Calgary Civic Election Poll #3: The race heats up

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by Cowboy89

Nenshi won't mean lower taxes, any hypothetical savings garnered from 'smart growth' vs. 'sprawl' will be ploughed into programs that real conservatives view as not being a responsibility of government.

I don't say this as a Nenshi supporter, but as a realist.

Social support programs that cover the areas that would deal with issues related directly and indirectly to poverty issues in the city are already heavily funded by the City and its departments. Things like Parks and Rec and thier related subsidies, FCSS programs etc. These are established and expected part of our Canadian life, in a similar manner to Child Tax Benefits.

I doubt there would ever be sufficient political will to abolish or drastically reduce funding for these programs because it would be political suicide, even in a 'small c' conservative center such as Calgary.

Originally Posted by Table 5

Jeebus, just turned on "view signatures" after a year long hiatus....forgot how much it makes the forum look like the classifieds.

Thats why I shrunk mine down. It was pretty annoying at full size.

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by Table 5

Jeebus, just turned on "view signatures" after a year long hiatus....forgot how much it makes the forum look like the classifieds.

I didn't know that was an option. Thanks.

[SebC]

Melville

interesting...

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Bunk

I love how there are two votes for Oscar Fech.

Today at the Kerby Centre Mayoral Forum he proclaimed that the mayor's office has threatened assassination against him.

He's not the only one. There was some 80 year old woman on the radio this morning who said she "wanted real answers, not just a bunch of talk calling all of us elderly people mentally ######ed."

Now, I wasn't at the forum, (Because I'm not elderly, so I was at work Tuesday afternoon) but I seriously doubt any of the candidates called the seniors in attendance "mentally ######ed".

I should also add that mentally ######ed is a direct quote, not the words I would use.

[Bunk]

Originally Posted by SebC

Melville

interesting...

What's that now?

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

He's not the only one. There was some 80 year old woman on the radio this morning who said she "wanted real answers, not just a bunch of talk calling all of us elderly people mentally ######ed."

Now, I wasn't at the forum, (Because I'm not elderly, so I was at work Tuesday afternoon) but I seriously doubt any of the candidates called the seniors in attendance "mentally ######ed".

I should also add that mentally ######ed is a direct quote, not the words I would use.

Sometimes I wonder if the book The Giver had it right.

[Cowboy89]

http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/Ba...066/story.html

Seems as though $87 Million on a $2.6 Billion operating budget shouldn't be too tall a task to trim. Maybe in order to help the process the eventual mayor and council could promote a challange to city employees to innovate on costs where people get paid bonuses based on how much their idea's save. That somehow worked in a lot of private businesses during the recession.

I suppose maybe the attitude of the average city employee might be different though as they see their departmental goals counter-intuitive to the goals of reducing taxes. In a private company if you don't get costs in line and profitability suffers people lose their jobs. In the city what's happened is that they just get bailed out by the taxpayer at the tune of council upping the tax bill by the 'required' percentage. Living and working in that environment for years probably wouldn't make employees that keen on coming forward with ways to innovate, especailly when the goal is an arbitrary McIver set goal. He's probably someone who isn't too popular with the civil servant crowd.

This is why I prefer my governments to be small in the first place. The stimulus provided federally in Canada and the US will prove that while it's easy to ratchet up spending, it's very hard to ratchet it back down.

[Rhettzky]

Originally Posted by Cowboy89

Seems as though $87 Million on a $2.6 Billion operating budget shouldn't be too tall a task to trim. Maybe in order to help the process the eventual mayor and council could promote a challange to city employees to innovate on costs where people get paid bonuses based on how much their idea's save. That somehow worked in a lot of private businesses during the recession.

We already have a program like that in place at the City. It does work well for the most part but doesn't really have the teeth needed to make significant change.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Bunk

What's that now?

If he's referring to what I think he is, let's just ignore him!

[Bunk]

Nenshi Podcast on Mobility issues:

http://www.buzzsprout.com/2383/16056...ast-4-mobility

I have to say that in this podcast in particular, Nenshi is really persuasive. His platform here is really well thought out.

[Ducay]

Ugh, I'm starting to think this election is now looking to be ABB instead of ABM

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by Ducay

Ugh, I'm starting to think this election is now looking to be ABB instead of ABM

According to the Herald comments its ABN, with plenty of hate for Higgins.

[frinkprof]

Originally Posted by burn_this_city

According to the Herald comments its ABN, with plenty of hate for Higgins.

Any statement starting with the bolded is usually good for a laugh.

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by Rhettzky

We already have a program like that in place at the City. It does work well for the most part but doesn't really have the teeth needed to make significant change.

Some of these bonuses are flawed. I know a fellow who drives a plow for the city and they get a bonus for coming under budget. So in some areas snow removal is below standard so these guys get a free trip to Hawaii every year. I'd rather them use specific metrics for certain departments to prevent running under budget when they should be spending to it.

[burn_this_city]

Originally Posted by frinkprof

Any statement starting with the bolded is usually good for a laugh.

Oh I know, my favorite places for a chuckle are cbc, cnn, and herald comments.

[KTrain]

I started up an election event on Facebook to help remind some of my friends and family when the election is. Sadly most of them will probably only hear about the election date because it was shown to them on Facebook. I tried to keep it as non-partisan as possible.

Feel free to add yourself and invite anyone you want. It would be nice to get some new voters to the polls.

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=110725145655797

[Ducay]

Now can we have a new poll/thread now that nominations are official?

[worth]

and can we include undecided, because I still am.

[CaptainCrunch]

I remain unbribed.

[CaptainCrunch]