Looking ahead to 2013, I would like my electorate to know that they have a report card by which to judge the effectiveness of the Councillor for Ward 2. My Sept. 30, 2010 blog Working On Your behalf For the Next Three Years attempted to give a broad outline of what I intend to do in the areas of social, economical and environmental sustainability.
This post is an attempt to add measurement to my goals, where possible. This is a document that I will bring forward on an annual basis in an attempt to hold myself accountable to the residents of Strathcona County and my Ward.
Playing Working & Living in a Safe Environment
- Encourage Council to support policy that strengthens existing neighbourhood associations and promotes the creation of new groups and associations
- Bring to Council a policy that addresses multi generational utilization as a key component of park revitalization.
- Bring to Council a policy to make playground accessibility mandatory.
- Double the number of Community gardens in Strathcona County from three to six.
Increase safety on residential streets
- Bring to council two new policies or initiatives that will result in lowering speed in residential areas.
- Support existing volunteer speed watch programs, education and enforcement.
Engaging Youth
- Obtain Council buy in to expand current services and programs to a youth centre concept with easy access.
- Encourage proactive and initiative youth activities in our community including a Graffiti Team and greater participation in Council meetings.
Municipal
Balanced Sustainable Growth
- Call for Council to review the measurables of Administration’s plan to encourage balanced sustainable growth of the County.
- Invite business and industry community leaders to have their own symposium to come up with innovative ideas that will result in sustainable growth that addresses the socio-economic needs of our region and a harmonious relationship between residents, business and the environment.
Openness & Transparency
- Continue to advocate for the implementation of an organization wide efficiency audit in order to increase accountability of the County to taxpayers.
- Increase the accountability of County Council to the taxpayer by urging Council to create policy that mandates attendance and participation in all Council Meetings and committees. This policy should stipulate what responsibilities a councillor has and what hours “on the job” is considered core to the task.
- Ask Council to create a policy that holds Councillors’ accountable to the public and enforces the Strathcona County Code of Ethics: including but not limited to a misuse of County resources and equipment, and disrespectful behavior toward staff or other councilors.
Customer Service – in pursuit of Excellence
- Present to Council the need to improve customer service to all key stakeholders. Request that a process be developed whereby Administration is held accountable to define and improve response times, address attitudinal concerns and resolve issues. Ask Council to engage our stakeholders in developing a model of excellence for customer service. Consider the need for an ombudsmen position.
Communications
- Continue to offer innovative ways to communicate to my public.
- Request that Council support open government data.
- Continue to support the creation of a social media policy which I have asked for since 2009 so that the County as an organization can better communicate on different levels with our diverse demographic of residents.
Accessibility
- Request that Council have a Councillor on the Accessibility Advisory Committee to ensure direct communication to and support from Council.
Preparing for Significant Demographic Changes
As the number of citizens over the age of 65 is forecast to increase from 13% to 25% of our total population in 2031 changes must be made.
- I will urge Council to support the findings of the Pioneer Housing Study (now in progress) as it relates to increased beds required in assisted living, creating a third level to our existing assisted living seniors care residents, and providing Increased housing options for an aging population.
- Continue to support the implementation of the Older Adults Plan in facilitating increased assistance for seniors living in the community.
Light efficient community
- Call for performance criteria that measure progress made on the implementation of the light efficient community policy that I brought forward in 2010.
Agribusiness & Urban Agri Initiative
- Support residents in their efforts to establish agri initiatives that increase sustainability in the urban area by bringing new policy opportunities to Council.
- Broadly supporting agribusiness in the rurban and rural area.
Provincial
- Encourage Council to advocate to the province for full development of the 23-acre hospital site, beginning with the completion of phase 2 by 2015.
- Demand underground powerlines.
- Continue to champion the building of a new courthouse by 2015.
Roxanne, I like that you commit to outcomes to the end of your term. This is an extensive list and I note that it is based on function rather than organizational silo and I think that’s a positive development.
ReplyDeleteI know that the county’s corporate planning department puts out a pretty good strategic plan and the budget/business plan is debated by you every year, but that can be a bit faceless. Having councillors put out their own vision and actions is refreshing.
I might be stating the obvious but I expect you’ll want to bite off chunks of this each year rather than doing everything starting today. Continuing with the theme of being obvious, you also need buy-in from your colleagues and a great deal of assistance from county staff.
If we ignore the input/action side, logic modeling would suggest that you will have outputs that lead to short term outcomes and then long term outcomes. Looking at what you’ve written, you have generally identified outputs and short-term outcomes. To me, the long term outcome is an even more 'liveable’ county.
Testing this from time to time with a group of citizens might make it more real and might let you determine whether the focus is correct.
Ian