2010 in Pictures: Let's Get Municipal

Maybe he's running for the BC Liberal Leadership...

Prentice and the Tory caucus, in happier times

Sadly, he's not resigning in furor over the potash deal. There isn't a hidden scandal involving Chinese pandas. He's not in any way involved with Julie Couillard.

Rather, Jim Prentice will resign as an MP to take a Vice-President position at CIBC. I'm not up on my conflict-of-interest rules, but I'm sure the Tories will assure us this doesn't breach any ethical guidelines and the Liberals will assure us it most certainly does.

Well, that's the official explanation for his departure. The more truthful one is that being Stephen Harper's environment minister is a miserable job that is quietly killing Prentice's soul and/or leadership ambitions. So, bon voyage Jim - we'll look you up when Stephen Harper or Ed Stelmach announce their resignations.

As for what it all means, we'll have a by election in Calgary - I'll leave it to the good people at Pundits Guide to speculate on timing, though I suspect it will get rolled up with the other two by elections we have coming down the pipe (one for a Bloc seat in Quebec, the other in Jay Hill's BC riding). Being Calgary, (spoiler alert!) the Conservatives will win that by election (though to downplay expectations the PMO will let Jane Taber know it's the Liberals' seat to lose).

I know it won't happen, but if anyone wants to speculate about Dave Bronconnier making a jump to federal politics, this would be a good time to do that. Calgary Centre-North one of the most Liberal-friendly ridings in the city, a popular moderate incumbent is leaving, and a by election entry point would let Bronconnier win on his name rather than on the Liberal brand. Toss in frustration among the Tory base over wild spending, and this is about as good a chance as Bronco's ever going to get. Hell, the city's even in a "let's go wild" kind of mood, having just elected Naheed Nenshi as mayor. Maybe they'd be crazy enough to vote in a Liberal!

But assuming Bronco doesn't run, the more interesting side effect of this is the inevitable Cabinet shuffle speculation we're about to be subjected to. John Baird will act as interim environment minister but assuming "interim" actually means "interim" (and this isn't like "Canada's new government") someone else will eventually inherit the portfolio.

As mentioned above, it's not exactly a prize job. I have no clue who Harper will choose, though I'm guessing it's likely someone whose leadership ambitions Harper is looking to crush.

Go Vote!

Monday is municipal Election Day and, after fewer than 1 in 5 Calgarians voted in the last municipal election, I’d encourage all my Calgary readers to take a few minutes from their time to cast a ballot. Hell, if you’re surfing blogs right now, you can’t use the “I’m too busy” excuse. Since the City decided against sending out “where do I vote” cards, if you’re looking for your voting station, you’ll need to click here.

While I could give a somewhat unbiased run down of the candidates, if the Herald’s not going to be impartial, I don’t see why a freaking blog should. What I can do is point you towards the Enlightened Savage who has an AMAZING recap of all the candidates for all the positions. Incredibly detailled - it's well worth the read. As for me, here’s why I’m voting for my guy.

I think the most important thing to do is to send a message. Calgary is, above all else, an establishment city. In the past 27 years, the incumbent mayor has won every time. It’s never even been close. The strongest challenge against an incumbent in that time was Ray Clark, who garnered 17% of the vote in 1998. I think Calgarians need to send a message in this election that the City is off track in some key areas.

The “roads, roads, and more roads” doctrine that swept Bronconnier into power twice has not worked. Traffic has worsened and Calgary Transit, despite high ridership numbers, has fallen behind where it should be. Public Transit only works if it’s accessible and enjoyable to ride. To make it accessible, we need to get the West and South-East LRT legs built. To make it enjoyable, we need to get four car trains running on existing routes, to ease congestion. Bronconnier’s proposal to expand the C-Train further north-east and north-west before building the south-east line or going to four car trains will just mean more overcrowding, turning more people off of the transit option. That's why Alnoor wants to get 4 car trains on the system and create new lines before expanding the existing, overcrowded ones.

Another key plank is transparency and accountability. Despite the howls Calgary raised towards the federal government on accountability issues, there are no rules right now at the municipal level. There is no ethics commissioner. There is no municipal auditor general. There are no campaign finance rules. Barry Erskine walked away from his job 4 days before the election and his entire war chest is his to keep. Bronconnier hasn’t ruled out using his sizeable war chest to run for MP or MLA. There’s also no real estate registry so there’s no way to know if elected officials are in conflict of interest on votes that can dramatically change property values.

The third issue that I personally feel strongly about is the secondary suite one. Right now, there are thousands of illegal secondary suites across Calgary because it’s illegal to rent out your basement in most parts of the city. Legalizing secondary suites would ensure the current suites are safe and would add thousands of units of rental space to the market.

Those are just the issues that grabbed me the most. Feel free to browse the full platform if taxes, the environment, or crime are the things that get you going.

I wouldn’t say that Bronconnier has been a bad Mayor. Far from it. But there is just so much potential in this city and it’s important to send a message that there needs to be a shift in some key areas. And the best way to send a message is by voting for Alnoor Kassam.

Would that have been my choice? Probably not.

The mayoral debates were held last night and I must say I found it quite enjoyable. You get a wide range of characters up on stage at things like this ("all my clothes are recycled except for my pantyhose").

The debate featured some lively exchanges between Alnoor and Dave on taxes, secondary suites, and accountability. Anything else I could add would just be subjective so, instead, I'll turn things over to the Better Calgary Campaign who, I might add, have already endorsed Dave Bronconnier (with reservations...growing reservations one imagines):

To quickly recap, a member of the audience complained that the Tourism Calgary, an agency partially funded by the city, had promoted Calgary as a friendly destination for gay and lesbian tourists prior to the North American Outgames, which were held in Calgary earlier this year. The Mayor, to our astonishment, did not defend Tourism Calgary, but went to great pains to distance himself from their actions (i.e. advertising to the gay community). In fact, he actually said that if the decision were up to him, he would not have ran the same advertisement. David Bertram, on the other hand, spoke passionately about diversity and the positive economic impact that reaching out to gay and lesbian tourists had on our city.

At the Better Calgary Campaign, we believe a vibrant city is a city the celebrates and promotes diversity. We are profoundly disappointed that Mayor Bronconnier, when faced with the opportunity to stand up and defend Tourism Calgary's admirable attempt to reach out to the gay and lesbian community, couldn't bring himself to do the right thing. We expected better.

You can read their full debate recap here.

Wednesday Round Up

Municipal: On the municipal election front, things are heating up. Imagine my surprise when my Tuesday night joindave newsletter had veiled references directed towards the Go Alnoor campaign not once, but twice. The first was a response to Dave's proposal for six new taxes that Dave now says are not a "priority" [note to Love & co: How hard is it to just say no?]. The second was Dave explaining why he is losing the sign war.

On the policy front, Alnoor has released his 24 page platform. It's quite possibly the most detailed policy platform ever released for a civic election in Calgary and I'd encourage all potential voters to read it. Hell, even if you're not a Calgarian, for policy geeks, it'll be more exciting than Maxim.


Provincial: While I wish I had time to read through the 192 pages of the AG's report (and that's just volume one), it continues to draw headlines. Daveberta gives a detailed run down of Stelmach's refusal to fire his ministers. The same ministers who gave the auditor general the run around and didn't see anything wrong with deceiving Albertans.


Federal: I've got to tell you, I'm kind of digging the fact that no matter how much the Liberals screw up, they're still in a statistical tie with Harper. And bBringing in David Smith and John Rae to help with the next campaign is a step in the right direction for the grits.

Meanwhile, the man Smith and Rae helped win time and time again is recovering from heart surgery. Here's hoping he's up and running for the book tour.


And... for those who missed it, be sure to take a look at Conrad Black's Rick Mercer Report appearance from last night.

Morning Round-Up

1. Yesterday, Dave Bronconnier declared September as "yellow ribbon month" in Calgary. While the timing is a bit suspect, rumour has it that October will be declared "provincial/municipal funding agreement awareness month" or "celebration of overpass construction month".



2. Brian Mulroney is in the news for "lashing out" against Pierre Trudeau. To be clear, this is a former Prime Minister trashing another former Prime Minister who has been dead for seven years, over things the later did a quarter century before becoming PM. Real classy Brian - good to see you aren't bitter or anything.

The Calgary Sun calls it a "clash of the titans", but I'm not sure it can really be considered a clash when one of the "clashers" isn't really able to, you know, respond.



3. Fred Thompson has jumped into the Presidential race and I'd have to peg him as the odds on favourite to take the Republican nomination at this point. The same way a lot of Liberals are longing for another Trudeau, one imagines a lot of Republicans would love to find the next Reagan and Thompson will probably be close enough for many of them.




4. Interesting move for McGuinty to release his full platform over a month before election day.




5. For those who missed it on Saturday, here's the link to Andrew Coyne's "politics here is uniquely stupid" column. Gotta agree, at least partially.

Four Quick Hits

Municipal, provincial, federal, and American political links on this Labour Day Monday.


Municipal: The Alnoor Kassam campaign will be running the first batch of radio ads this week, on traffic. They're kind of cute, so feel free to give them a listen here.


Provincial: Apparently Ed Stelmach is getting the always unpleasant Mr. Dithers label, according to the Globe. As much as I'm not a fan of Stelmach, I've actually never heard him called Mr. Dithers. I've heard "Unsteady Eddie", "Mr. Ed", "Special Ed", "Harry Strom Jr." and about 50 other insults, but never Dithers. The article also has this inspirational quote:

“Will there be people without homes? Yes. Will there be some sick people that we can't save, despite all the medical technology that we have? Yes, there will be. But people are continuing to move here because where else are they going to go in Canada?”

I think we may have a new slogan to replace wild rose province. "Alberta: Where else are you gonna go?"


Federal: The Tories continue to try and neutralize the Afghanistan issue.


US: Lots of Republicans seem to get themselves into sex scandals. And, for whatever reason, a large percentage of them seem to be gay sex scandals.

Ted Morton is the (Straw) Man

The feud between Dave Bronconnier and Ed Stelmach descended into self-parody over the weekend with Bronco taking offense to Ted Morton calling Calgary the best city in Canada. Here's the blow by blow:


Morton:

"Calgary by itself is a good but not a great city," [Morton] told delegates.

"What makes Calgary a great city -- the best in Canada as far as I am concerned -- is what surrounds it."



Bronco:

Bronconnier said the speech was more proof that Calgary's issues are an afterthought for provincial leaders.

"I think it's ironic from a rural MLA living in Calgary to tell an audience that Calgary is not a great city -- of course I take offence to that," he said.

"It was absolutely uncalled for -- they're trying to divide and conquer."
Following the speech, Bronconnier confronted Morton and "gave him a piece of my mind."



Morton:

Morton, the MLA for Foothills-Rocky View west of Calgary who lives in Varsity, said the mayor over-reacted to the remarks, going "ballistic" for no good reason.


"Dave is so self-absorbed and thin-skinned that he's capable of misinterpreting things and taking them out of context," he said.


"I think what you're seeing is a deteriorating relationship between Dave Bronconnier and every other official that tries to work with him."

Great Moments in Spin II

If I'm going to hit Stelmach, I guess it's only fair to hit his nemesis too. From Mayor Dave Bronconnier's letter to Calgarians:



"Until Thursday, April 19, I was hoping to be able to send you a list of the much-needed infrastructure projects The City of Calgary would be fast-tracking, projects that would have enabled us to begin catching up with a level of growth never before experienced by a Canadian City.



The list would have included beginning the west and southeast new lines of the LRT; more police, fire and EMS services; more buses and CTrain cars, widening and repairing roads; more parks upgrades and maintenance; more parks rec centres and sports facilities."



So...a feud over strings being put on 85 million dollars has cost the city billions and billions of dollars of projects. Uh-huh. Bronco should just have gone all out and continued:



"The list would also have included filling every pothole in the city, the abolition of municipal taxes, instantaneous snow removal, paving the streets in gold, a chocolate fountain in every backyard, and a first line centre for the Flames..."





[Full disclaimer: I'm doing some data analysis for a rival mayoral campaign.]