I’ve been a resident of this city for 26 years now and a paying taxpayer for 18 years and one thing I’ve noticed is as much as the city has changed what has not changed is the city council. Consistently throughout the years, successive city councils have proven time and again at how out of touch with reality they are.
There are several cases to prove this. The visitor centre that was at the intersection of 16/97 was the perfect place in a high traffic area but successive councils did their best to screw that up. Remember when they moved the visitor centre to the corner of Victoria and 15th and had no parking available for RVs or clear signage to say the visitor centre was here. Fast forward a few years and council got the bright idea to move it to its current location on First avenue. Now it gets less traffic and its in an area where I wouldn’t leave my vehicle unattended. Now the council is considering moving Mr. PG and given their past track record they will screw this up too.
Another one is revamping the downtown core. Great idea but again successive councils sunk millions into the downtown but did not address the issue of homelessness or large groups hanging out intimidating people until it literally boiled over two years ago and the city finally was forced to deal with the issue and admit there was an issue. The kicker is I still won’t go downtown because of lack of parking and there are areas where I wouldn’t leave my vehicle unattended still.
These are but two of a number of serious issues that the city has blundered on. Others are cost overruns, ignoring basic maintenance to fund projects and tax increases due to improper management to name but a few. I seriously considered running for council on several occasions but after sitting through monthly council meetings and reading committee reports I know I would end up getting frustrated by the red tape and there is nothing worse than having an angry person in council then nothing would truly get done.
Dean Soiland
Prince George
