By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. August 7, 2013. The anxious look hadn’t changed much since the first interview when Rick Goldring was running for the office of Mayor in 2010. At that time he had no idea what he was in for and he needed the three years he had with the Chain of Office around his neck to get used to being Mayor of the city and deciding what kind of a Mayor he was going to be.
Rick Goldring is, on the surface, as decent as they come. While not the quickest study at Council he is diligent and takes the time he needs to develop his point of view.
During the first two and a half years he had Frank McKeown as his Chief of Staff and the two worked well together. Sometime last summer a difference of opinion that could not be overcome developed and McKeown told the Mayor in July that he would leave his position at the end of the year. The Mayor has been running his office with a Chief of Staff that brings a much different talent and temperament to the job of Chief of Staff.
The purpose of our interview with the Mayor was to ask what he would do differently as he looks back over his first two and a half years as Mayor. “What would he not do that he chose to do and what does he wish he had done that he didn’t do.”, was the question we asked.
We were a little taken aback when the Mayor said there wasn’t anything he would do differently.
Were we seeing a level of hubris that is not a part of Goldring’s personality make up or did he not understand the question? That wasn’t clear at the time. There was some clarification when the Mayor called a day later and said upon thinking about the question there was something he would do differently and that was, – be part of the Downtown Vision. He said that he would make a point of being on that committee next year.
During the last provincial election Goldring looked at the candidates carefully and wanted to be sure the government understood the concern over a potential highway being rammed through the Escarpment. Kathleen Wynne, on the right was Minister of Transportation at the time.
Stephanie, what makes you think he cares? Not a lot of votes in the rural area. Seems he would rather promote the Pier and downtown despite it housing less than 7% of Burlington’s total population.
Seems during his interview and through his sober second thought, Mr. Goldring forgot that he should have taken a deeper, harder look into what non-resident Vince Rossi was doing to the City’s rural greenbelt community – aka: the Burlington Airdump.
Talk about not being prepped enough in advance. Both he and his staff should know better.
Tip – take a media relations class.