By Pepper Parr
October 16th, 2024
BURLINGTON, ON
Who knew!
It did seem odd that so many people weren’t able to attend the Council meeting on Tuesday.
I wondered – but there was a good reason.
Will CAO Basit do his fancy footwork while he is in Japan? Expect the Mayor to lead whatever parade there is.
Mayor Meed Ward, Councilors Galbraith and Nisan and CAO Hassaan Basit were on their way to Japan.
Wonder why Councillor Bentivegna, who chaired the Council meeting, (he did get through it) chose not to announce where these people were.
This was deliberate – instructions may have given not to say a word. This is sleazy and it smells.
Feels like they had to sneak out of town.
Councillor Galbraith
Councillor NIsan
The public perception has not been all that good about the spending involved.
For Nisan – this is his second trip to one of our Twin Cities.
The trips to Burlington two Twin cities has been a tradition. It was budgeted for and the funds had been allocated.
Given the significant tax increases it might have been time for the city to change the frequency of the visits.
It will tale some diplomacy to make these once every five year visits – perhaps a small gift exchange each year.
Perhaps the interval between trips should be every 10 years instead of every 5. a little fiscal restraint is important, especially since times are tough for a lot of folk right now. I would interested in reading a report on just how much and on what the money was spent. After all, it is the taxpayers that pay for these trips.
Something to mull over – its all well & good I guess to be twinned with cities around the world BUT whatever happened to out connection with Burlington Vermont? I have lived in Burlington for over 70 years & you can brag all you want Mr Dorr about sending, wow – 100 exchange students & the Teen Tour Band a few times overseas to to our current city ties BUT it pales in comparison to the yearly exchanges & friendships of 1,000’s of our children, (mine included), & the Band that went on between the 2 Burlingtons. So, maybe its time to look closer to home & resurrect something we all miss!
Could not agree more Charlie. We were hosts to Vermont childreen and spent time there during the games that were held. Still have badges to prove it. Special relationships were developed. We and a host family went on a wonderful weeks camping vacation together to PEI (with our combined 6 boys and family pets) and renewed the relationship every time we passed through the city the family moved to. We travelled a lot in the states with our boys as part of the Cyclepath BMX national team which Anne managed, so saw a lot of them. Good times, good memories and long lasting relationships that affected 1,000’s of Burlington residents not just those who get their trip paid for or can afford travel expenses to Japan.
Are we certain Nisan is in Japan? We agree when councillors and staff are representing the city at our expense we should be informed why they are absent from their main council duty. I.e. making and helping make best interest decisions on the spending of our tax dollars.
Editor’s note:
Our source was a member of council – however we are not at all certain he went to Japan. With Nisan – you never know where he is or, quite frankly who he is working for – other than himself.
Galbraith and Nisan have become the mayors new minions and they don’t even know it. Nisan going twice on the tax payers dime when someone more worthy could have gone. They should be paying out of their own pockets. This whole council needs to be given walking papers.
May be you all should do a little research on the benefits and the purpose of twinning. Itabashi and Burlington are celebrating the 35th anniversary and Apeldoorn and Burlington will celebrate the 20th anniversary next May as well as the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Netherlands by Canadian soldiers.
I have been the Chair of the Mundialization committee and left the committee in 2020. I was very much involved in making these trips happen, as a volunteer and what you people don’t appear to recognize are the benefits that presented our Burlington youth with a great experience. Over the years we have sent in the order of 100 High school students on exchange programs which does not cover the members of the Teen Tour band who have been to Apeldoorn 4 times and Japan 2 times and experienced the real stories from veterans at various Canadian military cemeteries in the Netherlands. In addition there have heen exchanges of High School students with Itabashi in Japan. All serious eye opening events. It should be noted that for roughly twenty years we received annual monetary donations from two of the original members of the twinning agreement which benefited charitable organizations in Burlington.
Burlington has been commended by both our twin cities about the high value of these relationships. Burlington even received an award from the Japanese Foreign office for having a true Japanese garden in our City.
You are all hung up on the expenditure of these 5 year trips. It is my firm opinion that having meaningful relationships with cities in other countries you have to maintain these relationship and the City, together with The Mindialization committee has done an excellent job. Just ask them and all the students and band members as well as numerous participants in Citizen exchanges how they feel about it and what they learned.
You know one of the great things about all this, we actually have people living in Burlington that know a little bit more about other countries and the way of life of their peers.
As far as travel by city employees, let me assure you that travel for 13 hours each way over a 4 day period in economy class is not a vacation
I will say that I have been on these trips a few times myself as Chair of the committee in a voluntary capacity and believe me it translates into a lot of work and attention .99
It’s the second trip for the Mayor and Nisan to Japan in less than six years despite the fact that, I believe the Gazette reported recently, the council back in the day who started the twin cities “thing” had said that visits to Japan to celebrate anniversaries should not occur more frequently than ten years apart.
It is offensive in the extreme that they think going to Japan for a celebration – again – is appropriate while raising our taxes close to 40 percent in the past three years. Talk about entitlement and tone deafness! That this wasn’t announced at the meeting by Bentivegna is also not acceptable. I suggest people write to the mayor and express your thoughts and ask how much is this costing us. I believe six of them are attending.
They should be sent packing all right, but not to Japan.
Most twinning arrangements between sub national jurisdictions were designed to encouraged trade .I doubt that there is one investment from this decade long deal.
It has turned into a free holiday on the tax payers dollar.
Is there even a public report on what benefits each participant achieved for Burlington.?
Editor’s note: The cherry trees that blossom every spring were a gift from as Japanese citizen
Council brought forward the next scheduled visit to Japan. That has been our biggest objection in tight times like we have. It was the extra visit squeezed in before the next election that has caused the most concern, not the twinning celebrations and previously scheduled visits.