Ongoing YYCCC (Chu + Farkas) Transgressions Threat

[Bigtime]

I really have a hard time believing that Nenshi will run again.

I think Gondek waits this one out, builds up more name recognition and goes for mayor next time.

[Ducay]

I'll say it again. Please stop mentioning Davison for mayor. There is a chance he might see it and run, and no one but him benefits from that.

I'd take Nenshi, Hehr, or Farkas over him. Heck, even Barb Higgins would do in a pinch

[InglewoodFan]

Originally Posted by Ducay

I'll say it again. Please stop mentioning Davison for mayor. There is a chance he might see it and run, and no one but him benefits from that.

I'd take Nenshi, Hehr, or Farkas over him. Heck, even Barb Higgins would do in a pinch

Whereas I would be 100% Davison over Farkas. I'll take a narcissist (not that I am convinced that Davison is) over an ideologue any day. I see it as the difference between ignoring other people's interests vs actively working against those interests.

[Roughneck]

Originally Posted by Bigtime

I really have a hard time believing that Nenshi will run again.

I think Gondek waits this one out, builds up more name recognition and goes for mayor next time.

I think Nenshi runs if there's no other candidate that could go against Farkas.

Originally Posted by Ducay

I'll say it again. Please stop mentioning Davison for mayor. There is a chance he might see it and run, and no one but him benefits from that.

I'd take Nenshi, Hehr, or Farkas over him. Heck, even Barb Higgins would do in a pinch

I don't think Davison needs any prodding to go for mayor. Pretty sure it was the goal from the get go. Councilor was always just the stepping stone necessary to position himself to run for mayor. Developers and business community ready with him.

[kermitology]

Farkas is the mayoral candidate that will come with a slate of Manning foundation graduates. The UCP changed funding rules to allow slates of candidates to be funded.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmon...erta-1.5625799

The bill proposes the removal of limits on spending by third-party advertisers outside the local elections campaign period that runs from May 1 to election day in October. The bill also proposes removing the requirement for candidates to disclose their donors prior to election day.

Madu argued that this prevents deep pocket developers from buying elections, but I see the exact opposite:

"If passed, more people across the province will be able to donate money to multiple candidates ... unlike in the past where a particular developer or pro-development interest group could take over an entire municipal election in one particular municipality because they've got the money to do that."

But critics have worried the change would allow people with deep pockets to donate to a slate of candidates.

SaveCalgary and it's ilk will be funding a slate of Farkas like, UCP aligned candidates in the coming election. Farkas putting his name out now is organizing that message and hammering Calgarian's with it. A strong contender needs to announce soon and make sure he doesn't get too much of a head start.

[Swift]

LOL, some silliness from Colley-Urquhart in the community newsletter this month. I guess a picture of her in a face mask wasn't deemed patriotic enough (who knows why that would matter?) so she presumably asked some minion to Photoshop it. Instead of inserting a flag onto her mask, they inserted a whole Canadian flag face mask onto her mask! Not even an attempt to make it not look shopped.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by Cameron Swift

LOL, some silliness from Colley-Urquhart in the community newsletter this month. I guess a picture of her in a face mask wasn't deemed patriotic enough (who knows why that would matter?) so she presumably asked some minion to Photoshop it. Instead of inserting a flag onto her mask, they inserted a whole Canadian flag face mask onto her mask! Not even an attempt to make it not look shopped.

Did you ever think that was maybe by design?

[Swift]

Dude, I've put zero thought into any of this. Just thought it would be a funny, silly picture to share. Had no idea someone would want to argue over it.

[Ironhorse]

The rest of us can’t laugh, because the picture link is broken...

[Swift]

[Fuzz]

LOL. Nice one. Speaking of people who should have term limits...

[Ironhorse]

Wow...

[getbak]

Yeah, that's either an underpaid and overworked graphic designer not giving a f---, or a graphic designer than hates DCU and wants her to look like an idiot. Or a little of both.


I'm guessing her office sent the photo to the company that makes the newsletter with a request to Photoshop the Canadian flag mask over the mask she's wearing --- and that's exactly what they did.

[curves2000]

I think we may be in need of significant change across the board with council and I think a lot of posters are really discounting some of the needed change. Calgary is in very very rough shape and we really need to get our hands around certain things or we are headed for even bigger trouble. We can sit here and blame NDP, PC, UCP, Harper, Trudeau, Farkas, Ferrell or whomever. We need to have a collective re-think because as a city of our size in Canada, we won't be able to last a whole lot longer with the way things. Can Calgary sustain another 10-15 years with the way things are going?

The sad thing is that there is enough support and common sense approaches that the overwhelming majority of people will accept.

Calgary's debt problem: Simply put into a household finance terms, we got a big credit card balance, not quite near the limit but we have several big purchases that are going to push us VERY close to the limit. We need to decide quickly if we can ALWAYS afford a larger TV and dessert when going out for dinner.

Property Taxes: Yes they are a bad way of collecting revenue for cities, yes a huge portion does go to the province. How much property tax should we all pay? What's the fair amount? How far can they continue to go?

We hear stories all the time of these small businesses paying MASSIVE Sums of taxes. A small book store paying $20k in taxes, a friend of mine's got a small building on 17th. Tenants are a small bar, a quick service restaurant, a hair salon and a vacant space. Little parking. Nearly $200k a year in taxes .

We can't have a combination in Calgary of sky high property taxes, business taxes, for lease signs littered all over the place, sky high parking rates, a winter city, bike lanes taking traditional parking , a lack of bike lanes for people who enjoy it etc.

We always hear about efficiencies at city hall, about how low our property taxes are in Calgary, about how this magazine and that publication ranked us top 5 or 10 globally in terms of cities to live in. Is anybody getting the impression that the world is clamoring to come here?

Sometimes the harsh truth is that we aren't the cats *** Business of all kinds are rushing to come here. We haven't had the energy boom we have been promised, we haven't had the flood of clean energy and technology everybody is talking about. Businesses and people aren't moving here in mass amounts to take advantage of these low property taxes or this world class city efficiency.

A lot of political players are all making bank and have their retirements secured meanwhile enough people are dealing with the day to day destruction of their city slowly. We aren't in the ICU yet but we can't pretend things are all rosy for the future of the city unless we have some changes that start to have meaningful results across a whole host of issues.

[Fuzz]

Calgary residential property taxes are still lower than most other places. It's just that before they were even lower due to oil companies covering them for us. That's not happening now, but it doesn't mean we are in big trouble, it's just that we have come back to reality.





https://globalnews.ca/news/4311558/p...cities-canada/

[PsYcNeT]

Originally Posted by curves2000

I think we may be in need of significant change across the board with council and I think a lot of posters are really discounting some of the needed change. Calgary is in very very rough shape and we really need to get our hands around certain things or we are headed for even bigger trouble. We can sit here and blame NDP, PC, UCP, Harper, Trudeau, Farkas, Ferrell or whomever. We need to have a collective re-think because as a city of our size in Canada, we won't be able to last a whole lot longer with the way things. Can Calgary sustain another 10-15 years with the way things are going?

The sad thing is that there is enough support and common sense approaches that the overwhelming majority of people will accept.

Calgary's debt problem: Simply put into a household finance terms, we got a big credit card balance, not quite near the limit but we have several big purchases that are going to push us VERY close to the limit. We need to decide quickly if we can ALWAYS afford a larger TV and dessert when going out for dinner.

Property Taxes: Yes they are a bad way of collecting revenue for cities, yes a huge portion does go to the province. How much property tax should we all pay? What's the fair amount? How far can they continue to go?

We hear stories all the time of these small businesses paying MASSIVE Sums of taxes. A small book store paying $20k in taxes, a friend of mine's got a small building on 17th. Tenants are a small bar, a quick service restaurant, a hair salon and a vacant space. Little parking. Nearly $200k a year in taxes .

We can't have a combination in Calgary of sky high property taxes, business taxes, for lease signs littered all over the place, sky high parking rates, a winter city, bike lanes taking traditional parking , a lack of bike lanes for people who enjoy it etc.

We always hear about efficiencies at city hall, about how low our property taxes are in Calgary, about how this magazine and that publication ranked us top 5 or 10 globally in terms of cities to live in. Is anybody getting the impression that the world is clamoring to come here?

Sometimes the harsh truth is that we aren't the cats *** Business of all kinds are rushing to come here. We haven't had the energy boom we have been promised, we haven't had the flood of clean energy and technology everybody is talking about. Businesses and people aren't moving here in mass amounts to take advantage of these low property taxes or this world class city efficiency.

A lot of political players are all making bank and have their retirements secured meanwhile enough people are dealing with the day to day destruction of their city slowly. We aren't in the ICU yet but we can't pretend things are all rosy for the future of the city unless we have some changes that start to have meaningful results across a whole host of issues.

So this would be solved by City Hall being staffed with Manning Centre cronies, how?

[Ozy_Flame]

Great post, curves.

I think Calgary has to re-examine its outward strategy. The city can't afford to keep building massive interchanges and huge road expansions. That's just not sustainable, nor does it lend to a city that needs to address cost-cutting. Those things can cost $100's of millions of dollars, all to perpetuate sprawl.

Edmonton just passed the City Plan yesterday, which is a 45-year plan to densift the inner city, grow "upwards", and focus on power centres with strategic arteries that enable citizens to get everywhere they need to go - work, shopping, and play - within 15 minutes of their house, whether it's walking, biking, or car. It seems funny too, given that these very plan basically suggests that you have less reason to take major throughputs like the Henday (ring road). It passed in Council 11-2 (one of the two objecting Councillors was Mike Nickel, AKA Farkas North).

That said, cities are complicated ecosystems of costs. I don't think you can look at one problem without looking at others. A comprehensive "lift and shift" in mentality needs to happen - Edmonton, Calgary and even other Canadian municipalities - for sustainable growth with fair taxes and services.

[timun]

The big question that no self-proclaimed fiscal hawks on council can ever succinctly answer is: okay, we need to stop raising taxes, so what do you propose to cut?

The answer is always some flim-flam about "middle management" and "administration", but that doesn't get us very far because it represents a small slice of the expenditures pie. You want to really cut spending, and thus taxes? Let's cut the police budget, it's half a billion dollars all by itself. Let's cut transit service, that's another billion. Let's cut water services, that's about $400M. Let's cut the fire department, that's about $300M. Roads are another $300M or so, let's cut that too.

No politician, even the slimey Manning Foundation stooges, will meaningfully touch these budgets. They're sacred cows that no one dare touches, because they'd get voted out if they did.

[Flamenspiel]

^^Lets cut the arena, about $300M, let’s cut the Olympics, about $500M.....

[MarchHare]

Originally Posted by Flamenspiel

^^Lets cut the arena, about $300M, let’s cut the Olympics, about $500M.....

Incidentally, Druh Farrell voted against both of those, yet Rick Bell and the editorial staff at the Calgary Sun regularly label her as the big spender on council. Yet if Calgary actually adopted the things she advocates for (greater housing density, reduced urban sprawl to the outskirts of city limits, less car dependency, etc.) it would significantly reduce The City's operating costs in the long term.