Community Platform

I’m not shy about sharing my ideas. Here you can see my take on every major decision that has come before Council since I got elected.

But, we need the entire community working together to build a great Grande Prairie. Which is why my campaign is focused on talking to residents.

I spent the first month of my campaign hosting Community Conversations. These were times open to anyone in the community to come share what they want to see from our next Council. They were a big part of the process I used to develop my platform.

Below, I list my priorities for next term. My platform lays out what I intend to advocate for if I get re-elected. But I’m always open to pushback or new ideas. As you read my platform, I’d love to hear from you. What do you think our next Council should be focused on? If you’re interested in arranging a phone, coffee, or Zoom meeting: please get ahold of me.

VALUES

As I undertake Council work, TRANSPARENCY is key to everything I do. Residents have a right to know what the City is working on and understand why Council makes the decisions it makes. Transparency is key to allowing residents to become good citizens who hold Council to account in elections and have input into decisions throughout the term. To promote transparency, I’ve written about all major Council decisions, spent a great deal of time talking to residents, and advocated for better communications and engagement from the City.

As I transparently do my work, there’s been three primary values that I’ve applied to decisions. My goal on Council is to make Grande Prairie more sustainable, livable, and connected. What I mean by that:

• Sustainable means having what our community needs to be stable and healthy in the long term. This includes a smart and modern approach to regulation, reasonable taxation, professional asset management, and strong regional partnerships.

• Livable means having what we need to go about our lives. This includes safe communities, a healthy economy, robust transportation networks, help for people who need it, and plenty of opportunities for work, education, and play.

• Connected means having residents feel like they are part of a great community. They have many opportunities to meet other residents and build social networks. There is a robust and healthy non-profit system for residents to contribute to and benefit from. And Grande Prairie is a City people can be proud to live in and excited to visit.

If re-elected, I intend to advocate for:

• Infrastructure servicing in Hughes Lake to allow for new industrial development within City boundaries.

• Establishment of a Clean Energy Improvement Program to allow businesses to access federal financing for energy efficiency and generation. This will help businesses reduce not just their emissions, but also their utility costs.

• Continuing to improve licensing, permitting, and other City processes so that the City doesn’t stand in the way of starting or growing business.

• Continued targeted grants to help local businesses recover from COVID restrictions.

• Council to better partner with and advocate for arts, culture, and sports groups as well as community non-profits. These organizations are a significant part of our economy and need to be recognized as such.

• Continued efforts to properly manage City expenses to contain tax increases. Appropriately balancing this with the need to maintain the high quality of services Grande Prairie needs to have in order to attract and retain labour.

• Advocacy for the province to access federal funding to create affordable daycare spaces. If the province continues to refuse, advocacy for the federal government to enter into direct funding agreements with municipalities to create affordable daycare. Getting parents to work is vital for our economy, and lack of childcare is a huge challenge in our region’s labour attraction strategies.

If re-elected, I intend to advocate for:

• Giving a stronger voice to the Police Advisory Committee to ensure that policing priorities are meeting community needs.

• Creating discounted or free opportunities for residents to access Mental Health First Aid courses to that they can help and properly refer friends, family, or colleagues in crises.

• Working with communities to explore engineering solutions to slow down traffic on problematic residential arterial roads, especially those with a school. Solutions could include curb bump-outs for pedestrians, planted medians, or better marking of school and playground zones. When it comes to traffic safety, enforcement should be the last resort.

• Stronger support for Neighbourhood Associations to help residents meet their neighbours. Having connected neighbours is the best defense against crime and the best way to make sure help is immediately available in crises.

• Stronger support of non-profits that help people in crises.

• Evidence based approaches to COVID-19 response while undertaking advocacy for the provincial government to not download health decisions to businesses, non-profits, and municipalities.

• Prioritizing Opioid Crises response, with a focus on reaching residents who need help but are not street involved (street involved people deserve help too, but have been the focus of past efforts).

• Dedicating police resources to following up on and addressing reports of property crime.

If re-elected, I intend to advocate for:

• Continued reform to Council’s Community Group Funding framework. Supporting non-profits in the community is a cost efficient and effective way to enhance Quality of Life. But funding decisions should be more transparent, streamlined, and aligned with community priorities. Once funding is set at an appropriate level, it must keep up with population plus inflation growth.

• Replacement indoor recreation in Avondale after the Leisure Centre is demolished. It doesn’t need to be a state-of-the-art facility, but this key piece of land located between two high schools deserves investment.

• Increased staff resources be put into developing and supporting Neighbourhood Associations. If properly fostered, Neighbourhood Associations are an excellent tool to recruit volunteers, raise private funding, and provide advice to the City to enhance their communities.

• Close gaps in the City’s Active Transportation Network. To allow people to safely walk or bike everywhere in the City, an investment of approximately $7 million is needed (source). A plan should be put in place to make this happen within the next 5 years.

• Collaborate with non-profit, sporting and cultural groups to create a Community Calendar so that you never have to say “I had no idea that event was happening” again.

• Exploration of an indoor park and garden space on the Montrose Cultural Centre site to help residents maintain mental health through our long winters.

• Working with community partners to create more opportunities for young adults without children and seniors to connect with others and have fun. These are two demographics that frequently move from Grande Prairie. Retaining them will help our community and economy.

If re-elected, I intend to advocate for:

• Council and senior management to participate in a Blanket Exercise, conversations with indigenous Elders, Trauma Informed Care training, and other opportunities to better understand the impact of Residential Schools. Learning is a crucial part of pursuing Truth & Reconciliation.

• Increased service hours for Transit and Accessible Transit. Over the last few years, hours have been reduced and fares have been increased. People relying on Transit have had to quit jobs, miss appointments, and skip important life events. This isn’t right. Efficiency improvements such as smaller busses on low use routes are good. But reducing service is not ok.

• Regular public reporting on work towards meeting our commitments under the Welcoming & Inclusive Communities initiative. This will allow Council and the community to discuss systemic issues that need to be addressed.

• Prioritizing sidewalk, curb, and gutter repair in places where a person with disabilities reports a deficit that is impacting their regular travel through our community.

• Transcription added to Council meetings so that people with auditory challenges can see what Council is talking about.

If re-elected, I intend to advocate for:

• Increasing opportunities for the public to learn about City processes and have meaningful input into Council decisions. Including regular “lunch and learns” where residents can sit with staff members to learn and ask questions about City programs and departments.

• Continued focus on delivering City Services more efficiently.

• Refining the use of Priority Based Budgeting to make sure that City funding is going to high priority programs and services.

• Creating a Benefit Based Procurement policy to enable City capital spending to provide better benefits to our local community and economy. Ideas within this policy may include a requirement to source locally when legally allowed to do so, and incentivizing some City Contractors to hire people with barriers to employment.

• Council to undertake Service Level Reviews of highest cost programs to make sure that community needs are being properly balanced with fiscal realities.

• Continuing investments in roads to catchup on traditionally underfunded Road Rehabilitation work. Creating a fiscal plan to properly maintain our storm water infrastructure.

• Commissioning an independent study to benchmark City salaries against comparable positions in the private and non-profit sectors and other government organisations. An Executive Summary of this study should be publicly released. In the community and at Council, I’ve heard lots of conversations about staff compensation. We should be sure to base these discussions on facts and data, not anecdotes.

• Reducing the residential property tax burden by increasing other revenue sources, including adopting a Storm Water Utility model. A priority for our residents is having property taxes more in line with other cities. This requires controlling our expenses. But it also means expanding our revenue opportunities. Comparatively, our non-tax revenue is lower than other jurisdictions. To get our taxes more inline without gutting services, this needs to be addressed.

• The City and County are currently in provincially mandated arbitration. It will assign cost sharing based on the services each municipality delivers to residents of the other municipality. Any money the City receives through this process should be put toward tax relief, not increased services.

• Building partnerships with the County and other municipal partners to better deliver services. Since an arbitrated agreement will remove conversations about sharing costs for existing services from the table, our next City and County Councils will have a unique opportunity to strengthen their working relationship.

If re-elected, I intend to advocate for:

• A long pause on the Downtown Rehabilitation project. The pipes that needed urgent replacing are already replaced. For now, investment is better spent elsewhere.

• Exploring the development of seniors housing on the Montrose Cultural Centre site (south of the library). Partnerships with Grande Spirit Foundation and private industry may provide opportunity to build a tower that has a mix of affordable housing for seniors and market housing for anyone. This would fill an important need in our community (housing seniors) while also creating economic activity in the City Centre. Within this development, the creation of an indoor park or garden should also be explored.

• Building a playground on the Montrose Cultural Centre site (south of the library). This would make it much more appealing for families to live and play in the City Centre.

• Implementing light pole wraps, street sign toppers, and other low cost options to brand the “City Centre.”

• Creation of a “micro-festival” program. Groups that want to put on an event downtown would be given $1000, 4 hours of professional graphic design time to create promotional material, marketing via City social media, and permission to close a side street for a morning or afternoon. These would provide immediate draw to the City Centre, and successful micro-events may lead to the creation of future larger scale events.

• Exploring City partnership in creating daycare spaces downtown. This would fulfill a childcare need in our community and make it more practical for parents of young children to live or work in the City Centre.

• Where practical, moving City and Aquatera office jobs downtown. More professionals working downtown is a sure way to increase economic activity.

• Continued support of the Mobile Outreach Program and other initiatives to decrease social disorder, respond to complaints, and get vulnerable residents help they need.

If re-elected, I intend to advocate for:

• Strong support of the Youth Emergency Shelter’s new build. Giving young people help when they find themselves homeless is not only the right thing to do, it is also the best way to eliminate chronic homelessness in the future.

• Exploring the development of seniors housing on the Montrose Cultural Centre site (south of the library). Partnerships with Grande Spirit Foundation and private industry may provide opportunity to build a tower that has a mix of affordable housing for seniors and market housing for anyone. This would fill an important need in our community (housing seniors) while also creating economic activity in the City Centre.

• Working with Grande Spirit Foundation, the province, and other municipalities to create Continuing Care beds for seniors and others with the needs.

• Working with the Centre for Young Parents, Sunrise House, and other community partners to find options for independent young people who do not have a credit history or family support to obtain rental housing.

• The federal government to invest its fair share in our region. Federally, housing is a priority. However, a disproportionate amount of money get spent in the large cities. The City of Grande Prairie should work with regional municipalities and other mid-sized Cities to make sure that federal grants are spent in our communities too.

• Creating incentives (ex: grants or waiving of City permitting fees) to build 3+ bedroom apartments. Apartments are often an affordable rental option for families, but they cannot find an apartment big enough, forcing them to rent a house they cannot afford.

• Supporting regulatory changes and/or incentive programs to encourage row housing and narrow lot development. This type of housing allows home ownership opportunities at a lower price point than traditional single detached developments.

• Making sure that the Coordinated Care Campus phases up slowly and emphasizes consultation with building residents and nearby properties. If done properly, this project will change lives, improve our community, and save taxpayer dollars while having no impact on its neighbourhood. Council needs to be razor focused on making sure it is done right. (More info on this project at here)

KEEPING YOU INFORMED

Above, I’ve shared what our next Council should focus on. But many are also interested in my work during the previous Council term.

Following are channels I’ve created for you to follow my Council work. If re-elected, I will keep updating them. You can use them to see how I’ve approached past Council decisions.

You can find me active on social media: