Take the time to read it if you can, looking forward to my reader's comments. Remember I will not censor any comments has long as they are not personnel or slanderous.
http://briangallant.ca/wordpress/2012/11/03/the-other-side-of-the-petition/
Dean's Comments
First of all his comments regarding people/businesses being
intimidated or mislead. If that is true a simple call to municipal affairs from
enough people will get that departments attention, there is a toll free number
in the phone book and your call is confidential.
Mislead, there are 2500 people on that petition in less than
three weeks. The group that went around in late 2008 had 1201 names. Does he
really believe that an additional 1300 people can be "misled" maybe
he is thinking we have a lot of dumb people here (I don't think so).
Mr. Gallant made the following comment: "Has anyone else out there realized that
there was a petition against council, which ended in a consultant hired by
council to conduct an inquiry, almost exactly three years ago?"
This was not true, when the budget process began in October
of 2008 a number of councilors requested that a corporate review take place.
The majority recognized we had problems in the municipality, and that we needed
an unbiased source to help us identify those problems.
September of 2008 the plebiscite on the Crowsnest Centre
took place. Obviously, there were some people that disagreed with that decision
and the group "Citizens to save the Crowsnest
Pass May 5,
2009 council meeting stating that the petition was invalid.
The minister stated the following: "However, I suggest that the
municipality consider engaging a third party to conduct a review of the
administrative and governance processes in place. The review presents an
opportunity to evaluate the municipality's strengths and identify potentials
for improvement."
At that point, the motion was made to approach George Cuff
to conduct a corporate review.
The whole issue of a corporate review was a political battle
within the council of the day, the minister's comments only reconfirmed the
position the majority of council had taken seven months prior to the petition
failing and three months prior to it even beginning. Prior to the petition even
being conceived the majority of council had publicly taken a position that a
corporate review was necessary and would have happened even without a petition.
Therefore, to try to tie the two together is "misleading"
Then he states the following: "I will also say that I
have received dozens and dozens of phone calls, emails, and face-to-face
endorsements from residents that council should stick to its path because we
are doing the right thing"
That sounds like the "silent majority thing
again".
Picture this Calgary has roughly 900,000 eligible voters,
what do you think the council in Calgary would say if a citizens group went out
and signed up 475,000 names on a petition in less than three weeks. "The
silent majority support us"?
He also states the following:
"Other residents told me that the petitioners said, “We
need to get rid of all these newcomers” because it’s obviously the “newcomers”
that are to blame for everything, not 30+ years of poor management".
First, you want to talk about a divisive comment, I have sat
at ratepayers meeting and have seen people that have been here all their lives
and other that have only been here for a few years. Same with the people going
around with petitions.
This 30+ years of poor management crap is getting on my
nerves, no question there has been some councils and administrations that have
been stronger and done a better job than others do. Do I think there has been
30+ years of poor management? No
