that would be an opening for an opponent, I think.”

[email protected]
twitter.com/CarysMills

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news...ys-taxes-transit-and-jobs-top-priorities

[1overcosc]

^ Bodes very well for Watson's re-election.

[IntoTheCore]

Originally Posted by JeffB

When a political outsider like Maguire runs for a major office, I suspect they do so not realizing just what the job really entails and what the limitations are on what they can do. O'Brien had that to a large extent too, as he ran on a zero tax increase pledge, wanting to run the city like a business. As everyone in the city found out, that is easier said than done.

As I recall, O'Brien might also not have immediately understood that the mayor has only one vote in a group of 24.

[Dado]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

^ Wow, Maguire literally is a complete idiot. He seems to have no clue how electricity works in Ontario.

1) First of all, Hydro Ottawa's rates are regulated by the province. He can't just lower them on a whim.
2) Local utilities can't generate electricity and give it away for free to their customers. Energy has to be sold back to the province, who in turns sells it to the people.
3) The Ontario government has said a billion times that it has zero interest in expanding Hydro Ottawa's service area. Why the heck would Ottawa "640,000" voters sway over a province that has 11 million voters?
4) Hydro Ottawa is part of the Ontario electricity market. He can't just buy power from Quebec without being part of a province-wide deal.

All this is true, but frankly, in the abstract, I think he's basically right on most of this (and I'm pretty sure (2) above ("give it away for free") is not actually in his plan). Ottawa Hydro should be able to sell to all residents of Ottawa. Ottawa Hydro should be able to buy electricity from Quebec.

Municipal candidates should campaign for issues of municipal jurisdiction! Not try to play Premier.

Ok, but that line of thinking means that a lot of issues will never get raised, much less addressed.

Issues like commercial and institutional waste disposal are *never* going to be raised in a provincial election. It might be an issue in part of a riding here or there, but it will never pass the lips of any premierial candidate.

Similarly, the bizarre hold the OMB has over planning decisions, as well as related rules from building codes to the obnoxious patio fencing for places serving alcohol. It's not an issue that gets traction at the provincial level. Then there's anything dealing with roads, from design to speed limits to congestion charging and road tolls. There's even the weird way police salaries seem to be determined province-wide. All of these, like electricity, are under provincial jurisdiction but the effects hit at the municipal level, or at the least the public perceives them to be.

But they're also issues that will never get raised in a provincial election. So it's basically got to be up to municipalities, acting through their mayors and reeves, to raise them with their provincial overlords. And for that we need to elect people as mayor who are inclined to do just that.

None of this is to say I have much patience for Maguire himself, but criticizing him for raising an issue under provincial jurisdiction that has municipal impact is a bit much. For Ottawa, this mayoral election is sadly something of a Seinfeld election: about nothing at all.

[1overcosc]

It's not like hydro is an issue ignored in provincial politics. It's one of the biggest issues in provincial elections and has been for decades now. No need for mayors to being attention to it.

I do agree with his 4 points, but I really don't think he should make, as the centrepiece of his campaign, ideas that he has no authority to implement, and, more importantly, has no chance of persuading the people who can. Wynne would more or less laugh in Maguire's face if he brought those 4 demands to the province. I think mayoral candidates should focus on things they CAN do.

The other issue is that he doesn't seem to get that his platform is ultra vires of the city's authority for the most part. For 3) he did say he acknowledged provincial obstacles, but for the other three he made no mention of the province's control.

After the absolute disaster that was O'Brien's mayoralty, we should never trust mayoral candidates who clearly have no idea how the city works. And I'm shocked the media doesn't put more emphasis on that fact.

[rocketphish]

Election candidate accused of 'disrupting' Orléans community event

Ian MacLeod, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: September 23, 2014, Last Updated: September 23, 2014 7:14 AM EDT

An election candidate in Orléans is under fire for “disruptive” behaviour at a community event at which organizers called city authorities to have her expelled.

The messy political spat has the Cardinal Creek Community Association accusing Ward 1 municipal candidate Jennifer Robitaille of attempting to hijack a Sept. 13 park-opening ceremony and community barbecue for a political rally.

The association’s board, in a letter published in the online and print editions of the Orléans Star, denounces Robitaille for poor judgment and asks for a public apology.

“She was not invited, nor was she a sponsor to the event,” says the letter. “She did not ask permission to hold a political rally during our family community event. We consider this to be a lack of judgment and respect for our community association from a prospective Ward 1 candidate.

Robitaille is firing back on her campaign website. She says association organizers bullied her and her campaign team and that the episode has soured some of her student campaigners on political involvement.

She concludes the intent was to keep her away from ward voters, part of a politically motivated ploy to boost the campaign of incumbent Bob Monette. The experience, she writes, “felt like dirty American politics.”

The backdrop for the incident was the Sept. 13 grand opening of Cardinal Creek Park, Ottawa’s newest park.

Community association members spent nine months planning the event, including obtaining a city park permit, $2 million in liability insurance coverage and about $15,000 from local business sponsors to pay for the day, Sean Crossan, association vice-president, said Monday.

As many as 2,000 residents were expected to attend, but rain cut attendance to about 300 people. The crowd included local members of Parliament and Queen’s Park, Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson, incumbent ward councillor Monette and ward candidate R. Gordon Jensen.

Crossan said the municipal candidates were welcome to attend provided they kept any campaigning low-key and one-on-one.

But Robitaille, he said, arrived with a group of about 12 to 15 campaign supporters, including a man Crossan identified as Robitaille’s husband.

He said the group was outfitted with black pompoms and leis as well as “Vote for Jennifer” signs.

“She thought she would take advantage of our fun family day and take it for her personal benefit. (They were) all yelling, ‘Vote for Jennifer!’ right in the middle of our barbecue area, where people were lining up to be served with hotdogs.”

Crossan said he and another association board member approached the group.

“We said, ‘What are you guys doing here? There’s no political rally. We’ve got a park permit. You’re not allowed to be here. Please move. Go out on the sidewalk.

“Her husband came up to me, nose to nose and said, ‘This is a democratic country. We can do whatever we want. We can be here.’

“I said, ‘No you can’t be here, we have exclusivity. We have a park permit. We have this park booked for the day. And then they didn’t leave.”

The organizers finally decided to telephone city bylaw officials to try to have an officer dispatched and order the group out of the park.

However, “the minute we got through, they started to walk away. They went to the sidewalk (off of park property) and they yelled and screamed for 10 or 15 minutes and then it started to pour (with rain) and then they left.”

Robitaille denies being “disruptive and loud” at the event. She said the incident was videotaped but said she was not willing to share the video.

In her online statement, Robitaille says, “upon arrival, the team was greeted with open hostility from the association and were threatened with physical removal from the public space. “Now to be fair, the team mistakenly hand carried two bilingual signs, inviting people to ‘Meet the Candidate’ (I am in campaign mode after all). When the signs were promptly removed, the team was still threatened to be removed from the public park grounds.

“The reason given for the expulsion was that this event was a private event and that I was not invited. Not invited? Public signs had been posted for weeks leading up to the event, inviting residents to attend the grand opening.

“It is disheartening when students’ first foray into the political realm is faced with open hostility. When I hear comments about youth not getting involved in their community or a lack interest in elections, I can understand why when behaviour like this occurs. They did not enjoy the bullying and negativity that felt like dirty American politics. The youth left the event disillusioned about community involvement and politics in general.”

In an email, she added: “This (media attention) is simply a distraction tactic from the issues and I will not play their game. I have already moved on.”

It’s left Crossan disillusioned, too.

“It kind of put a damper on the day,” he said. “We don’t want this to happen to any community association again. We decided that it was time for her to give a personal apology. Considering what went through that day, it was totally unacceptable and inappropriate. We never want this to happen again.”

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