I am only one of many residents right now that are trying to figure out where the Inspiration for our new brand came from.
I think I may have found the answer on my fellow bloggers latest post regarding A return to Mountain Freedom and one of the comments available at. http://blog.johnprince.ca/
http://footage.shutterstock.com/clip-3271019-stock-footage-triangles-representing-mountains-forming-up-different-formations-retro-computer-game-style.html
http://www.johnprince.ca/images/image.png
Showing posts with label John Prince. Show all posts
Showing posts with label John Prince. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 3, 2013
Sunday, March 24, 2013
The Blame game and moving forward Oct 21st
Just spent a couple of days thinking about what my fellow blogger John Prince posted http://blog.johnprince.ca/2013/03/ratepayers-blame-game.html regarding the Ratepayers meeting the other night and who is to blame for our situation. Before I ramble on about my opinion of where we go from here I would like to make a couple of statements.
1. A lot of what John said is true.
2. Who's to blame? most of us I will be the first to admit, I voted for some of these guys. Let's be honest how many people got caught up in the "he's so educated, he's young, he's got some great idea's, he's going to cut our taxes once he gets everything in order....." the list could go on and on but never the less people got caught up in it.
What happens now? The municipal Inspection will come in listen to a lot of people, various organizations and then throw this issue back into the hands of the taxpayers on October 21st.
Even though this council has done a lot of things that a lot of people disagree with. When you read the Municipal government act, there is no clause that says you can't raise taxes, franchise fees, hire administrators, bring in peace officers, get rid of fire departments, or for that matter spend tons of money putting a bunch of triangles together.
I am not saying for one second that the petition should not have been done I understand fully why people did it, but council instead of taking the attitude of listening to the statement 2500+ people made signing that petition, took an attitude of "bring it on you won't find anything wrong". Maybe if they had Calder Bateman working for them at that time they would have took a different approach.
What the Municipal Government act states is that we the people of this municipality get to make a choice on where we go from here. Even in the remote chance that the province threw this council out we would still be faced with the same issue October 21st.
Now we can keep blaming, pointing fingers or we can start preparing for October 21 which ever route we pick will ultimately come back to Oct 21st. So now we need to talk about moving forward, come Sept 23 (Nomination Day) I expect that most of the incumbents will put their names forth for the next term. So for those people that support this council the issue is very simple they will mark their x and look forward to four more years of what they have just had.
If you are not part of that group, you need to start thinking about either running for office yourself or looking at people around the community that could and will represent what you are looking for over the next four years.
The qualities required to sit on a municipal council? Some say that it requires common sense that's true, it also requires that you can understand numbers, If you can't that first budget Administration will bury you with paper, past experience with budgets is a great asset. Then you better have a back bone, very quickly you will be labelled one of the Mayor's puppets if you do not speak up. You also better understand it is impossible to please everybody, some peoples expectations are very high and at times unrealistic. There will be a need to make some very difficult decisions over the next four years if you do not have the stomach for that, please don't step forward. You also better be a person that is a good listener, people need to feel like you are really listening to them.
Most importantly if your going to help this community to move forward start of by being honest, do not tell the public you are going to fix everything over night. Do not tell people that once you get a handle on things you will cut taxes. Do not tell the people your are one of them and then spend the next four years looking down on them.
We, by that I mean the residents of the Crowsnest Pass that are not satisfied with the direction of this community over the last three years need to be preparing for some hard work and to start making some good choices or else we will get the same as we have had and maybe even worse for the next four years.
1. A lot of what John said is true.
2. Who's to blame? most of us I will be the first to admit, I voted for some of these guys. Let's be honest how many people got caught up in the "he's so educated, he's young, he's got some great idea's, he's going to cut our taxes once he gets everything in order....." the list could go on and on but never the less people got caught up in it.
What happens now? The municipal Inspection will come in listen to a lot of people, various organizations and then throw this issue back into the hands of the taxpayers on October 21st.
Even though this council has done a lot of things that a lot of people disagree with. When you read the Municipal government act, there is no clause that says you can't raise taxes, franchise fees, hire administrators, bring in peace officers, get rid of fire departments, or for that matter spend tons of money putting a bunch of triangles together.
I am not saying for one second that the petition should not have been done I understand fully why people did it, but council instead of taking the attitude of listening to the statement 2500+ people made signing that petition, took an attitude of "bring it on you won't find anything wrong". Maybe if they had Calder Bateman working for them at that time they would have took a different approach.
What the Municipal Government act states is that we the people of this municipality get to make a choice on where we go from here. Even in the remote chance that the province threw this council out we would still be faced with the same issue October 21st.
Now we can keep blaming, pointing fingers or we can start preparing for October 21 which ever route we pick will ultimately come back to Oct 21st. So now we need to talk about moving forward, come Sept 23 (Nomination Day) I expect that most of the incumbents will put their names forth for the next term. So for those people that support this council the issue is very simple they will mark their x and look forward to four more years of what they have just had.
If you are not part of that group, you need to start thinking about either running for office yourself or looking at people around the community that could and will represent what you are looking for over the next four years.
The qualities required to sit on a municipal council? Some say that it requires common sense that's true, it also requires that you can understand numbers, If you can't that first budget Administration will bury you with paper, past experience with budgets is a great asset. Then you better have a back bone, very quickly you will be labelled one of the Mayor's puppets if you do not speak up. You also better understand it is impossible to please everybody, some peoples expectations are very high and at times unrealistic. There will be a need to make some very difficult decisions over the next four years if you do not have the stomach for that, please don't step forward. You also better be a person that is a good listener, people need to feel like you are really listening to them.
Most importantly if your going to help this community to move forward start of by being honest, do not tell the public you are going to fix everything over night. Do not tell people that once you get a handle on things you will cut taxes. Do not tell the people your are one of them and then spend the next four years looking down on them.
We, by that I mean the residents of the Crowsnest Pass that are not satisfied with the direction of this community over the last three years need to be preparing for some hard work and to start making some good choices or else we will get the same as we have had and maybe even worse for the next four years.
Monday, October 15, 2012
The other side of the Issue in the Crowsnest Pass
John Prince posted on the other side of the issue this morning.
http://blog.johnprince.ca/2012/10/the-good-bad-and-ugly-of-cnp-fire.html
I would advise everybody to read this post, the most important part about Democracy is allowing everybody the right to their opinion. If you do or don't agree that's fine it's another part of the process we call Freedom.
http://blog.johnprince.ca/2012/10/the-good-bad-and-ugly-of-cnp-fire.html
I would advise everybody to read this post, the most important part about Democracy is allowing everybody the right to their opinion. If you do or don't agree that's fine it's another part of the process we call Freedom.
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Former Fire Chief Speaks out.
Slagging off, Mr Prince beat me again he has printed the article from this week's Crowsnest Pass Promoter. Regarding the former Interim Fire Chiefs comments made at the last council meeting.
http://blog.johnprince.ca/
Can not understand if they had the full support of Mayor and Council why this got of the tracks.
Begs the question who is running the good ship Crowsnest Pass?
http://blog.johnprince.ca/
Can not understand if they had the full support of Mayor and Council why this got of the tracks.
Begs the question who is running the good ship Crowsnest Pass?
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Crowsnest Pass CAO Update
On John Prince's blog there is a further update on this situation.
http://blog.johnprince.ca/2011/05/councillor-gallant-appeals-to-residents.html
http://blog.johnprince.ca/2011/05/councillor-gallant-appeals-to-residents.html
Monday, April 4, 2011
New Blog of Interest
Under my heading of Interesting Blog and Websites you will see a new listing, "The Miners Journey" which belongs to long time Pass resident Peter Rosner, this will give readers one more perspective on life in the Crowsnest Pass. Would be good for anybody that's got the time to check it out.
Note: Also under Interesting blogs you will not see "The Pass" any more that blog is now under the author's name "John Prince", like Peter above another long term resident of the Crowsnest Pass, please check out when you can
Note: Also under Interesting blogs you will not see "The Pass" any more that blog is now under the author's name "John Prince", like Peter above another long term resident of the Crowsnest Pass, please check out when you can
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Poll Results to 9:30am October 14 (Three days to vote)
I know its not scientific, and I know blogs only appeal to a certain element of the population.
But some interesting results so far on my Blog and Mr Prince's, the first six choices on my poll are:
Ward
Saje
Gallant
Cole
Londsbury
Macleod
The first six on Mr Prince's Blog are:
Saje
Ward
Gallant
Longsbury
Macleod
Cole
Same six names, different order but never the less the same six.
Then where it gets really interesting is names through positions seven to ten.
On both they are identical:
7-Saindon
8-Mitchell
9-Sygutek
10-Irwin
Once again I realize, this is not Angus Reid and election day may be totally different, but it is interesting how the names are lining up.
But now the readers of both Blogs if your not happy you still have time to vote.
You can link over to Mr Prince's blog my clicking on "the Pass" under Interesting blogs to the right of my page.
But some interesting results so far on my Blog and Mr Prince's, the first six choices on my poll are:
Ward
Saje
Gallant
Cole
Londsbury
Macleod
The first six on Mr Prince's Blog are:
Saje
Ward
Gallant
Longsbury
Macleod
Cole
Same six names, different order but never the less the same six.
Then where it gets really interesting is names through positions seven to ten.
On both they are identical:
7-Saindon
8-Mitchell
9-Sygutek
10-Irwin
Once again I realize, this is not Angus Reid and election day may be totally different, but it is interesting how the names are lining up.
But now the readers of both Blogs if your not happy you still have time to vote.
You can link over to Mr Prince's blog my clicking on "the Pass" under Interesting blogs to the right of my page.
So Vote
Friday, October 1, 2010
Throw the bums out!
On Mr Prince's Blog this morning is a post regarding the rising discontent over incumbent politicians and how local incumbent politicians should be very afraid.
I would like to speak to some of the comments he refers to.
http://blog.johnprince.ca/search?updated-min=2010-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-07%3A00&updated-max=2011-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-07%3A00&max-results=25
I know this is a case on the International and provincial side of things but the article he refers to does not talk at any point about municipal politics, but lets assume it will flow to that level.
Anyway let's talk about the rest of the post I will take some quotes and address them with my comments :
"According to the above story people in general are angry. Very Angry! They feel their politicians are elitist, arrogant and oblivious to their pain and suffering, and as such doing little to nothing to address their issues and concerns. As a result, it's a very, very bad time to be an incumbent."
Most of us on the present council are simple folks six of us have lived here for ten years or more.
Do we have some members of our council that are elitist, arrogant and oblivious to the residents pain and suffering, yes I think we have some of that do you really think taht applies to the whole of council? should they all be painted with that same brush?
Then we go to:
"With this in mind, I wonder how our own incumbents are feeling about their chances of getting back in, considering the mood of our residents towards the on-going, never ending, three year long battle between the two waring camps on our council?"
John you really do not buy into the 4-3 Irwin propaganda do you? we all know that council spilt over the Crowsnest Centre issue and a some budgetary related issues. We also all recognize that 95% of Council Motions pass by something other than 4-3.
Would this be the first council accused of being 4-3?
But as you have said many times yourself this council did a lot of things well and did not receive enough credit for the good things they did.
"The never ending battle between the waring camps" isn't that exactly how the media, Irwin and his cronies portrayed the council from 1998-2001? Was that all accurate?.
"All the while, apparently, oblivious to the fact there is a good chance none of them will be getting back in because of their past actions".
If none of us are to get back in due to our "past" actions then I suspect the voters will go back further than just this last council, because very few of us that have sat on council previously have not had our names tarnished by one part of the media or the other and Irwin's cronies.
"and understand from this that what is needed and wanted is democracy in action where councillors actually work together as a team for the greater common good and get things done, by applying some good old-fashioned basic common-sense while leaving the grandstanding and 'gotcha' politics behind"
Democracy isn't that about taking a position, debating it and voting? 4-3, 5-2, 6-1, 7-0 which one of them is not democracy.
"Can one blame them? After all, this council treated us like we were mushrooms i.e. kept us in the dark and fed us BS. We never had public forums to discuss any of the important issues, such as Bridgecreek/River Run and the lack of security deposits and long-term taxpayer liabilities, CLC (legal costs), the 4-3 voter split, etc., etc. and still know little to nothing on who, what, when and why with respect to these matters? They acted like they were above us and need not bother or trouble themselves with such matters as accountability and due diligence. Transparency went out the door as did fiscal responsibility. Thoughtful people believe one side was as bad as the other with respect to these matters, and therefore neither side is deserving of getting back in."
Couple of comments:
The Bridgecreek/River Run this is a private deal no different than any other development, we as a council can approve development agreements, zoning etc. No different than if I owned a piece of private land the municipality can not force me a built on it. There are people here that have owned land for 50 years and never done anything with it. That is a right allowed to us in a democratic country.
The mistakes the council made here was when the first council sold this property back in the mid 90's with no conditions attached to it.
Then this council made a large error, when we did not force them to put up security, I also feel that the Mayor made a big mistake when he appeared in their promotional video.
CLC legal costs those were not caused by council if you go back to the report in the spring that we were given by our financial officer after a request by Councillor Mitchell if memory serves me right those costs were about $80,000. Approximately $30,000 of that was due to the plebiscite that was forced on the municipality, which the public eventually sent a clear message on. The rest was as a result of the legal action taken due to the leases signed by the CLC Society.
The 4-3 I give Irwin credit here, he created an issue to blind as many people as possible to the real issues.
What amazes me is that some really smart people have brought into this issue, unless of course they are just using it for political advantage!
Another point if we are going to label this council as the 4-3 council what would we label previous councils, I hope I get this right:
1998-2001 4-3
2001-2004 5-2
2004-2007 4-3
2007-2010 4-3
Help me out folks let me know if I'm wrong.
"Fiscal Responsibility out the door".
Really over the last ten years can anybody point to a council that as done more to become more efficient, to reduce costs, than this one? sometime in the next two weeks I will list them all.
Anyway back to the question on the post, should incumbents be afraid? I guess depending on which side of the issues the voters side with, obviously some incumbents should be afraid.
But I believe that some of the councillors on this last council stood for what they truly believed in despite the fact that they were lambasted in parts of the media week after week.
They could have had it easy, they could have sat back and agreed with Irwin and his cronies, caused no controversy, had wonderful things said about them by those same hacks.
And today those same people would be blasting them for being a 7-0 council, a bunch of mindless sheep, Irwinites, that stood for nothing.
Anyway I believe that the people of the Crowsnest Pass are smart enough to cut through the crap that parts of the local media and Irwin and his cronies, have put out about members of this council and previous ones.
Finally yes I agree some what in that a few of the incumbents do not deserve to come back.
Change will happen in the Crowsnest Pass.
I would like to speak to some of the comments he refers to.
http://blog.johnprince.ca/search?updated-min=2010-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-07%3A00&updated-max=2011-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-07%3A00&max-results=25
I know this is a case on the International and provincial side of things but the article he refers to does not talk at any point about municipal politics, but lets assume it will flow to that level.
Anyway let's talk about the rest of the post I will take some quotes and address them with my comments :
"According to the above story people in general are angry. Very Angry! They feel their politicians are elitist, arrogant and oblivious to their pain and suffering, and as such doing little to nothing to address their issues and concerns. As a result, it's a very, very bad time to be an incumbent."
Most of us on the present council are simple folks six of us have lived here for ten years or more.
Do we have some members of our council that are elitist, arrogant and oblivious to the residents pain and suffering, yes I think we have some of that do you really think taht applies to the whole of council? should they all be painted with that same brush?
Then we go to:
"With this in mind, I wonder how our own incumbents are feeling about their chances of getting back in, considering the mood of our residents towards the on-going, never ending, three year long battle between the two waring camps on our council?"
John you really do not buy into the 4-3 Irwin propaganda do you? we all know that council spilt over the Crowsnest Centre issue and a some budgetary related issues. We also all recognize that 95% of Council Motions pass by something other than 4-3.
Would this be the first council accused of being 4-3?
But as you have said many times yourself this council did a lot of things well and did not receive enough credit for the good things they did.
"The never ending battle between the waring camps" isn't that exactly how the media, Irwin and his cronies portrayed the council from 1998-2001? Was that all accurate?.
"All the while, apparently, oblivious to the fact there is a good chance none of them will be getting back in because of their past actions".
If none of us are to get back in due to our "past" actions then I suspect the voters will go back further than just this last council, because very few of us that have sat on council previously have not had our names tarnished by one part of the media or the other and Irwin's cronies.
"and understand from this that what is needed and wanted is democracy in action where councillors actually work together as a team for the greater common good and get things done, by applying some good old-fashioned basic common-sense while leaving the grandstanding and 'gotcha' politics behind"
Democracy isn't that about taking a position, debating it and voting? 4-3, 5-2, 6-1, 7-0 which one of them is not democracy.
"Can one blame them? After all, this council treated us like we were mushrooms i.e. kept us in the dark and fed us BS. We never had public forums to discuss any of the important issues, such as Bridgecreek/River Run and the lack of security deposits and long-term taxpayer liabilities, CLC (legal costs), the 4-3 voter split, etc., etc. and still know little to nothing on who, what, when and why with respect to these matters? They acted like they were above us and need not bother or trouble themselves with such matters as accountability and due diligence. Transparency went out the door as did fiscal responsibility. Thoughtful people believe one side was as bad as the other with respect to these matters, and therefore neither side is deserving of getting back in."
Couple of comments:
The Bridgecreek/River Run this is a private deal no different than any other development, we as a council can approve development agreements, zoning etc. No different than if I owned a piece of private land the municipality can not force me a built on it. There are people here that have owned land for 50 years and never done anything with it. That is a right allowed to us in a democratic country.
The mistakes the council made here was when the first council sold this property back in the mid 90's with no conditions attached to it.
Then this council made a large error, when we did not force them to put up security, I also feel that the Mayor made a big mistake when he appeared in their promotional video.
CLC legal costs those were not caused by council if you go back to the report in the spring that we were given by our financial officer after a request by Councillor Mitchell if memory serves me right those costs were about $80,000. Approximately $30,000 of that was due to the plebiscite that was forced on the municipality, which the public eventually sent a clear message on. The rest was as a result of the legal action taken due to the leases signed by the CLC Society.
The 4-3 I give Irwin credit here, he created an issue to blind as many people as possible to the real issues.
What amazes me is that some really smart people have brought into this issue, unless of course they are just using it for political advantage!
Another point if we are going to label this council as the 4-3 council what would we label previous councils, I hope I get this right:
1998-2001 4-3
2001-2004 5-2
2004-2007 4-3
2007-2010 4-3
Help me out folks let me know if I'm wrong.
"Fiscal Responsibility out the door".
Really over the last ten years can anybody point to a council that as done more to become more efficient, to reduce costs, than this one? sometime in the next two weeks I will list them all.
Anyway back to the question on the post, should incumbents be afraid? I guess depending on which side of the issues the voters side with, obviously some incumbents should be afraid.
But I believe that some of the councillors on this last council stood for what they truly believed in despite the fact that they were lambasted in parts of the media week after week.
They could have had it easy, they could have sat back and agreed with Irwin and his cronies, caused no controversy, had wonderful things said about them by those same hacks.
And today those same people would be blasting them for being a 7-0 council, a bunch of mindless sheep, Irwinites, that stood for nothing.
Anyway I believe that the people of the Crowsnest Pass are smart enough to cut through the crap that parts of the local media and Irwin and his cronies, have put out about members of this council and previous ones.
Finally yes I agree some what in that a few of the incumbents do not deserve to come back.
Change will happen in the Crowsnest Pass.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Reporting the News in the Crowsnest Pass
Reading a post on my fellow Bloggers site, regarding the issue of "media censorship" in the Crowsnest Pass.
http://blog.johnprince.ca/
I was a little surprised in my five years on Council I have not noticed any kind of censorship in the local papers until now. (Hate to be sarcastic)
Now if we want to talk about bias that's a different issue, some examples.
The four to three vote on council some of the media makes this sound like it's the regular way of doing business, they fail to report that 90%+ of all motions at council record a vote other than 4-3. Even in our corporate review it reports that the 4-3 is only common on significant issues (Crowsnest Centre).
The greater problem where the issue of bias comes in, is that the previous council and every council prior to that had some kind of spilt but because the spilt favoured the Mayor and his supporters that was acceptable and obviously not news worthy . Bias? maybe.
The Corporate Review itself after numerous discussions with various members of our community, I discussed with as many people as I could what came out of it based on what they had read in the media. Depending on the time of the week I spoke to people (One paper comes out on Tuesday the other on Friday) the first comments were all focused on the 4-3 and the perception that the issues Council faces are the fault of one part of council. The group of people I spoke to later in the week seem to feel that there are many issues related to council and its the fault of all of them. Bias? Maybe
The issue of the Crowsnest Centre from what has been printed in the media a total stranger to the Community not knowing the problems, would assume that Council is shutting down a solid, financially viable, some people have even suggested profitable, operation. Of course I do not believe that nonsense but I guess we will find out the truth at the end of the year when the Municipality takes it back over. Bias? Maybe
Speaking of the Corporate Review and thinking about Mr Prince's comments what did the Review have to say about the local media.
Page 69 "The relationship to the local newspapers appears to be mixed and may be based on the degree of support shown by one relative to the other to one "side" of Council" Does that say Bias?
Anyway I tip my hat to Mr Prince for raising this "new issue", I'm sure when he was on Council there was no issues with "Censorship, Bias, One sided reporting, Spilt votes, etc etc"
http://blog.johnprince.ca/
I was a little surprised in my five years on Council I have not noticed any kind of censorship in the local papers until now. (Hate to be sarcastic)
Now if we want to talk about bias that's a different issue, some examples.
The four to three vote on council some of the media makes this sound like it's the regular way of doing business, they fail to report that 90%+ of all motions at council record a vote other than 4-3. Even in our corporate review it reports that the 4-3 is only common on significant issues (Crowsnest Centre).
The greater problem where the issue of bias comes in, is that the previous council and every council prior to that had some kind of spilt but because the spilt favoured the Mayor and his supporters that was acceptable and obviously not news worthy . Bias? maybe.
The Corporate Review itself after numerous discussions with various members of our community, I discussed with as many people as I could what came out of it based on what they had read in the media. Depending on the time of the week I spoke to people (One paper comes out on Tuesday the other on Friday) the first comments were all focused on the 4-3 and the perception that the issues Council faces are the fault of one part of council. The group of people I spoke to later in the week seem to feel that there are many issues related to council and its the fault of all of them. Bias? Maybe
The issue of the Crowsnest Centre from what has been printed in the media a total stranger to the Community not knowing the problems, would assume that Council is shutting down a solid, financially viable, some people have even suggested profitable, operation. Of course I do not believe that nonsense but I guess we will find out the truth at the end of the year when the Municipality takes it back over. Bias? Maybe
Speaking of the Corporate Review and thinking about Mr Prince's comments what did the Review have to say about the local media.
Page 69 "The relationship to the local newspapers appears to be mixed and may be based on the degree of support shown by one relative to the other to one "side" of Council" Does that say Bias?
Anyway I tip my hat to Mr Prince for raising this "new issue", I'm sure when he was on Council there was no issues with "Censorship, Bias, One sided reporting, Spilt votes, etc etc"
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