I got ready to go to the 7:30pm Council meeting today. At 7:10pm the babysitting deal fell through.  It’s the third Council meeting I had to miss because I could not find babysitters (my wife has classes on Monday nights this semester). 

How hard can it be to stream these meetings online?  Put a $500 camera connected to a computer and stream the video.  Heck I will go set it up for the town. 

It’s 2010!  I was video chatting with family ten years ago.  Talk about being antiquated!

Regular readers of my blog may not be surprised to learn that I have decided to enter the race for the Local council for Ward 8.

I am not going to make vague and ambiguous promises. I am not promising to change the world, bring about world peace, end world hunger or to teach every bad driver how to drive. However, I do unconditionally promise to be accessible, transparent and representative (full commitment).

A councillor is supposed to listen to his or her constituents and represent their interests in the Council. Those who know me know that I can do that very well.

I want to improve the quality of our lives, and those of our children. You can get highlights on my campaign page (or drill in deeper to get a whole lot of details).

If you support me then perhaps you’ll consider fanning me on facebook to show support. You may also consider making a little campaign donation.  Every bit helps.

[ps: I have disabled comments on this post. Please leave a comment on my campaign page instead.  Thanks so much]

A comment was posted in response to my post: What makes a good councillor.  The main question was:

…what do you think a councillor should do when a group of his/her constituents asks for support for something that is in opposition to his/her principles?

You can read the comment and my response here.

It’s not their views on policies as much as their principles (see here for the difference).  More importantly, a councillor needs to listen to his or her constituents and represent their interests in the Council.  An inaccessible councillor cannot possibly be a good representative. Unfortunately, we have a couple of these in Milton. 

This map shows where 2010 ward boundaries are.  Pushpins show where current councillors live.  Notice a concentration in Nassagewaya and around Main Street?   Worse, notice how there’s really no one South of Derry (other than Rick Day.  No comment). 

Click here to expand the rest of this article

With the CN Rail petition thing I started thinking, Milton seems really under-represented in the Halton Council. 

Milton’s population growth between 1996 and 2001:

  
Source: http://www.halton.ca/PPW/Roads/PDFs/MasterPlan_FinalReport.pdf

With this chart Milton’s share of Regional Councillors make sense.  But it’s not 2001, it’s 2009.  Lets see a forward looking estimate:

Population growth estimate until 2021:

  
Source: http://www.halton.ca/PPW/Roads/PDFs/MasterPlan_FinalReport.pdf

Explosive growth means Milton has far more infrastructure needs than rest of Halton does.  The most recent census (as of mid-summer 2008) puts Milton’s population at 72,500. 

Take a look at the growth forecast until 2021:

This table estimates that Milton will hit 82,700 by 2011.  Considering Milton had 72,500 people a year ago, I am willing to bet that Milton will have 80,000 people before 2009 is over.  Heck at this rate Milton may have closer to 100,000 people by 2011, instead of the original just over 80,000 forecast.  So if anything then population growth forecast underestimated Milton’s growth.  However, for the purpose of this post we will stick with forecasted numbers.

This table shows that in 2021 Milton will have a much larger proportion of Halton’s population, twice as many people as Halton Hills and not too far below Burlington.  Right now the Halton Regional Council has 20 people (not including the chair), only 3 of them from Milton.  If we are to hold Burlington at 7 councillors and Halton Hills at 3 (to maintain their current levels), then the Halton Council will need to re-adjust its size to 25. It will need to change Oakville’s seats to 9 (giving it two extra) and Milton’s to 6 (giving it three extra). 

Hey what do you know, that will give Milton a chance to think about full-time councillors too (something I argued against doing until Milton has more representation in the Regional Council).  Essentially Milton will be able to work with 5 full-time Councillors + a Mayor instead of 8 part-time Councillors + a Mayor. 

It’s too late to do this for the next 2010 election, but 2014 will be here before we know it.  This is something Milton should really push hard for.  Considering Oakville gets extra seats too, this should be doable. 

That is the only way to get a fair deal from the Halton Region. 

Back in May the Town of Collingwood decided to continue the at-large system where councillors run in the entire town, instead of just their wards.  In addition, they also decided to demolish historic wards. 

Let me first explain what a ward is. A ward system divides a municipality into sections (called wards, obviously).  Councillors are elected by residents in their wards.  The at-large system sees councillors elected by all voters.  At-large systems are an exception for councillors.  For Collingwood residents it means that each resident will vote for 7 Councillors, 1 Mayor and 1 Deputee Mayor.  That’s an awful lot of votes to cast in a single election :). 

This got me thinking … what makes a ward system better than an at-large system.  Here are my thoughts :

• Every area of the town / region deserves representation.  Without wards a single segment of town population, a special interest group or a densely populated part of town may be able to elect all councillors, leaving others with no representation.  In case of Milton it means that all candidates could just appeal to residents of Hawthorne Village and nearby (new) communities, and completely ignore older parts of town
• Running in a ward makes councillors more accountable to neighbourhood voters.  Imagine if all Councillors came from the same part of town
• That leads to this point: the ward system prevents (or at least greatly minimizes) the undesirable possibility of having all councillors come from the same area of town
• Wards can represent the diversity of the town (old Milton vs. rural Milton vs. new Milton.  Farmers vs. commutors), allowing each ward to elect its own representative.  Without it a homogenous group of councillors can be elected to represent an otherwise heterogeneous town
• Wards make it much simpler to judge candidates.  Imagine having to select 7 councillors out of 20 candidates, instead of 1 out of 3. 
• Election debates are unworkable in an at-large system
• Citizens who need help know exactly who to contact and can hold them directly accountable at election time.  This is one reason why I did not even like how Milton picked two Councillors from each ward.  I like one ‘butt-in-line’
• Printing election materials and lawn signs for the entire town is cost prohibitive, not to mention highly confusing (imagine if you had to cast 11 votes)
• Your councillor likely lives, drives, walks, and shops in your neighborhood. This gives councillors a better understanding of neighbourhood issues and allows them to be proactive in dealing with neighbourhood problems
• Wards allow new blood to enter the race.  Incumbents often have a lot of advantage, having gotten a lot of name recognition during their tenure.  At-large system penalizes new-comers who often do not have the resources to market themselves town-wide

My letter to the editor, published in Milton Canadian Champion on July 31st, 2009:-

DEAR EDITOR:
I read Tim Foran’s column ‘Part-time council not realistic in this new ‘small city’ back in April, when he argued for a pared-down, full-time council.

I’ve been thinking about that issue for a while and must say I prefer that Milton council stay part-time, for now at least.

Town councillors make about $26,000 a year, a third of it tax-free. Compare that to the cost of full-time councillors in Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton and other cities and one realizes that Milton spends less money on all eight local councillors than larger cities spend on just a couple, especially once you include office costs, personal staff and expense accounts fulltime councillors get.

It’s cheaper, at least financially, to have part-time councillors.

Milton has one part-time councillor for about every 10,000 residents, while Mississauga has one full-time councillor for 60,000 residents. At that ratio Milton would only get one full-time councillor if a switch was made. Even if we double this, we will end up with a council size of three — the mayor and two councillors. This is hardly a representative council for a town as diverse as Milton.

In addition, it’s expensive to have full-time local councillors who do not draw their salaries from serving regional council as well. This means that Milton’s full-time local councillors should also be regional councillors. This is what cities like Burlington and Mississauga do as well. This will also put a cap of only three councillors in Milton.

Then there is the accessibility issue. I believe that one passionate part-time councillor can represent a neighbourhood of 10,000 people a lot better than a single full-time councillor representing half the town.

It also allows each part of the town to elect a councillor who understands issues and challenges faced by that area, and can therefore effectively represent that ward.

Finally, it is easier for newcomers to enter politics if their wards have 10,000 people or so. As a result, a few incumbents lose their seats in every Milton election. That is not true in larger cities like Mississauga, where incumbents win by large margins because it is so difficult to challenge them.

It may be possible to make regional councillors serve fulltime while local councillors work part-time. That may relieve some of Foran’s concerns. I’m not sure if it is necessary, but it’s a better compromise than an exclusively full-time council in a town with less than 100,000 people.

Milton will one day grow to a size where the sheer number of part-time councillors will make a smaller number of full-time councillors an attractive option. However, at less than 100,000 people, Milton is not there yet.

ZEESHAN HAMID, MILTON

Another Milton blogger, Mike Cluett, blogged about the councillors increasing their salaries yet again.  I won’t repeat anything he said.  You can read about it in his own blog post.

The issue is that councillors are put at the same pay-scale as the rest of the town staff.  This is actually good, because then their salaries  have to be in sync with that of others.   However, the problem is that it is the councillors who vote for salary changes.  This creates a moral hazard where councillors can give themselves salary raises!

Here is my proposal to solve the problem.  Let the sitting council vote on salary changes, but don’t let their own salary changes take effect until the next council.  This will allow the voters to vote out councillors who get too carried away.  This will also make sure councillor salaries keep up with times without creating too much of a moral hazard.