What this city NEEDS from its councilor

Hamilton is an aging city that, since at least amalgamation, has not been able to get its head around spending. I contribute this shortfall to overall city mismanagement and a neglected understanding of the city budget purpose. We are all creatures of habit and unfortunately we have been habitually making mistakes. I believe we are now entering a time of consequence; the City of Hamilton needs a voice that understands the real issues to their core. We need to go far beyond just the basics that we have in front of us.

This city needs a person that will stop trying to find revenue tools and begin to find ways to stop the spending.

As cities are revenue neutral, all revenue should be used to fund services, not cover up overspending (to avoid a tax increase). Currently, our elected officials are trying to find additional revenue so that the taxpayer doesn’t realize the true costs. The tax verses service ratio in this city is unbalanced (especially for the community of Flamborough).

This practice of deceit needs to end!

The city needs someone that will review the budget department by department on a consistent basis, NOT once a year.

In the private sector, I review budgets daily, tracking expenses against the budget to ensure profitability. In a municipal government system, given the scope of the budget, this isn’t always possible. However, holding department heads accountable to there own budget, will allow a more managed expense system.

The city has levels of management across all divisions.  In many cases, which i'll address later, we have too many managers and not enough people doing the hands on tasks. What I propose for this coming term is very simple.

We have to hold people accountable to their own department budget and if they fail to keep it on track then we have make changes. I know that no one is perfect, myself included, but a consistent negligence to the budget has brought us here (a roughly 2 billion dollar problem), and it needs to end now.

The city needs someone who is willing to hold people accountable to both their successes and failures.

Accountability has been lacking municipally, provincially, and even federally for decades. This is mainly because the body that truly governs government is government. It is very easy, through process, to disguise the total picture and avoid questions on a persons work. As part of my plan, I will become COMPLETELY accountable to my constituents. I will present to my constituents, my position on the issues and document this in plain English. The people of this city, of this province, of this country, want their questions answered. We can’t afford to allow our current ways to continue, especially on a municipal level. I will create internal processes that allow the work of city staff to be open and traceable.

This practice of deceit needs to end!

The city needs elected officials that will show up to every meeting and vote on the issues that matter.

So many times, certain councilors are absent on key votes in order to avoid their own accountability issues. As part of my platform, which can be read under the Vision 2018 (insert hyper-link) section of the web page, I will make mandatory that all elected officials either attend the scheduled meetings or face city issued fines from their salary. The monies generated from this fine will be donated to a local charity on behalf of the city.

Its time that the residents of Ward 14, and beyond, got the representation that they have been paying for out of city hall and its time that all taxpayers see the city for what it has really become. We can’t re-write history, but together we can change the future.

We can fix this. In fact, we will fix this!

I can’t do this alone. Together on October 27th, and through 2018, I need your help. We all depend on your vote…

The city of Hamilton needs this vote to count.

The future children of Hamilton need this vote to count.

The elderly residents of Hamilton need this vote to count.