By Gazette Staff
January 21st, 2026
BURLINGTON, ON
It was a very cold night.
Despite the weather, a small group showed up for the first public event Focus Burlington put on. Using the theme: Beyond the Ballot Stephen White took the audience through a series of questions put to a four-member panel. The questions are set out below.
The two-hour event didn’t manage to get to all 10; questions from the audience were varied and, for the most part, very much to the point.
I wasn’t a huge audience but it was respectful enough, and they had a lot to say.
They were looking for answers to issues that just couldn’t be answered.
Interesting, the maniac south of us wasn’t mentioned once.
The audience wasn’t very happy with the performance coming from the City Council.
Budget issues and what the audience thought their city council wasn’t doing for them dominated.
Alan Harrington spoke of the need to get people involved, saying there wasn’t much hope for a change with the current Council.
Brad Harness, publisher of the Burlington Independent, acquitted himself rather well. While he has yet to formally announce, he will run for the Ward 2 seat that Lisa Kerns is expected to vacate to take a run at becoming the Mayor of the City. No formal announcement yet.
Mark Carr, a former member of City Council (Ward 6 when it was a 17 member Council saw merit in what was being done at Regional Council. He didn’t get much in the way of agreement on that point.
Pepper Parr, publisher of the Burlington Gazette told the audience that the biggest problem the city has is “assessment”; new homes are not being built which means the tax revenue stream can’t keep up with the amount of money the city is spending.
It is that issue, the amount the city is spending and the tax increases that follow that broughtFocus Burlington into being.
Left to right: Alan Harrington, Brad Harness, Eric Stern, a Focus co-founder, Mark Carr and Pepper Parr
A chartered accountant in the audience said he was stunned when he learned that the budget book is more than 600 pages long.
Another resident said she was finding Burlington too expensive to live in and expected to have to move at some point..
The one issue that pervaded almost everything was the lack of meaningful engagement. No one spoke about how well things were going at City Council . There wasn’t any praise for even one of them.
1: When you look back on the past four years of the Burlington City Council, what story does their record tell? If you had to assess their overall effectiveness—not intentions, but outcomes—how would you evaluate their performance and why?
2: What decision or initiative best represents the strongest leadership shown by the current mayor and council over the past four years—and what lasting impact will it have on Burlington?
3: Where do you believe the mayor and council fell short of public expectations, and what lessons should future councils take from that shortcoming?
4: What do you think has been the most significant or impactful decision, action or moment in the life of this mayor and council during the past four years?
5: Looking ahead to the next four-year term, what are the most critical challenges facing Burlington—and how prepared is the next mayor and council to address them realistically?
6: Public scrutiny of municipal spending continues to Based on what you’ve observed, where are the greatest opportunities for smarter spending, cost control, or service redesign—without compromising quality?
7: How do you expect provincial policies and decisions under the Ford government to shape—or constrain—the priorities and autonomy of Burlington’s next mayor and council?”
8: As you assess Burlington’s political landscape, where do you see the greatest potential for change—whether through new voices, tighter races, or shifting voter priorities?
9: Municipal voter turnout remains a challenge across How well do you think Burlington engages its residents in civic life—and what concrete steps could meaningfully increase participation and trust?”
10: For someone in the audience contemplating running for municipal office, what advice would you give them in preparing their policy platform or organizing their campaign?
Leave a Reply