Our hope was that the Mayor would insist on telling the public how much the city spent on legal fees and how much they settled for if there is a settlement. 
The best the Mayor would say was that he would “follow the process”
Rick Goldring maintains he was elected to keep tax increases to 10% during his four-year term; he believes he will be able to do that and he might – but there are going to have to be some hard service cuts if he is to keep to his election promise. The lower tax revenue from the Industrial, Commercial and Institutional sector in 2013 is going to mean something will have to be cut somewhere.
Keeping the tax rates within the 10% election promise is not going to be easy in 2013. The Mayor will have to take his story to the public and hopefully rein in some of the spending his fellow Council members would like to see.
We asked the Mayor how he has fared as an environmentalist Mayor. He backed off the placing of a wind turbine on the pier; he backed away from voting for bike lanes on Lakeshore after supporting the proposal at the committee stage. He didn’t fight all that hard to keep the trees on Ghent Street, when that project was before city Council. He has hardened his position on a private tree bylaw, but realizes now that there is a lot more educating to be done before the city will manage to convince its citizens that a good private tree bylaw is in everyone’s best interests.
On this one he is in total agreement with Ward 2 Councillor Marianne Meed Ward. They found themselves as the only two people voting for something on more than one occasion. Is this a Mayor positioning himself to be more of a populist and move a little closer to a populist Council member?
In the nothing ventured – nothing gained column one has to give the Mayor some credit for trying to bring about a shift in the way the city sees itself and what it has, if any, in the way of aspirations. Burlington isn’t led by a vision; it seems to be the result of a dynamic tension where the views and interests of many pull in different directions and that keeps the city upright – sort of.
Mayor Goldring believed he could break out of that mould and came up with the One Dream idea that was quickly swirled down a black hole and hasn’t been seen since.
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.