By Pepper Parr
July 10th, 2025
BURLINGTON, ON
Editorial Opinion
At 9:00 am this morning Mayor Marianne Meed Ward will call a Special Council meeting to order and have the Clerk do a role call to ensure there is a quorum.
Will ward 1 Councillor Galbraith attend virtually or will he be in the room to be part of whatever vibe there is going to be.
Will CAO Hassaan Basit be in the room – he did not take part in the last Standing Committee or the last Special Council meeting. He walks out of City Hall on the 4th of August after just 16 months in the job.
The understanding we have is that Council will go into a Closed Session – there is the suspicion that someone has taken legal action – Burlington Aquatic Devilrays (BAD) has said they have put their request for a Judicial Review on hold until they have a better understanding of what Council is going to do.
There is no word on what Golden Horseshoe Aquatic Club (GHAC) intends to do. From a media perspective, GHAC has gone mute.
What seems to have been lost here is that the seven members of Council were elected to serve the needs of the 194,000 citizens of the city. The city has just the one swimming club that offers a program that focuses on training and sponsoring competitive events.
For reasons that have yet to be explained, City Hall decided that a Request for Proposal format was to be used to determine who would offer the swimming program. That RFP didn’t limit applicants to city based organizations.
Some feel that the city funding should be open to anyone. That would be fair, some have said.
What has fairness got to do with it? There is a Burlington organization that has delivered a service to swimmers for four decades in place and they seem to be doing a good job. If the delegations made by Katie Lebel and Pam Pitz are an accurate reflection of the quality of the club management, the city is lucky to have them.
Being fair and allowing some other organization to submit a bid that would kill the BAD organization is fair to who?
The city administration lost sight of what was taking place: This was about sports, not which procedure was used to determine which club would provide the services to swimmers.
GHAC is focused on growth – nothing wrong with that – but is organizational growth going to be what kills a swimming club that has served the city exceptionally well if the number of people who attended the Council meeting last week is any indication. Is BAD perfect – of course it isn’t.
One of the things the city could/should do is hire an independent organization (not people from the Parks and Recreation department – they should be part of the review ) to do a deep internal review on the effectiveness of BAD. Every organization needs oversight. The City Auditor could be tasked to get something like this done.
There is close to $250,000 on the table. This is taxpayer money – it should be spent on Burlington organizations and not on an organization that has programs in numerous locations in the GTHA.
GHAC said they are not a Hamilton swimming club – then what are they?
Burlington might want to give some consideration to help funding a second swim team; the city also has to look at its inventory of swimming pools.
This egg on everyone’s face is embarrassing for everyone. We are, or we should be, better than this.
Council has to ensure that all the facts are on the table, including who did what and why.
It is clear now that the RFP approach was a mistake – who made that decision?
Everything City Hall does is political – senior people are expected to be conscious of the political impact on the decisions they make.
That does not mean what they do should be driven by a political agenda – that is what Council members are in place for.
Why the current CAO was not involved and why the treasurer wasn’t at least made aware of what was happening is something the public may never know – and that would be unfortunate.
Marianne Meed Ward turned herself into a very effective council member on the two words: accountable and transparent.
Her grip on those two words is less than it once was.
City Council should not even be involved Political interference
Procurement process is over Move on
Stop wasting valuable time over disgruntled swimmers
What was not clear in the Delegations I heard on Monday, July 7th at the COW meeting from the GHAC, was how many Burlington members with Burlington addresses are members of the GHAC? (and the percentage of Burlington members for their entire organization). This is the number that council should be looking at compared to the number of Burlington members with Burlington addresses that are members of BAD.
Burlington Property Tax payers pay a portion of their property taxes towards Parks & Recreation, which finacially support Burlington City owned pools.
Just as Hamilton Property Tax payers contribute financially to Hamilton city owned pools, which encompasses all of Hamilton, including Ancaster, Dundas, Waterdown and Stoney Creek. Also known as the “City of Hamilton”.
If GHAC does not have the required number of Burlington members with Burlington addresses participating in GHAC (i.e. the percentage), why should they be allowed to use Burlington pools paid for by Burlington Tax payers for “Burlington Residents”?
BAD operates in Burlington; and not in the City of Hamilton.
BAD operates out of Burlington only; while GHAC is able to rent space in the entire City of Hamilton, which has many more opportunities for pool time in many more pools across the City of Hamilton which encompasses Hamilton, Ancaster, Dundas, Stoney Creek and Waterdown.
Further to Burlington Councils Special Meeting of today, that Burlington council suggests possibly building another new covered pool with seating for viewing etc. is ludicrous! and Burlington Property Tax Payers cannot afford it.
GHAC is a City of Hamilton group, and should not expect to take pool time away from BAD, which is a Burlington group.
Trying to correct an error made with the RFP process at COB over swim time allocations should not come down on Burlington Property Tax Payers to build a new covered pool as a solution to the COB’s problem in pool allocation by City staff or otherwise;
Not so simple to” Rent the pools to the Burlington Aquatic Devilrays”
GHAC has a signed rental agreement from the City.
If Council decides to give the contract to the Burlington Aquatic Devilrays at this point in time why would any other group or business want to work with Burlington?
In business a signed contract is legal and binding.
‘What has fairness got to do with it?”
The answer is everything! If the City was to act in any other area of operations in an unfair manner, The Gazette and its usual group of Council bashers would be all over it, crying foul!
“…and they seem to be doing a good job.”
“Seem” being the operative word. You have as much knowledge or idea as I or anyone else has as to whether its performance and offering have been good, bad or ugly.
“If the delegations made by Katie Lebel and Pam Pritz SPELL are an accurate reflection of the quality of the club management, the city is lucky to have them.”
“If” being the operative word.
Those two ladies have very biased points of view being intimately involved with BAD.
“What seems to have been lost here is that the seven members of Council were elected to serve the needs of the 194,000 citizens of the city.”
That appears to be exactly what the City is doing. Being fair, unbiased, & seeking the best offering for Burlington swimmers. Playing favourites as you appear to support does not serve Burlington residents.
‘Being fair and allowing some other organization to submit a bid that would kill the BAD organization is fair to who?”
To whom ? Well if the offering by GHAC is superior to that of BAD then the City is being fair to the swimmers and to all Burlington residents.
“Council has to ensure that all the facts are on the table, including who did what and why.”
Finally a smart and logical sentence in your opinion piece.
“It is clear now that the RFP approach was a mistake – who made that decision?”
The RFP approach was used for the first time in 2020 at which point BAD, as RFP winners, had absolutely no problem with it. In 2025 it loses and suddenly it starts whining, crying and having tantrums.
“Marianne Meed Ward turned herself into a very effective council member on the two words: accountable and transparent.
Her grip on those two words is less than it once was.”
It would seem her calling of special council meetings (plural), not shooting from the hip and prejudging the matter, investigating the matter with Council to discover all the facts would contradict your statement.
Mr. Leigh – I used to comment quite regularly in the Gazette some years ago. I stopped because there were people who really didn’t know when they had made their point. They commented ad nauseum on each and every article, sometimes several times. I withdrew from the field because it all became an exercise in futility. I think that I have commented once on the “swim issue” yet you have grouped me with Joe Gaetan, Lynn Crosby and Blair Smith as some sort of unholy quartet. These are good people and they really don’t deserve your rather jeuvenile sarcasm and open contempt.
More to the point, I know why they are commenting but I am very unclear what ‘stake in the game’ you have. Perhaps you could clarify. You seem somewhat obsessed with this issue, far beyond the normal interests of a concerned citizen. I’m not accusing you of anything improper just why has this issue grabbed you to the point that you are making yourself look rather silly.
There’s absolutely no steak in issue whatsoever. I have grown children who never wanted to swim competitively. I’m just a Burlington resident who is tired a reading comments from the three people you mentioned and reports in the Gazette which prejudge an issue without having all the facts to hand.
My only stake in this as you put it in this matter is to get all the facts of what actually happened and determine what is the appropriate way forward. You all seem happy to accept wannabe unsubstantiated facts put forward by those with obvious agenda and bias.
You say I seem to be somewhat obsessed with this issue. I do not care a flying fig about the swimming program, whether BAD or GHAC get the pool time. All I want is all the facts to come out so we can all see what actually happened and move on. I also hope by banging on those who prejudge that maybe they’ll learn to zip their lips until they have all the facts.
You say I’m making myself look rather silly. I don’t think so. I think all those including you in this who prejudge are the silly ones. There’ll be no apologies from me.
Maybe if at the end of the day city council finds nothing untoward happened in the RFP process, and GHAC was awarded contract fairly all of those who bought BAD’s spin will offer a Mea Culpa.