I would like more details because some of those statements could be more significant than they first appear.

The tax shift being one.

“continue the NPA fair tax shift to help keep Vancouver small businesses competitive”

That a euphemism for higher residential property taxes and permit fees, right?

If true I say bravo, but good luck selling that one the electorate. How many small business owners are left in the City anyway?

Jesse, do you think it is fair that you buy every last city service at 48% of its actual cost? If the situation was reversed, would you be looking for someone to fix it?

We want jobs and we want prosperity, so we need to put our money where our mouth is.

I am not sure it needs to be an actual refund but the annual surplus is not shown as any sort of carry forward into the subsequent years budget as an offset.

what bugs me about it is that they ask us to choose between fire and police when in reality there is enough left over in the previous year to perhaps have both…

Trouble is it ends up going to flaky stuff like front yard wheat fields.

This just in – Lawn to Loaves continues to be $5000.

I would like to see the NPA produce a list w/ costs of the alleged “flakey stuff”.

“NPA makes strange promises”

You know I really can’t argue with Frances that the idea of common-sense in this city is strange to us. No matter what the extra amount comes to — one penny or a thousand dollars, it doesn’t matter. The fact is, it’s your money. Not Geoff Meggs’ or Gregor Robertson’s.

Let’s say your co-worker is heading to the store, they ask you if you want anything and you get them to grab you a bottle of juice (Happy Planet of course). You hand them a 5 dollar bill. Now I was always taught by my parents to return the change when you do something like that. By not giving that money back to us, the city is just keeping the change. Sure it’s not a heck of a lot, but still, it’s not theirs.

I know accountability isn’t as flashy as wheat or chickens or bike lanes, but we do need elected officials that respect that accountability is job one.

So is this announcement strange? Sadly, yes. Hopefully after November 19th it won’t be strange anymore.

re ‘Lawns t o Loaves’ continues to be $5,000

Many of us read a recent letter published in the Vancouver Sun, from a local inner-city school teacher begging for help with providing children at that school with snacks, lunches, socks, shoes etc.

$5,000 would have gone a long way in helping these kids, rather than providing a privleged few with a couple of loave of bread and a symbolic gesture.

For some, it puts things into perspective of where priorities should lie and where they do lie.

@brilliant #8

Global change and its impact on food security is NOT flaky. It’s more than legit, and its magnitude has been greatly underestimated by federal and provincial governments. I applaud a local government or politicians (read: Peter Ladner) who attempts to address food security.

@ Paul T. – deciding what to do with budget surpluses is separate from accountability. It’s a policy question.

Budgeting is an exercise in predicting the future, and as such it’s an inexact science. I have what most people would probably describe as an iron-clad control over my household expenses, but I still go over and under my budget by various amounts each month. So I bank the small surpluses and use them in the months that I run the small deficits. I don’t sweat the differences as long as the imbalance doesn’t go too far one way or the other.

The city budget should be the same way. If there’s a budget surplus one year, it should go towards next year’s budget. If a multi-year trend of surpluses or deficits, then the overall budget needs to be adjusted.

I realize that it’s not quite that simple because of legislation that restricts the City’s flexibility (I understand that it’s prohibited from actually running a deficit, for example) but still the principle of using the surplus to offset next year’s budget is the approach I’d prefer to see taken.

Everyone knows the provincial Ministry of Education funds K-12…[snip extraneous teacher bashing]

So why is Max using it to bash CoV budgeting?

Lawn to Loaves was part of the grant package the CoV makes every year. Suzanne Anton approved that budget. Proposals come forth, staff sort them and make their recommendations, Council approves it.

In years past the NPA has funded a Wooden Boat festival and other such things.

Getting rid of these grants entirely is certainly a position one can take, but so far I haven’t seen anyone make that argument.

As for the rest, we live in a world where the top 1% has seen their share of national wealth double to nearly 40%, a world where the wages of middle and lower classes have stagnated for decades.

The top 1% of income earners are more than delighted to see people like you turn, not on them, but on each other.

They’re laughing in fact.

$5000 signing bonus? I wish!

How horrible that we should pay teachers a high wage, I mean come on–education? What a waste.

@ brilliant #18

wow, great contribution to the discussion.

brilliant,

Your line of thinking reminds me of this:

http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/environment/ig/Environment-Cartoons/If-Global-Warming-Is-A-Hoax.1-Bh.htm

@spartikus #23:

I wasn’t ‘bashing’ the funding of K-12, I was making a statement that since given many kids don’t have proper shoes, socks, breakfasts lunches etc, and that a Vancouver teacher has been asking the public for help in donating these items – that the $5,000 used for a symbolic food learning experience, that few will benefit from, could have gone along way to help support kids that really need the help.

However, if you want to talk about the K-12 funding tied in with the above…)from the GS – Janaury 2011)

In fact, in terms of educational outcomes, food in schools is one of the best things to spend money on. That’s according to Susan Lambert, president of the B.C. Teachers’ Federation. The province should have postponed the rollout of full-day kindergarten (which began in 2010), she told the Straight in a phone interview. They should cut StrongStart B.C. early-learning programs—another Liberal project. Instead, she said, the money should be used to provide a breakfast-and-lunch program to all kids who need it.

“The federation, for how many years, has talked about how hungry kids can’t learn,” Lambert said. “It’s fallen on deaf ears for a long time.”¦The federation is in support of all-day K. But in my view, instead of making a commitment to it, that money should have been channelled into areas where kids are going without.

Meanwhile, Patti Bacchus tweeted this:

@pattibacchus
pattibacchus Interesting read for parents of preschoolers – Delay Kindergarten at Your Child’s Peril: http://nyti.ms/nnMXp6

*******

So which is it – the BCTF either supports the all day kindergarten or they don’t, regardless of who brought it in. Rght now – mixed messaging depending on what political agenda is being pushed.

that the $5,000 used for a symbolic food learning experience, that few will benefit from, could have gone along way to help support kids that really need the help.

It’s profoundly dishonest to use the spending choices of one level of government – in this case the Province – to bash another level of government – in this case the City of Vancouver – who isn’t responsible for the lack of funding which you condemn.

BTW, enjoying the opening day of the new BC Place, Max?

There’s about half a billion dollars that could have purchased a lot of shoes, socks, breakfasts.

“but only the NPA are making announcements so they are the ones getting all the criticism for the moent.”

Interesting isn’t it? After this website and many of the posters on it claimed the NPA was disorganized and at deaths door, suddenly they are the only ones worth talking about. At least Anton is out there in the media answering questions and responding to criticism…you can’t find our mayor doing either. In fact if I was Geoff Meggs, I’d be asking why Gregor gets all the attention when Meggs seems to be doing all the work.

@spartikus #33:

If Vision is going to boast about spending $5,000 on a program geared at school kids to show them where their food comes from, do you not consider to ironic that a good percentage of those kids don’t even get a breakfast? Do you actually think that those kids and their parents see a need to visit someone growing wheat in their front yard ? I am sure as they struggle, that is one of their biggest worries.

Like I said, priorities and I am sorry you and A Dave can’t get past your rose colored union glasses to see what is right and wrong and how a seemingly small spending decision to you, can mean a world of change to others.

Robertson used the poor and the homeless a key component of his 2008 election campaign. and since then, he has abandon them.

A Dave #34 Your name might Be Changed to “A Hole”!
Go Max Go!