It was my pleasure to present to the Comox Rotary Club as Mayor of Courtenay and Chair of the Comox Valley Regional District to update them on some of the successes, challenges and projects that are in progress.
Successes
- Strategic Priorities
- $62.8 Million grant for Water Treatment Project. Huge shout out for our MLA Ronna-Rae Leonard (and previous MLA Don McRae) and our MP Gord Johns for all the work they did supporting this project and arranging meetings
- Affordable Housing – Opening the Braidwood Project and The Junction has added over 80 units this year alone thanks to partnerships with the province and Makola Housing and the John Howard Society. However, there is still much to be done and we are still working on more units
- Water leak repair
- Development Tracker and Mayors Select Committee meeting with Developers
- Accessibility and regular meetings with citizens
- Intergovernmental relationships with a focus on K’òmoks First Nation
Challenges
- Ageing infrastructure like the 5th St Bridge and years of delaying necessary work to not only save it but to extend its life by another 50 years.
- Tent Cities – issues around root causes like affordable housing, addictions, and mental health which are beyond the mandate of the city and the resulting crime and costs of cleanup.
- Calling on the Province and Federal governments to create a National Strategy for Tent Cities.
In Progress
- Creating an Organics program that would allow us to reduce our landfill garbage by up to 50%
- Creating new Municipal revenue streams like a portion of Liquor and Property Transfer taxes and creating a Solid Waste Tax or grant to close older landfills
- Creating an employee housing working group with large employers in the Comox Valley
- Kus-kus-sum project
Q and A
- Time to repair water pipe
- Number of Fire Departments in the Comox Valley, Mutual Aid agreements and Efficiency
- Amalgamation and how our Regional District facilitates intergovernmental projects
- Landfill closing costs and my trip to Victoria May 22 to meet with Minister of Environment
- Main initiatives to battle Climate Change – Organics, Declaring Climate Crisis, banning single-use plastics, encouraging Youth Environmental Action