Front runners duke it out over transparency
New mayoral front-runner Barb Higgins released a transparency platform Monday, calling for a new audit committee and lobbyist registry as well as and having council members and senior staff declare all their real estate and business holdings.
But her two chief rivals — Ric McIver and Naheed Nenshi — shot back, saying she is merely copying policies they’ve already released.
Higgins wants to see an audit committee made up of five citizens with financial expertise and two council members — which will be chaired by a citizen — along with establishing an independent ethics counsel and ombudsman’s office.
“The whole goal is to address Calgarians’ concern over the accountability and transparency and it seems there’s an eroding trust with what’s going on at city hall,” she said.
“Calgarians deserve to know where their money is going, how it’s being spent, how it’s being handled.”
But McIver and Nenshi countered that she is merely mirroring their own policies, released weeks ago.
“She’s lifted that almost entire policy straight off my website so I guess I have to say I like it because she’s essentially agreed with me on almost everything,” said McIver.
“I rolled out my cost control accountability and transparency program back on June 22 which includes essentially everything she said, a lot later than what I have put out.”
Nenshi went so far as to call some of the platform naive.
“Good for her for doing this but the suggestions she’s making, the ones not exactly the same as what I’ve suggested are actually a little bit naive,” said Nenshi.
“For example, the establishment of a lobbyist registry is expensive and challenging.
“Much easier is what I’ve proposed, I’m just going to print a list of everyone I’ve met with every month.”
Higgins said too much business is handled behind closed doors at in-camera meetings, which she will limit.
“The land committee, for the most part, all of those meetings are being held behind closed doors and those are big deals being made,” she said.
“An example we saw in the last couple of days, a deal being done, there’s a lot of questions around the price that land was sold for and how an affordable housing project was done.”
McIver, who chairs the land committee, took exception, saying everything is done above board.
“She, by her own claims, was a co-producer, senior writer and deeply involved in all city hall issues and she didn’t see anything wrong with this until it showed up on the front page of a newspaper,” he said.
“I saw something wrong with this a long time ago so I’m glad she’s trying to catch up but she’s way behind.”
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