Hey City Hall!...Get out of the Way and Let the Magic Happen!

“Eye on City Hall”
A column of Information, Analysis, Comment, and Unfiltered Opinion
Reprinted from Oshawa Central Newspaper
Bill Longworth, City Hall Columnist
May 16, 2011

During the election campaign, I stated that creating a UOIT campus downtown was a terrible and costly error for city taxpayers.

I suggested that the huge city tax losses from all of the downtown buildings being taken over by “tax exempt” UOIT were going to have to be made up by residential taxpayers and that is still a fact.

I suggested that the downtown was in decay because city council over the years had demonstrated little vision to correct the situation. And that continues to be the case.

My Mayor Election campaign site called for major concentration in the improvement of our downtown.

Part of the plan was the creation of pedestrian malls along King Street from Mary to Centre and along Simcoe from Bond to Athol. I suggested redirecting Eastbound King traffic down Centre and along Athol to rejoin King Street at Mary. Similarly I suggested Northbound Simcoe traffic be redirected East along Athol and North on Mary and West on Bond to rejoin Simcoe.

I suggested an international design contest be promoted to conceptualize downtown streetscapes and building facades and the city to offer financial inducements by way of tax credits to property owners to improve their buildings in ways suggested by the winning plan.

I had a giant vision for making the downtown an attractive and distinctive “people place” which in turn would attract pedestrian traffic and high end retail and cultural operations.

So many municipalities have brought new life to their once-lifeless places that it is not beyond the possible in Oshawa’s downtown. I think of the main streets of Port Perry, Port Hope, Toronto’s Beaches, Yorkville, The Junction, Little India on Gerrard, Queen West, Spadina, Kensington Market, Liberty Village, The Distillery District ...and the list goes on and on. Revived neighbourhoods, often with their art and cultural components, are leaping up every day...and it could happen in Oshawa with a vibrant, creative and determined vision.

Unfortunately, Oshawa’s “Industrial Age” Politicians seem frozen in time hoping for the best but refusing to take even baby steps into the future. They’re not developing a vision of what this city could become. The closest they’ve come to visioning is continually telling us what a great place this is. Words are not enough! We need forward thinking vision, ideas, and action!

City leadership, under this Mayor, is not leading council and city staff to brainstorm ideas for city development. Real leaders would be setting direction for our future but this is not being done. Council, and this mayor, sees its role as simply putting out fires on issues that arise and City Bureaucrats effectively manage council by keeping them too busy swatting flies to concern themselves with truly important matters such as a vision for the future development of this city.

They’re kept busy debating the size of signs, the kinds of pets people can have, their weight loss programs, etc., and acknowledging decisions made by the Region on Oshawa’s behalf . City Council Agendas rarely address anything of significance.

We have now almost completed 1/8 of our new council term, and not a decision of significance has been taken. Everything seems frozen in time. Of course, this lacklustre performance should be expected since those elected promised no big vision and no big ideas for the future direction for this city....and I guess we have to accept the non-visionary “blind” leadership voters elected.

All growth and change in Oshawa is haphazard and left to chance as it has been for the last 50 years during which time Oshawa’s downtown has been sliding downward.

From time-to-time, we’ve had some outsider’s efforts to pump some progressive development into the downtown with the CIBC tower on the four corners, the Michael Starr Building, and now the Courthouse...and a few restaurants have opened to cater to the increased lunch crowd but the downtown has not taken off.

None of these developments have occurred as a result of planning or decisions of city hall. All resulted in decisions by external agencies...CIBC and the Provincial Government.

In light of the absence of any city hall vision and planning for the improvement of the city downtown over the last 50 years, I am now ready to support the move of the university and its development of a downtown campus and just ask city hall to move aside in favour of UOIT’s real thrust to breathe life into the downtown.

UOIT has recently released a planning document for its downtown campus which promises some ambitious and exciting developments for the downtown including an influx of 5000 students by 2015. UOIT’s vision, in the absence of any coming from city hall, has persuaded me to now support the downtown campus.

As City Hall and the politicians have reneged on their leadership responsibility in planning for downtown renewal, I am now supporting UOIT which has created a strong vision for downtown development and renewal...and ask City Hall to simply get out of the way and let UOIT’s magic happen.

I am pleased to see some additional greening, additional walkways, and increased building development related to the UOIT plan, and a concentrated effort for some cultural focus points. Even more, I am excited to see for the first time in 50 years that there has been some major planning for the future development of the downtown.

There will be severe student safety problems with the heavy traffic along King and Simcoe Streets and to alleviate this concern, I’m hoping that more landscaped pedestrian walkways and redirected traffic as I suggested during the election campaign will come to fruition. This will create a downtown “people place” that will not only improve safety for the students, but will attract adult foot traffic to a more pleasant downtown atmosphere which will in turn attract more upscale business. It would also provide opportunity for fountains, sculpture gardens, tree plantings, casual seating areas, etc, a magnet for cultural growth, and high end dining and retail establishments.

Proper development could turn Downtown Oshawa into a tourist destination changing the reputation of Oshawa from “blue-collar” industrial to education, high tech, and culture.

While the UOIT plan indicates some greening of the downtown, in my estimation, there can never be enough of this...and my idea about closing two blocks of downtown Simcoe St and about four blocks of King Street would add a “nature,” “upscale,” and “clean” atmosphere to the downtown. While the university plan includes a pedestrian mall by closing one small street between King and Bond adjacent to the Regent Theatre. I would encourage closing all streets from Bond to Athol between Simcoe and Mary for additional pedestrian walkways and student safety.

As in the case where streets are closed to Landscaped Pedestrian Walkways like Calgary’s premier 8th Avenue downtown business district, and Ottawa’s “Spark Street Mall,” the streets are accessible for emergency vehicles at all times and for delivery vehicles early morning and overnight.

Because of the exciting prospect presented by UOIT’s vision for the downtown, I am now of the opinion that the loss of city tax revenue is simply a cost for an improved downtown and a more attractive city which will boost Oshawa real estate values from the GTA basement and provide increased value to every city property owner.

The UOIT plan is coming close to my ideas for downtown renewal as expressed in the Mayoral Campaign....and the presentation of creative and big ideas for the city which was why I was in the race in the first place.

Oshawa has suffered from small time City Hall thinking for too long. Now is the time to take the shackles off and do everything possible to facilitate the leadership now being given by UOIT.

And in the meantime Oshawa City Hall---Move over! Ship out! Get out of the way! By inaction over too many years, you’ve abdicated your responsibility to plan for downtown renewal and development. Hand the job over to an organization that’s serious about getting the job done! Now!

As for the waterfront? We’ve had enough of small time city hall bureaucrat and political thinking. So far, planning has seemed to take a number of disparate elements, thrown them up in the air, and planted them where they landed. There’s no sense of developing an overall integrated plan to produce a world class waterfront. Let’s not lose this opportunity to transform our great waterfront resource into a world class place to complement the work UOIT will do in our downtown.

And so I say to the City Politicians and their City Hall Masters, the bureaucrats, if you want example of big league thinking to apply to our waterfront, check out the plans I introduced during the Mayoral Campaign.

Be sure to follow Bill’s radio broadcasts, “Eye on City Hall”,
every Monday, 6-9 pm EST, on http://www.ocentral.com/thewave/

Hey! What are we getting for our tax money?

“Eye on City Hall”
A column of Information, Analysis, Comment, and unfiltered opinion
reprinted from Oshawa Central Newspaper
Bill Longworth, City Hall Reporter
January 10, 2011


City taxpayers gambled on a new council, and so far it looks like we’ve elected duds. Even though we haven’t seen any leadership come from Mayor John Henry, we haven’t seen any initiatives come from any of the other council members either. It appears as if everyone so far is just sitting back waiting for something to happen. It's follow the leader without a leader!

Hell, we haven’t even had any disagreements or arguments or putdowns on council yet to lead to a little excitement. At least with the last council, we could expect frequent dissention at every meeting to provide for a little newsworthy comment.

So far, our Regional Councillors have each earned about $20,000 of our tax money and it is appropriate that taxpayers now have some kind of accounting of what we’ve gotten for this expenditure.

In the first ten weeks of this new council, the situation has to be classified as a zero-sum game----total political salaries and expenses = $176,925 (approximate), taxpayer’s benefit = 0. In zero sum parlance, this means that city politicians have so far in the 10 weeks of this new term cost city taxpayers approximately $176,925 and have not yet received a penny of value for these tax dollar expenditures.

Oh, Mayor John Henry has received his new Equinox, paid for out of his personal money as we’ve been told, and if this is so, he is to be congratulated. That is, of course, unless he simply pays for the car out of his weekly $100 minimum car allowance that he will arrange to at least give him the perk enjoyed by his fellow council members. Perhaps as mayor, he will have this car allowance ballooned to some higher level commensurate with his increased responsibility.

His Equinox, though, is a neat sleight of hand. He gets to business expense 30% annual depreciation on the car, write off any car loan interest, receives a 100% credit for the HST, receives a tax writeoff of 100% of all auto expenses, and an inflated tax free weekly gas allowance to pay for the car. Neat! He gets to play a hero looking after our tax dollars with the same net benefit to him----a free car!

He, along with his fellow council members will undoubtedly get their tanks topped up free at the city gas pumps that service all city vehicles. This would, of course, be in addition to the auto allowance that is supposed to fuel their vehicles. It would be an eye opener to see an accounting of all those who are able to use this fuel depot.

Saying as how Henry bought his own Equinox (yeah?), I guess he is entitled to decorate it however he wishes. I have heard a report that he has had a red maple leaf plaque with a blue “O” (for Oshawa) emblazoned on the red leaf. On a quick glance, I’m told that the crest looks surprisingly like the Federal Conservative Logo which is a blue “C” on a red leaf.

If this “crest story” is true, and I’d love to hear confirmation from someone who has seen the car, it does make sense for Henry to give credit to the Federal Conservatives and to the efforts of Oshawa Federal Conservative MP, Colin Carrie, whose campaign team, sign locations, and election machinery got John Henry elected.

Colin Carrie’s unprecedented level of meddling in Oshawa Municipal Elections was extremely unusual as politicians at one level do not typically meddle in the affairs of another level of government.

Carrie’s meddling in city politics is not a new revelation and has been reported in past “Eye on City Hall” columns.

But we are now learning amazing revelations that John Henry’s campaign manager, Mark Sheriff, has been appointed the Mayor’s Executive Assistant. Nothing surprising in that...except that Sherriff has just resigned as president of Colin Carrie’s Conservative Riding Association to take on Henry's Exec. Asst. job.

We now have all of the powers of the Oshawa Conservative Party installed in the Mayor’s Office willing and eager to have their chains yanked by Ottawa.

I had speculated in a past column that John Henry was personally recruited to run as a Mayoral Candidate by Colin Carrie and of Carrie’s strong connection with the Henry Campaign by his attendance at Henry’s side on election night as votes were being counted and his attendance at Henry’s private victory celebration at Downtown’s Thirsty Monk Restaurant following the victory. Now we know that the Henry Campaign was completely orchestrated by the Carrie election machinery and that Carrie was intimately involved right from the beginning. Carrie is Henry.....and Henry is Carrie...our Federal MP and our Mayor are one and the same. Dangerous!

With such an intimate connection between Carrie and Henry, there is sure to be no Federal/City disputes....that whatever Ottawa wants for Oshawa, it gets. Henry will endorse anything the Feds want for Oshawa, for example, the Federal / City Harbour Agreement to guarantee more industrial development at our lakefront. It doesn’t matter what the people want. It’s all part of a plan by Carrie to have Ottawa dictate city politics and policy for us.

None of this Conservative takeover is co-incidental but a well-organized plan. We know also that Carrie had a role in the election of Tito Dante Marimpietri and John Neal. A worthwhile question remains, which others of our new council members got the support of Carrie’s election machinery?....and why?

As a side note, I have it on good authority that the Woodstock Council had a significant turnover and that all members of that Council are now Federal Conservative Party Members.

Perhaps it is not too stretching to theorize, that Stephen Harper is making attempts to extend his electoral control across the country right down to the municipal level. After all, that would be consistent with his practise of exercising iron fisted control over Cabinet Members and his Conservative Caucus.

Perhaps Carrie’s meddling in Oshawa Affairs, and the apparent meddling in Woodstock’s Municipal Election, foretells a Harper Conservative Agenda to grab a tiller on all political affairs across the country. That would be dangerous for democracy, dissent, and an alternative voice. That could lead to G20 type policing fiascos across the country. It’s only in dictatorships where one guy pulls all the power.

In America, political organization by the Republican and Democratic Parties extends right down to the precinct (neighourhood level) and all political candidates for all offices at all levels run on the Republican or Democratic (or Independent) ticket with voters being largely identified at the neighbourhood level as registered Democrats or Republicans.

Is the Federal Conservative Party participation in Oshawa’s Municipal Election, orchestrated by Colin Carrie, part of Harper’s Grand scheme for the nation...to Americanize Canada politically and grab unfettered control by organizing Conservative Control right down to the city and neighbourhood level with local political offices being held by candidates chosen by the national party? With his strong arm control he’d be the “President” (or dictator) of our country.

We already know that Harper would like to Americanize our nation by cutting out Canada Pensions (which has recently been floated as a trial balloon), cutting out transfer payments for health care and higher education, and reducing the power of the Federal Government vis-a-vis the Provinces. As President, with neighbourhood control, he might have far greater control in reaching these objectives.

I have regularly reported politics as a game of pay-offs and deal-making for votes and of course personal ambition is never far from the surface.

The chattering classes in Oshawa have upped their volume in questioning John Henry’s honesty, transparency, and integrity in honouring his election pledges, particularly in respecting city voters which was a major campaign pledge.

They were particularly disappointed in Henry for nominating and voting for Roger Anderson as Regional Chair as Anderson was the chief proponent of the garbage incinerator being built on the city borders.

I have heard from an inside and reliable source that discussions will take place shortly to “re-balance” representation on Regional Council by the various member municipalities. This is a “given” as growing populations in Ajax, Pickering, and Whitby are under-represented relative to the slower growing Oshawa. Despite the imbalance, city representatives in the past have successfully resisted and staved off any reduction in Oshawa Regional Representation.

I have now been told by insiders that John Henry agreed to a “secret” deal to not oppose any reduction to Oshawa Regional Council representation as a trade-off for the overwhelming support he received for his prestigious $6000-$7000 seat on the Durham Police Commission. We’ll have to keep an eye on how this plays out.

Personal ambition in politics often trumps the public good. Stay tuned!

Be sure to follow Bill’s radio broadcasts, “Eye on City Hall”,
every Monday, 6-9 pm EST, on http://www.ocentral.com/thewave/

The Election of the Returning Council Members Can’t be Just a Co-incidence

“Eye on City Hall”
A column of Information, Analysis, Comment, and unfiltered opinion
Bill Longworth, City Hall Reporter
November 15, 2010

In looking over the results of the recent election, I note that only four members of the last inept city council survived while seven members are no longer on council.

All this change is good and a key objective of my mayoral campaign. As the public memory is short, part of my campaign strategy was to incessantly focus public attention on the missteps, mistakes, and misdeeds of the John Gray led city council to foster the public mood for change.

I also had to focus public attention on the misrepresentations of council veteran Louise Parkes whom I saw as a disaster for Oshawa should she get elected. Her campaign platform calling for “Fair Taxation” seemed to grossly misrepresent her personal spending habits while on council, a fact that I exposed at every opportunity.

I ran for the position of mayor as that is the only office where any attention is paid to what the candidates have to say and is the one office which guarantees most face time with the media…a necessity if you have an important message that you want to get out.

Getting my message out resulting in a huge turnover on council was much more important to me than any ambitions I had for the Mayoralty.

Since the election, I have had some opportunity to analyze and reflect on the results and one of my observations has become quite telling because it has distinct and important consequences for the city.

I had always insisted that Mayor Elect John Henry had access to the Colin Carrie Sign list as his signs got erected very quickly once he declared his Mayoral Candidacy.

Securing sign locations is a time consuming activity and was something that could not be done prior to Henry’s declaration as a mayor candidate without the secret getting out of the bag.

Also his sign campaign was far stronger in the east side of the city (Carrie’s riding) rather than on the west side of the city which is in Jim Flaherty’s Federal Riding.

Henry also likely had access to Colin Carrie’s election machine which has developed over three successful elections since 2004. There is no other explanation of his “running away” with the election. He certainly did not perform as a “superstar” councillor, being rather unremarkable at the best of times.

Colin Carrie has been in regular and frequent public disputes with outgoing Mayor John Gray and thus would have sufficient desire to see him replaced.

This would provide Carrie motivation to seek out and “appoint” a candidate to succeed Gray. Thus Carrie is likely at the very beginning to have convinced Henry to seek the Mayoralty offering help from his Federal Campaign Team as the bait.

Running for Mayor without Carrie’s help and intervention would have been unlikely since the general consensus by council observers was that Henry’s run for Mayor was premature. Even one of Henry’s friends indicated this to me at the first Mayoral Debate.

In the CAW retirees Mayor Debate, for example, John Henry, in answer to the question on how he’d attract industry and jobs to the city, stated that we have a deepwater port, a major highway, a main rail line, an airport, a skilled work force---we can built anything and ship it anywhere in the world. He failed to see that we’ve had these attributes for the last 50 years and still experienced a net loss of industrial jobs.

Not recognizing that the city has the highest industrial/commercial tax rates in the GTA making us uncompetitive even with Whitby, Ajax, and Pickering and that downward adjustment of these rates was imperative to attract industrial investment and jobs to this city, you’d think would be basic information and insight necessary to lead this city.

It is unlikely Henry would have sought the Mayor’s chair on his own volition without intervention from Carrie. His $100,000 salary as a Regional Councillor would have made profits from his small office products retailing business seem redundant and been a major loss to him.

A vital question then, is what Carrie might have offered Henry in the way of lucrative Federal Appointments to replace his $100,000 Regional salary had his quest for the Mayor position been unsuccessful.

So now you’re probably beginning to think that my suggestion of Carrie’s meddling in city politics is slightly delusional, schizophrenic or mad.

So how else would you explain that three of the four returnees to city council were also the three city councillors invited by Carrie to Ottawa, in May, 2009, to meet with the Government Leaders over the harbour, and even at the time get an introduction to the Prime Minister. You will recall that Henry, Neal, and Marimpietri were criticized by John Gray as “stooges” at the time.

Funny that all three were elected when we had such a major turnover on council.

Is this just co-coincidence, or is the hand of Carrie, and his election machinery, behind the re-election of all three.

Pidwerbecki, the fourth returning council member is, of course, popular within the NDP community as manager of former MP, Ed Broadbent’s, Oshawa Office.

Interestingly, Henry, Neal, and Marimpietri do not sit on Carrie’s Riding Executive, although Local politicians typically try to conceal their political leanings and associations in any case.

Doug Hawkins, a candidate for Regional and City Councillor, sits on Jim Flaherty’s Riding Executive. He finished well out of the race, placing 15 out of 26 Regional Council Candidates, and didn’t appear to get any significant or “official” help from the Flaherty election machine.

There are consequences to the re-election of Henry, Neal, and Marimpietri.

These are three of the six votes needed to insure that there are no glitches in the Federal/City Waterfront Agreement that support the continuing industrialization of the East Wharf, the construction of the Ethanol Plant, and the building of a rail spur to the waterfront industrialization zone.

Of course, this increasing industrialization makes the waterfront less attractive for condo and commercial development, such as fine dining establishments, as the pollutants, dispersants, dirt and grime and odours will discourage top developers with their financing from coming to Oshawa to develop our prime lakefront resource.

I guess my dream of a world class waterfront will not come to fruition and the marina will not be as impressive as I’d envisioned.

The Shwa will have increased industrialization guaranteed at our waterfront while other places like Toronto, Chicago, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and even Buffalo, have been busy reducing lakefront industrialization and working at transforming their lakefronts into people places.

Maybe the next thing we’ll see at our waterfront, along with the ethanol plant and the railway spur line, will be giant cranes and a cargo container storage facility leveling some of our treed areas on the east port as the present bulk cargo facilities at our harbour get replaced by cargo container handling facilities in general worldwide use today.

Too bad….but the Oshawa people….and Colin Carrie have spoken.

Late footnote---I've just been informed that Colin Carrie was at Henry's election headquarters the whole night as returns were coming in and even attended Henry's victory celebration party on election night looking over him like a mother hen, I'm told---even accompanied Henry to the private feast at Sopprafino's following. Interesting that Sopprafino's is owned by Tito Dante Marimpietri's wife's family! I wonder whether Marimpietri and Neal also attended this feast---and which other elected politicians attended which may give an indication that Carrie's hand extended far greater than we have so far surmised.

Be sure to follow Bill’s radio broadcasts, “Eye on City Hall”,
every Monday, 6-9 pm EST, on http://www.ocentral.com/thewave/

Oshawa---Bush League or Big League? The Choice is Ours!

“Eye on City Hall”
A column of Information, Analysis, Comment, and unfiltered opinion
Bill Longworth, City Hall Reporter
August 16, 2010


At the first Mayoral Debates held at the Oshawa Golf Club on August 4, the Mayor Candidates were asked a number of questions, one of which dealt with the recently completed Harbour and Waterfront Agreement between the City and the Federal Government.

While I am pleased that the agreement returns significant acreage to the city, I am displeased that a key component of the agreement is to confirm our lakefront as a mixed-use industrial/recreational area with increased industrialization on the East Wharf.

This agreement gives veiled support for the construction of the proposed ethanol plant and a feeder railway spur line to the waterfront.

Oshawa Harbour Commission Chairman, Gary Valcour, in the Federal Press Release announcing the agreement stated that, “The agreement offers a strong message of Federal Government support for an industrial and mixed-use port in Oshawa providing current and prospective port users with the certainty needed for continued growth and investment.”

These words are very telling and clear---there will be expanded growth of industrial uses at the harbor. This increased industrialization which is one of the key components of the Federal and City agreement is of major concern. I feel that increased industrialization and recreation and greening of the waterfront cannot happily co-exist.

Increased port industrialization is inconsistent with what is happening at every other lakefront along the Great Lakes. Toronto has closed down virtually all of its lakefront industrialization---all of the grain elevators have been demolished and the warehouses have been turned into boutique retail malls. Increased industrialization is completely incompatible with creating a people place.

Mayor John Gray, in his simplistic and self patronizing way said, “Everything is wonderful---we are doing a great job---any criticism of city council is bad for Oshawa” and gleefully announced at the Mayor Debates that the settlement after 40 years of dispute is great, and gloated, ”Now we can get the marina built.”

The Mayor’s support for the waterfront deal and his haste to build the marina indicates, once again, the chief deficiencies of his leadership and his vision for this city. That is small-minded bush-league thinking which worships the past, piecemeal planning, and no vision of big league grandeur for this city.

I believe we need an integrated plan for the entire lakefront. A too hasty rebuilding of the marina will limit overall planning for a world class development.

With the waterfront agreement, I am afraid we will see a return of my earliest impressions of the Oshawa lakefront when I first visited as a toddler from Toronto with my mother too many years ago. Beyond my fascination with watching a “large” sailboat tacking up the channel to the marina, I still remember the dirt, the grime, the smell, and the visual pollution of the many oil tanks and the unkempt weedy fields on the east side of Simcoe a few hundred feet north of the lake and I remember how different it seemed to have railway tracks going down the centre of Ritson and Simcoe Streets. I even remember seeing a steam engine shunting its load down one of these main streets.

This waterfront agreement ushers in a return to these visions of the past. With this waterfront agreement, lakefront users will continue to be subjected to the noise, dirt, grime, odours, airborne pollutants, dispersants, contaminants and particulate matter, and visual pollution of smokestacks and rail spurs and truck traffic.

This increased industrialization plays major havoc with my plans for a world class development at our lakefront, one of the most naturally beautiful lakefront environments from Kingston to Niagara Falls.

The “East Wharf industrial barrier” will physically separate the west lakefront from the second marsh nature and ecological reserve and will prohibit integration of the overall development and ease of movement between the two.

In a time when Toronto and other inland ports are reducing the impact of industrialization and shipping at their lakefronts, Oshawa, with this Federal Government agreement, is going against the trend of the “greening” and “people-ing” of lakefronts.

Oshawa is a “bulk cargo” port when containerization is the norm, and Asia, rather than Europe, is the source for most imported and exported goods. This has made Great Lakes shipping less important than in the past. Goods arriving by container ship in Vancouver are moved overland by rail arriving in their original shipping containers even here in Eastern Canada.

The ethanol plant proposed for Oshawa would be better located in the Corn Belt close to its raw material on existing Trans Canada Rail Lines to reduce shipping costs.

The big thrust everywhere is to make waterfronts green and so all cargo warehouses and grain elevators have disappeared from the Toronto waterfront. If this is the trend in other places, why not here in Oshawa?

For the sake of a very few jobs and very minimal contributions to the economic well-being of Oshawa, we should not sacrifice the development and enjoyment of our lakefront for all our citizens. The proposed ethanol plant might employ 15 people and reduce lakefront enjoyment potential for 160,000 people…not a fair tradeoff by any measure.

Proper development to maximize people benefits at the lakefront has the potential to pour many more tax dollars into the city coffers than industrialization, and has the potential to increase real estate values in the entire south end and all of Oshawa, pouring millions extra into our tax coffers. Recreational, commercial, and residential uses will also generate huge capital and wealth creation to contribute to the Oshawa economy.

My lakefront vision as Oshawa’s new mayor is to discourage any industrialization of the lakefront and to instead develop our waterfront with all of its natural potential into a world class recreation and ecotourism destination and a prime residential area on Lake Ontario’s North Shore.

I would lead the city into sponsoring an international design and development contest attracting the best and brightest visionaries, architects, and planners from around the world to visit our lakefront to come up with integrated plans and ideas and proposals to give us a world class waterfront that would put a new face on Oshawa and give our lakefront iconic status similar to the iconic status of Toronto’s “New City Hall” which also resulted from an international design contest.

Any attempt to fast-track the marina without considering overall plans for the lakefront as has been suggested by Mayor John Gray, limits the integration of the overall design concepts for lakefront development…but unfortunately this short sighted planning characterizes city politician thinking resulting in giant problems like the student housing crisis around the university.

I believe that the lakefront development should be “big league” and not “bush league.” Besides a new marina, it would include high class condos separated by publicly accessible parks, gardens and walkways on the east side of Simcoe all maintained to parks standards by the condo developers. No development would block public access to any portion of our waterfront. All parking would be underground and all designs should be on a common nautical theme. All design schemes would include redevelopment of the present Lakeview Park and include plans for the entire lakefront including all lands over to the Darlington Provincial Park including enhancing hiking and viewing possibilities of the Second Marsh nature preserve.

All development would occur on city owned lands on which we would negotiate long term land lease agreements providing long term tax relief for the citizens of this city.

We need politicians who think big time---who have big visions and big plans and big confidence in Oshawa’s future to move us out of the bush leagues and into the big leagues. A place where people want to move because of the reputation of this city and its progressive leadership, and our quality of life---not because we have the cheapest and most affordable housing in the GTA.

Our lakefront can be a major tourist attraction, a major star on Oshawa’s landscape, an opportunity to put Oshawa and its lakefront on the national stage and a place to bring Oshawa national recognition that will make every city resident proud to call Oshawa his home…an opportunity to throw off the chains and reputation of “The Shwa.”

The proper “Big League” vision and approach will attract giant capital to develop our lakefront without costing the city taxpayer one dime and land lease agreements will provide tax relief into the forseeable future.

No longer should we accept being the doormat of the GTA.

Be sure to follow Bill’s radio broadcasts, “Eye on City Hall”,
every Monday, 6-9 pm EST, on http://www.ocentral.com/thewave/

The Preposterous Mr. Gray

“Eye on City Hall”
A column of Information, Analysis, Comment, and unfiltered opinion
Bill Longworth, City Hall Reporter
April 26, 2010

Absurd, crazy, daft , foolish, harebrained, idiotic, dopey, loony, nutty, half-baked, off-the-wall, batty, unglued, bonkers, and wacky are not usually words used to describe your mayor, the chief executive of your city. But Mayor John Gray’s asinine actions that have recently become public have once again earned our “leader” these apt descriptors.

You’d think that nothing could beat using our tax moneys to fund MBA’s for his ”chosen” or using our scarce tax monies to fund his own birthday party to the tune of $45,000, but this week we discover that he has used our property tax monies to the tune of $916 to pay Provincial Offences parking tickets and dog bylaw offences for private individuals.

While $916 is not a huge amount, there are important principles involved. Is there anything that the Mayor will not fund with our property taxes?

We just wonder how much more creative Mayor John Gray can get in the inappropriate use of our tax monies and wonder whether we are just discovering the tip of the iceberg in his reckless and unethical squandering of taxpayer resources.

As for these fines, a letter released by the City Director of Finance Services in response to details requested by the Finance and Administration Meeting of March 25, 2010, states: 1) that a media member attending the Oct. 7, 2009 KISS Concert was advised by a representative of the city to park in a handicapped parking space and was subsequently fined. The Mayor’s office paid the $316 fine to the Provincial Offences Office and was subsequently reimbursed by the media member’s employer in April 2010, and 2) The remaining $600 is comprised of tickets issued on Aug 12, 2009, by Animal Services staff to an individual for “allowing an animal to run at large (3 tickets @ $125 each) and for failure to register an animal ($110). These fines were increased to $600 due to late fees and were paid directly by the Mayor’s office to the Provincial Offences Office.

There are giant questions arising from these fines: 1) Was it the mayor who counseled the press to park in the handicapped parking zone and, if so, what does that say about the mayor’s attitude toward accessibility by the handicapped? 2) Is it legal for the mayor to use tax funds to pay fines issued to private individuals? 3) What is Oshawa’s Auditor General’s comment on this use of property tax funds? 4) How widespread is the mayor’s indiscriminate use of our tax dollars? 5) Why was the city reimbursed for the parking infraction in April 2010 only after the expenditure was discovered at the March 2010 meeting? 6) What is the mayor’s comment justifying the use of tax monies to pay personal fines?

In light of this squandering of tax resources, and to really put icing on the cake, the various mayoral candidates were asked by a local paper to comment on the major issues facing the city. All responded, “High Taxes!”

John Gray, the guy who paid these personal parking and dog infraction fines out of your tax dollars, and led a council wasteful in so many ways of our tax dollars, agrees that high taxes are a big issue. He said the city’s high tax rate results from its aggressive program of capital improvements. He didn’t mention them, but he might have mentioned the consistent million dollar losses of the GM Centre, the unneeded demolition of city arenas, and the needless demolition and rebuilding of a large part of city hall. He mentioned the low tax increase this election year but failed to mention the record high increases in previous years to give us the highest tax levels in the GTA. You can bet your bottom dollar that Gray expects to recoup tax revenues lost this election year with record high increases immediately following the Oct. 25, 2010 municipal election. You will recall that he pressed for a 9% increase immediately following the last election!

John Gray’s record is not one that favours lower taxes.

Two other candidates, Louise Parkes and Cathy Clarke are also city politicians who have consistently voted for the slash and burn and rebuild philosophy that has run our city debt levels to record highs. Both, like Mayor John Gray, are now calling for restraint this election year, no doubt to go back to the “drunken sailor” days of spending after the next election that they exhibited while on council.

A vote for those on council, past or present, is an invitation for them to persist with the wasteful and extravagant ways of the past that runs up our city debt, wastes your tax money, and digs a hand ever deeper into your pockets to feed politician’s sense of entitlement. If you’re pleased with the direction city politicians have been taking this city, vote for them!

If you feel the city needs new direction, you should consider a clean sweep of council. Those who have sat on city council and contributed to putting this city in the fiscal and high-tax and management mess that it finds itself should disqualify them from getting your vote.

As your new Mayor of Oshawa, I promise to give this city the real visionary leadership it needs starting with annual tax cuts until Oshawa reaches the average tax rates of the GTA. I believe 5 to 6 years of 3% annual tax cuts would do the trick at the same time as providing a slow enough cutback to city hall for adjustments to take place to cut out the fat, and cut out the waste and needless expenditures at the same time as protecting our levels of service.

Tax cuts, of course, are not the only aspect of my new leadership of Oshawa. I have visionary plans for the downtown and lakefront that you might read at www.wepromise.ca.

Come the New Year, Oshawa voters will literally throw out the old and usher in the new…we’ll throw out the tired and uninspired leadership of the past and usher in a new vision and a new beginning for our city.

Be sure to follow Bill’s radio broadcasts, “Eye on City Hall”,
every Monday, 6-9 pm EST, on http://www.ocentral.com/thewave/