Views From Ninth Place

I renewed my web domain, so I guess that it’s been a year since I started campaigning. I think I’m going to do a semi-regular series of these, offering a bit of perspective as someone who campaigned, attends almost every meeting, and continues to be very involved in several community initiatives and boards. Obviously, I don’t have any more insight than anyone else into what’s happening behind closed doors, but I am reasonably well connected to some City staff and Councillors. I have no intention of betraying the confidence of conversations I have with them, but it helps to contextualize things just a bit. 

Since Council released their long-awaited Strat Plan (I’ll cover that in a separate blog) and will take a short break before getting into budget season, I feel like it’s a good time to check in on a few things. As often happens in elections, there are lots of hot button issues that people are apparently really passionate about during a campaign that get immediately forgotten:

MCAF - The Municipal Consent Access Fee. There is a ratepayers lobby group in the city that I found myself sparring with a few times during the election. They were (and presumably are - I’ve been blocked by them for some time) very worked up about the MCAF, and it was asked of candidates in several different iterations of questionnaires and interviews. I did as much research into it as I could, and had what I thought was a balanced perspective on the subject. Since the election - absolute crickets. To my knowledge (and I go to almost every Council meeting) it has not come before Council at all. I suspect it may be discussed in the context of the budget, but it’s a mostly unpopular - and misunderstood - revenue tool that likely won’t find a champion on Council.

Offsite Levies. These were very similar to the MCAF in the sense that I felt like I was answering a question about them every couple of days from people reaching out via email, in meet & greet events, and every time someone sent a survey of some kind. And like the MCAF, I tried to dig into them and be thorough. I sat down with a member of BILD, met with a few representatives from large industries, and spoke with former and (at the time) current Councillors. Some folks ran on abolishing them entirely. I didn’t and don’t see the value in that. My feeling was that they could certainly be reviewed, and that they needed to be appropriate in scale as to not put us at a disadvantage against our regional colleagues. But ultimately, large industry is used to paying them, and that they are a necessary part of development. And just like the MCAF, they have not been discussed in open Council at all.

Division Avenue. This one is a bit tricky. It’s still being brought up in the context of the proposals around 3rd St. N (more on that in an upcoming blog). I continue to drive on it more days than not. For all the people who were absolutely enraged, and who spent A LOT of time asking us candidates if we would “reverse” it (a thoroughly absurd idea), it’s just as busy as I ever remember it being. I’ve lived in the area for almost exactly 5 years, and I still see people turning on and off of it. They have to do that slowly, more acutely, and deliberately - which is exactly the point. But despite one Mayoral candidate who ran on stopping the “boondoggle” of Division, it doesn’t seem to have affected most peoples’ daily routines.

Population Growth. Well, aside from the people who think the census is a conspiracy and might actually number high enough to distort the results, we will very likely finally see some meaningful population growth in Medicine Hat! I can say, anecdotally, that we get people into the restaurant regularly who are new to The Hat and have moved from bigger centres to upsize from a condo, soft retire, or are just craving something a bit calmer. Two of those goals resonate with me, but I did very much the opposite of retiring by moving back here! Where I think this subject is relevant to this blog is how it pertains to the Strat Plan. Population growth isn’t really mentioned specifically. It’s likely assumed to be a by-product of some of the other goals like economic growth and community connection. I heard through the election - and I'm certain I wasn’t alone - that we need to grow our residential tax base, that we’ve been stagnant (or dying, according to some) for decades, and that we’re nothing but a sleepy retirement community. I would have to assume that such a strong narrative would inform a strategic priority; certainly more acute than something like “organizational effectiveness” which should be a default setting. For something that was of such large concern to voters, it doesn’t seem to have made the formal list of priorities.

Remote / Foreign Workers. This one might have been a bit more niche with folks who are predisposed to a level of xenophobia, because there was an awful lot of conflation between the TFW program, people being recruited from other cities for key roles, and people working for the City remotely. I was constantly astonished by how people could be complaining about an HR employee living elsewhere and switch immediately to framing that as an immigration issue. I chalk a lot of that up to people just parroting whatever ragebait video they most recently half watched on social media. But, when they stack a few of those up and form an entire narrative in their heads about it, it becomes an issue that candidates have to answer repeatedly. Again, here is a scenario where this “issue” seems to have completely evaporated. Of course the same folks who dislike immigration and blame people with dark skin for all of their problems are going to continue being bigots, and we’ll have to deal with them insisting on being taken seriously again the next time around. But remote workers, TFWs, and people being recruited from other cities have not made it onto an agenda in Council, nor do they seem to be upsetting the majority of voters & residents. Imagine my surprise….

Curious to see what people think will be a “priority” next time around,

- Adam