1 - What is the most important issue facing the City, and how would you propose to deal with it?
Revitalization of the downtown city core has to happen. With this, we can address the issues of homelessness and criminal activity.
We need to take back our community. We need to work together to create positive clean spaces to attract healthy happy activity to remove the negative.
This can be done by having more community events downtown, green spaces, dog parks, walking groups and other social activities. We also need to clean up abandoned businesses and work on a theme for the downtown so people want to go there.
2 - What is the best way to deal with the crime issues in the City?
We need to take a look at our bylaws to see if there's more we could be doing.
Revitalization of the Downtown is key. We need to take back our community. I would like to do the New York approach used which has worked: Under the broken windows theory, an ordered and clean environment 鈥� one which is maintained 鈥� sends the signal that the area is monitored and that criminal behaviour will not be tolerated. Conversely, a disordered environment 鈥� one which is not maintained (broken windows, graffiti, excessive litter) 鈥� sends the signal that the area is not monitored and that one can engage in criminal behavior with little risk of detection. This quote comes from Oscar Newman, Defensible Space: Crime Prevention Through Urban Design.
3- Should the city apply most if not all of its annual take from the casino to upgrading its aging infrastructure, such as water and sewer lines?
Yes, some of the revenue could be used for this, but community grants which is much needed for some organizations also receive some of that money, so it has to be balanced.
I believe the staff at City Hall are doing a great job at allocating the funds.
4 - Do you support term limits for members of council?
No, I don't believe there needs to be a term limit. If the citizens aren't happy, they will decide during the next election to re- elect a council member or not. If someone is doing a great job, they might not get re-elected due to this limit and the citizens could suffer.
