By Pepper Parr
Burlington, ON March 15, 2012 It was a year ago today that we lost you John. We’ve been busy.
They went and named a school after you and wouldn’t you know it – the community immediately wanted some of the property around the building set aside for public park use. You`d have been proud of the way the Orchard community organized themselves – they certainly showed staff how it should be done.
The city spent several months putting together a Strategic Plan that you would have been really pleased with. And, the darn thing is doing what it’s supposed to be doing.
We have the Community Engagement person in place but that concept hasn’t energized very many people. Not sure how well Community Engagement is actually going to work – it’s time for Burlington – may not have come yet. What having the Community Engagement person in place did do was ensure that your Shape Burlington report was kept in print. Actually it was you and Walter and a solid committee that put the whole thing together and Walter is certainly out there keeping the flame alive.
Shaping Burlington is there as well – they’ve not managed to create a significant profile for themselves or learned how to take positions on issues. The idea that they would go beyond the Shape Burlington report itself either hasn’t occurred to them or they just don’t want to do anything like that. They haven’t done what we thought and hoped they would do. Wasn’t what we talked about, was it?
Heritage is still a mess; Joe Lamb mumbles about running for office locally, Keenleyside still tells Council that the condo people are getting a bad deal, Walter delegates and consistently tells council not to mess around too much with the advisory committee structure.
The Waterfront Advisory is pretty close to a disaster but some of the members of that committee are beginning to push for a different approach.
That mayoral candidate we both campaigned against – turned out we were wrong. The guy can do the job – quite well actually. He went and got himself a new city manager – this is a guy you would really like – he`s not a Serb but he`s OK. Comes out of London and you know the kind of problem he had with the Mayor over there.
The dogs miss you. Buster and Molly and the other mutt whose name I can never remember still yap away. Chris takes care of the odd jobs around the house, Lorraine is in close to daily touch with Arlene. The hip surgery did what it was supposed to do and she doesn’t have that funny little walk anymore.
There are good days and days that are not as good for her. That God you spend your time with now, forgot to give us a real Canadian winter (he dumped a couple of loads of snow elsewhere) which means she can get out in the garden earlier.
The ‘goat’ decided not to hold the Super Bowl party –everyone thought it was something you should take with you.
Still perplexed with the way MMW conducts herself as a council member. The one thing that is consistent is her sticking her neck out. She doesn’t always get it right – but no one can fault the woman for trying. She drives city hall staff bananas and she has certainly changed the way council members relate to their Wards.
Blair Lancaster declared a conflict of interest on a very small matter but in doing so set a different tone at Council and within weeks there was Jack Dennison leaving the horseshoe and sitting in the public gallery on a conflict matter.
Eric Cunningham didn’t get the Maid of the Mist contract – it went to an American firm.
The Greek with the Grenade has put up a web site which means the 2014 election will be slower.
The provincial Tories took a pass on both Brian Heagle and Rene Papin and went for Jane McKenna – one could see the smooth hands of Foxcroft and Keith Large in that manoeuver. She then went on to beat our friend Karmel, who didn’t do as well as MMW did when she carried the provincial banner.
Cam has a job as a lobbyist for an organization that’s in the optical field.
The Pier is going to get built. It’s $5 million over the original cost and the turbine that was to give the Pier a high tech element is never going to work.
We miss you pal. So does the city, but they might not know that yet. Take care.
John Boich is the reason there is an Our Burlington. The idea of a newspaper on a web site came out of many conversations with John as we walked his dogs in the Wellington Precinct. John Boich was a trusted adviser as we worked our way through the first months of our existence. John passed away March 15, 2011
Wonderful tribute Pepper