Clean up the City to encourage growth

I've been reading over the web pages of the three candidates for Mayor of Fort St. John -- and one thing that they all have in common, is their stated intention to promote the City to the rest of British Columbia, and perhaps even further afield, in the hopes of attracting more workers, residents and tax-payers to the City. For the good of the City, of course. But to do that, I've heard people say, one must dispel the impression that Fort St. John is cold and dirty, and who would want to live here anyhow?

The thing is, it is cold and dirty. Okay, there are a few months of the year, after the sandy residue has been cleaned off our streets, that it's not dirty. But as soon as it snows, back comes the sand. It's a safety thing - we need to put sand on our streets to help keep vehicles on the roads. That makes it dirty. Trying to tell potential residents otherwise would be misleading. And why is the snow such a problem? Well, because it's cold. I first moved here in 1981, and apart from a couple of years recently, I can't remember a Halloween without snow. Halloween is in October. And the reason gardeners of the area don't plant their gardens until the beginning of June, or at least until after the May long weekend? Because there's no guarantee that there won't be snow or frost until after then. So, during 8 months of the year, there is likely to be snow on the ground. Why does it snow? Because it's cold.

Who would want to live here? Despite the extremes of weather we experience, the Peace region is beautiful to behold. And it's fun to live here.What would encourage people to come to Fort St. John? What would make people want to stay?

We need a greater variety of businesses in Fort St. John. The intentions of the mayoral candidates to promote the City to attract workers are good. But make sure its businesses, not just oilfield workers. For example, I am sick to death of shopping at Wal-Mart, and having no choice of clothing for my children other than the cheap crap that Wal-Mart provides. Okay, there's SmartiPantz too, and I love some of their clothes, but the prices are exorbitant, in my opinion.

Who wants to come here from other centres and suffer from a lack of choice? The most variety we have in our local businesses, it seems to me, are the number of drinking establishments in town. Off the top of my head, I counted 10 establishments with bars (they may be restaurants and bars, but they have a BAR) . . . yet there are only 2 places to buy children's clothing. There is only one place for men to buy a suit. And two places for men's work clothes. That's 5 places to outfit people who make up probably more than half the City's population. Yet, there are at least 10 places where one can get plastered.

There is something wrong with this picture. Perhaps it could be addressed, both in the city's promotion campaigns, and through the downtown revitalization project. I gotta tell you, looking at downtown Fort St. John, particularly the blocks of 100 Avenue, between 100th Street and 104th Street, I sure as heck wouldn't want to come here and look at that every single day.

Face it. It's nasty.

Yet I live here. I've lived here for a long time. There are many good qualities to Fort St. John. But if our future leaders are truly committed to making it a better place - a fine, welcoming, prosperous, aesthetically pleasing city, that people will want to move to - you've gotta do more than just tell people we have a lot of jobs up here, and that our summers are beautiful. You've got to back it up with concrete improvements. And I don't mean a few flower pots and the odd tree on the main drag which miraculously survived snow-plows and vandals.

I'm talking about building standards. Standards of appearance. Sidewalks which were laid a little more recently than 1974. Perhaps put the homeless people to work, cleaning-up the streets that they live on, rather than leaving them to hang around our downtown core, no doubt wishing that they had something to do, other than standing around. Not only could they help, but it might give them back some pride, and a sense of accomplishment.

I know people will ask, where would the money for this come from? How about, instead of wasting taxpayer money on entering the City in the Communities in Bloom competition, we take that funding and use it to make our community a nicer place. Who, in Ontario, for example, really cares how many flower pots Fort St. John has? We have to live here - wouldn't that money be better spent on improving the appearance and services of the city for those who actually live here, not some anonymous pack of judges from Ontario? Really, I would've thought it was a no-brainer.

Yes, participating in the Communities in Bloom competition has been a point of pride for previous mayors and councils . . . but how proud can you be of something that's acting as a bandaid on a festering boil on the butt of our city? Make the City nice for everyone, 12 months of year, not just for a pack of judges in who come to town in June.

Whichever of the mayoral candidates who could come up with viable plan to do that, would have my vote on November 19th.

Political virginity abounds!

As I write this, the deadline for submitting candidacy papers for Fort St. John's municipal election is a mere 6 hours away. I'm pleased to note that for this election, there is a whole slew of political virgins, itching to get their hands dirty in the local political arena.

Virgins, you say? Why did I call them virgins? Simply because a large number of people running for Fort St. John City Council this year have never held public office before. Like the HGTV show, Property Virgins, about people who have never bought a property before - these people who want to run our city, who want to make it a better place for all residents, are Political Virgins.

This is a really good thing.

That's not to say there's anything wrong with long-time councillors running again. Because there isn't. I'm encouraged by the fact that there's going to be a good mix of old and new on council for the next 3 years, following this election. It's pretty much guaranteed.

Okay, on the news this morning, they said that there's enough candidates to completely replace the current council, but I really don't think that's going to happen. While political virginity is a good thing, a whole council of unproven, untried, inexperienced political virgins just might be a really bad idea. Obviously, those running for council care about the city, and how it's run, but to balance their enthusiasm and new ideas, we still need some voices of experience.

The area which really needs to have a large dose of political experience is the position of Mayor of Fort St. John. While I admire the guts of those who run for mayor without any prior political experience, I have to admit that I think its a bad idea. Maybe I'm old-fashioned or something, but I think one should work their way up to the position, get some experience on council first, and see if the political life is really the life one wants. And if they can handle the pressure.

Look what happened the last time a politically inexperienced mayor got elected. The people were unhappy. The city was embarrassed. No doubt, the mayor was also unhappy and embarrassed. I would've been. But, that's done. Come December, he can move on to something more enjoyable, something less potentially volatile perhaps.

At the moment, we have 3 candidates for mayor; and 11 candidates for council, 6 of whom have never held political office. This weekend, after the nominations have closed, I'll discuss my thoughts on the council and mayoral candidates. Hopefully, I will have plenty of encouraging news for the voters of Fort St. John.

Thanks for reading! And remember, on November 19 - go out and VOTE!!

Succumbing to Election Fever!!

That's right, I've succumbed to election fever - Fort St. John's municipal election, that is. I realized yesterday, that I've been disgustingly UN-informed for the past few years . . . an inexcusable situation for me, since I used to be in the media and knew everything that was going on at City Hall. Okay, I've been busy at home, having and raising our children, and I was boycotting the Alaska Highway News for awhile because, they, in my opinion, couldn't write a coherent sentence or get the facts right if their lives depended on it - but those people have either been tuned in, or left the paper in the last year.

So, I now have no-one to blame for my ignorance, except myself. A situation I propose to rectify. Immediately.

Before I start pontificating on what the current city council has done wrong, or right, let me start by saying that I don't believe any ONE person is responsible for the things that have gone on in the past three years. After-all, there are 7 people on council (6 councillors and a mayor), and they all have a vote. And I don't think that any of the people on council are bad people. Obviously, some collective un-wise decisions have been made, but I don't think they were made maliciously. Some of the councillors, and indeed, the mayor, I know personally, and they're all good people. As are some of those running for election, other than the incumbents. I don't know them all, obviously, Fort St. John is a much bigger city than it used to be.

Join me in my battle against political ignorance, as I analyse what they've done, what they shouldn't have done and what all the candidates propose to do differently - if they think change is needed. This analysis will start at the beginning in 2000, when I wrote an article on Fort St. John, for the community focus section of Northwest Business Magazine.

Thanks for reading!