The candidates that will nervously watch Saturday night's (Oct. 20) municipal election results pour in after 8 p.m. plead their case one last time to Prince George residents at the last all-candidates forum at the University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC) on Tuesday (Oct. 16).
There were only a few empty seats for the UNBC event, which had an attendance of 300-plus people.
Each candidate was given six minutes. Questions were submitted by Prince George Citizen subscribers and Prince George Chamber of Commerce members. Candidates were then given one minute to make closing remarks. Marnie Hamagami with Theatre NorthWest was the moderator for the evening.
First to sit in the hot seat was Mayor Lyn Hall, who is seeking re-election on Oct. 20. His first question asked what part of the city's overtime policy for city managers he would change, if any."
Almost every seat is filled #cityofpg #UNBC @UNBC pic.twitter.com/S0zlGXTUDa
— Jessica Fedigan 👩💻 (@jfediganpgm) October 17, 2018
"That's been a real topic of conversation in our community since 2017 and of course now in 2018 with the evacuees," Hall said. "I want to start with thanking those folks who stepped up to the plate and helped out. It's my plan if I'm re-elected to bring that policy back to the new council and take a look at it and review that policy that's been in place for probably 20 years, so it is time that we take a look at it."
He said he does anticipate there to be changes to the policy.
The next question for the current mayor was why the City of Prince George didn't sign a letter of support from regional mayors supporting the LNG Canada project.
"The notification that came out, that was sent out to a number of mayors throughout the northern part of the province, our notification came out two days before they published the list," Hall said. "It has been my principle and practice over the last four years, is when we are requested to sign things off, I would take it to the council, that particular issue. If I'm re-elected, I'll take that to council because there is still an opportunity for us to sign off on that."
The lone challenger against Hall, Willy Ens, was not in attendance for the forum.
Frank Everitt was next to sit down with Hamagami. His first question was around allotted vacation time for general managers and directors for the city. Currently, general managers and directors receive four weeks after the first year, five weeks after two years and six weeks after three years.
"Depending on their length of service, yes," Everitt said. "We want our staff to go on holidays, take holidays. We don't want them to bank those things. When people get holidays, they go and come back refreshed and able to give 100 per cent to their job. It is important people leave their job and go away for a little period of time."
Next to answer questions was Viv Fox, who couldn't be in attendance due to hosting a two-day Emergency Management B.C. Indigenous Partnership table meeting. Her statement says the meeting was planned months ago.
"I apologize for being unable to join all of you at tonight's forum. I realize I am missing an incredible opportunity to connect with you in person," a statement written by Fox said. "Each and every one of you is here tonight because you are proactive, intelligent and an involved resident informing yourself prior to the vote; for that I commend you. Tonight, all of you will have the chance to meet and hear from the other 12 candidates. Every single one of them is an outstanding individual who shares a common passion for our city. My platform is based on three things I am very passionate about: safety, sustainability and inclusion."
Next up was Garth Frizzell. Frizzell was asked if Prince George should adopt a similar model to the many local governments in the Federation of Canadian Municipalities that elect members of a city council to represent a specific neighbourhood and if the city should have a similar program.
Fuller asked if RCMP should be dropped and local police brought in. He says there is not enough information to make a decision at this time #cityofpg
— Jessica Fedigan 👩💻 (@jfediganpgm) October 17, 2018
"There a wide variety of municipalities across Canada and the ward is used in many of the larger cities," he answered. "You can see that in Vancouver right now, they absolutely should be considering it because with 71 candidates being elected at large, it makes it very difficult to understand who's going to represent you the best. Prince George, I think the at-large system works really well. By having eight candidates, we can get the diversity we need and we've seen that there are even candidates who come, that are living in residences outside the city and represent the people of Prince George remarkably well. Considering and keeping in mind is always good, but at this point, I don't think it can serve us better than the at-large system we already use."
Dave Fuller then took his turn. He was asked about fluoride being appropriate, or not added to a water system, in order to ensure children have healthy teeth.
"There are actually only four or five communities in B.C. that have fluoride," Fuller said. "This was a referendum issue that the community voted on and I agree totally there are people who disagree with fluoridation in the water; however, I think that my record is that I can make a change in this community, that we have quite a few issues that are much bigger than fluoridation that is affecting the residents of this community."
Murry Krause was next and was asked what part of the of the city overtime policy for city managers he would change (if any).
"I think the mayor covered this quite nicely (earlier in the evening)," he said. "This has become such an issue in the recent past. There will be time to look at the policy again. As the mayor said, the policy has been in place for over 20 years and I think in the day it was seen as appropriate and I think the reality is that in the review of it, it doesn't mean it is automatically going to be gotten rid of. So we'd really be looking at is it appropriate and should it be kept or should it be scrapped and something else put in its place."
Terri McConnachie would take her turn answering questions. She was asked if she believes city managers should be allowed to set the salaries of general managers and directors without the approval of the city council.
"I think it's important to note that the only employee of city council that we manage is our city manager," she said. "From there, we have the trust and she has the ability to make decisions as necessary. In other words, council says steer the ship over there and she gathers everybody to grab a paddle and gets us there to determine how we arrive."
Cori Ramsay was next up. She also was asked what type of policy she would like to see for city managers.
"I think when we're reviewing the overtime policy. It's going to come up and we're going to have to review it. One of the things that I would like to see is something that is reflective of the work staff are putting in," she said. "We have an overtime policy for a reason and a lot of people are putting in hours. If I put in work, I expect to be paid for it and we shouldn't expect anything different from our staff."
Kyle Sampson was asked what obligation the City of Prince George is under to financially support a public replacement for Greyhound Bus service.
"I think this would come from more of an advocacy role to look at what group would support that," he said. "We're responsible for what happens in our city and what our citizens need in regards to services in Prince George. That would be a service to leave or come to Prince George. Is that a responsibility for us to fund it? Maybe not, but maybe we need to advocate for those services to be provided to us and our citizens. So we need to talk to other levels of governments to see how they can supply that to our citizens."
Susan Scott was asked too about staff holidays, too, if she thought it's reasonable.
"As it is currently structured, I do think it's reasonable," she said. "I think everything is open for review and I'm hoping that within the examination of overtime policy and everything that goes with that, that the whole package gets examined. As has been stated already, there are some expenses in our city that are going up and we have to figure out where they could go down or not change. We'll see."
Paul Serup then took his turn answering questions from Hamagami. He was asked if he thinks a voter turnout of just nine per cent for the pool and fire hall referendum was adequate enough for a mandate to go ahead with these projects.
"I very much appreciate that question," he said. "No, no I don't. I think that should have been done very differently. It goes as a waste of taxpayer dollars. Putting a pool at the Days Inn site, for instance, I think is a tremendous waste. The referendum was decided by this very small amount. The voters decided to spend up to $35 million. The disagreement that I guess I have is where that pool will be located."
Brian Skakun was asked if he thinks mayor and council should have term limits.
"That's a good question, I wonder why you asked that one," he said. "It's a really tough thing. For me, what I think a deciding factor would be (is) what the community thinks if we should have term limits. If they approached councillors and said I think there should be term limits, and it was convincing it (would be) supported. But where it stands right now, I've been doing this for a number of years, and this will possibly be my last term, but term limits are definitely a delicate issue and I would definitely leave that decision up to the community."
Next up was Cameron Stolz. His first question was surrounding his previous tax problems from 2014.
"It was definitely a hot discussion back then," he said. "It was a case where I was late paying my taxes. My taxes have been paid. Actually, paying my taxes this year, I have to give a tip of the hat to his worship who actually came down from his office just to watch me pay my taxes. That being said, I was going through a very difficult time with my business. I was asked if it wasn't ethical I should not be paying my taxes while you're collecting a city tax wage from being a city councillor. The challenge I had at the time as a small business, that has been around for 28 years now, I had some very difficult challenges there at the time. I was having a hard time with where the business was at, and I made what I thought was the ethical choice to pay my staff first, and then I paid my suppliers so I could keep my business open and my staff employed. I regret not paying my taxes; I've apologized for it and I apologize again. It was a difficult time, I made a difficult choice and in retrospect, I should have eaten a little more humble pie and maybe reached out to some friends and family and found a better solution for that."
Last but not least was Chris Wood. He was asked if it should be examined that the RCMP be replaced with a municipal police service to save money.
"Absolutely not," he said. "I worked for Ecomm 911 down in Vancouver. They handle all the 911 calls down there. There is a huge problem that they face and that problem is jurisdiction. That is the city versus the provincial highways. A local RCMP could not touch that highway. Someone could break into your house, they could run across the street, stand on that local highway and local police would only be able to stare. That is the difference with a local RCMP and a provincial."
Unsure who to vote for, when to vote or where to vote? All that information can be found HERE.
