麻豆传媒映画

Mayor Gregor Robertsons re-election campaign is in full swing.

Last week, he was talking no expansion of gambling, Sunday it was all about safe, livable neighbourhoods and Tuesday he rolled out his economic platform to a crowd of wealthy business types at a fundraiser.

But lets take a look at Sundays announcementspecifically the promise included in a news release to increase funding to add new staffing and officers to the 麻豆传媒映画Police Department, as well as increasing investments in 麻豆传媒映画Fire and Rescue facilities and disaster response.

Off the top, the cop promise is not what it seems.

I spoke to Vision 麻豆传媒映画Coun. Raymond Louie, chairperson of the citys finance committee, about hiring new cops. Turns out, the new cops Vision is talking about are the 35 promised to the VPD from the previous NPA administration. But along came a recession and the election of Robertson and his ruling Vision council and the cops were never hired. Thats because in 2009 city manager Penny Ballem told the VPD and other city departments to cut their budgets.

The VPD chose not to hire the 35 cops, who were to comprise the departments so-called metro teams. Their purpose was to reduce response times to incidents across the city by placing the officers on the road during peak periods.

Now Louie says Visions plan, if re-elected, is to provide $4 million to $5 million to hire the 35 cops. Louie said the thinking now is were stabilized somewhat in terms of our economy and its time to fund the metro teams. The police have demonstrated this is a more efficient model for them to operate under and that we would allocate funding to give them that resource which will hopefully provide even better service to our citizens, Louie said. What were doing is were putting money back in to the police department in order to fund these positions.

So just to be clear, faithful readers, Visions announcement Sunday wasnt to hire more officers but to come up with the money to pay for cops promised by the NPA.

OK, now to Visions promise of increasing investment in 麻豆传媒映画Fire and Rescue facilities

Again, the firefighter promise is not what it seems.

What Vision is referring to in terms of investment is related to the 2012-2014 capital plan approved by council in September. Thats the plan that will go before voters Nov. 19 for ultimate approval.

The plan calls for $13 million to build a new fire hall at Kerr Street and 54th and prepare the design for the replacement of a fire hall at Knight Street and 57th. In addition, $1.85 million will go to maintain and improve conditions at many of the fire halls.

This is all in the capital plan.

So, Mr. Louie, is Vision then promising more money to the fire department than already approved in the capital plan?

Ah, no.

So just to be clear, faithful readers, Visions announcement Sunday wasnt to come up with more money for firefighters than it already approved in a public council meeting in September.

The election is Nov. 19.

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Twitter: @Howellings