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Shelia is making a race out of it |
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Written by Al Hollingsworth
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Sunday, 28 September 2008 |
I think the cake walk Peter Kelly was expecting is beginning to crumble. When Shelia Fougere changed her strategy and came out swinging at the Chamber of Commerce debate, she suddenly got the attention of the voters. Is it too little too late? I don’t think so.
By focusing in on the leadership issue, she has put Kelly on the defensive, and at the same time exposed his major weakness; playing it safe. The mayor likes to see which way the wind is blowing and then take a stand.
He says by doing this he is representing the majority and addressing our wants and needs. Don’t eat that Elmer.
I have a question for the mayor. If his style of leadership is working, how come 60 per cent of the people he says he is representing want out of HRM?
As George Herbert Walker Bush has stated, “It’s that vision thing.” Citizens of the Halifax Regional Municipality, both urban and rural, want leadership. Not babysitting.
The structure of HRM is inherently flawed and those flaws need to be addressed. That is where the mayor comes into the picture. He leads, he has a vision, he nurtures that vision and guides it through his council. Heck, even Mel Lastman had some idea where he wanted to take Toronto!
The man known simply as “Mayor Mel” was labeled by many as a “nut bar” but the bottom line is he did run the show in Canada’s biggest city. Kelly would be well advised to borrow that page from Mel’s book and consider that voters elect their officials to lead, not to dither. If he needs further convincing, Kelly should look to another famous ditherer, Paul Martin, to see where that road will lead.
Here’s what Mayor Mel had to deal with. Boasting a population of 2.4 million, Toronto is Canada's largest city and the fifth largest in North America. One third of Canada's population is located within a 160-km radius of Toronto and half of the population of the United States is within one day's drive of the city.
Here, in tiny, by comparison, HRM, we can’t decide on anything. Everything goes to staff for study or to committee for review. Perhaps we should be like our neighbours to the south and have propositions on the ballot. Mine would be the 11th Commandment, Thou shalt not committee!
Among Mayor Kelly’s (and our) list of missed opportunities was the proposed commuter rail link. That study took so long that CN got tired of waiting for a decision and ripped up the rails.. The same will probably happed to the Bedford ferry service.
Perhaps the biggest issue facing the new mayor and council will be holding HRM together. The amalgamation road should never have been travelled in the first place. It was forced down our throats and is not working. But if it is to survive, municipal leaders must exhibit strong leadership and start the process of addressing inequities within the rural areas.
The next few weeks could be interesting as Peter and Sheila (okay, I didn’t forget David) go head-to-head in what now promises to be a heated atmosphere. Who knows, if Peter should prevail on October 18th, it just might make him a more effective leader.
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