Cochrane mayor Ivan Brooker and Coun. Jeff Toews are less than pleased with the approach of fellow Cochrane councillor Morgan Nagel, who launched an online, informal petition at rocktheroads.ca Oct. 5 in his effort to deliver a platform for Cochranites opposed to the aquatic/curling project.
Council gave the green light on the capitol project with a $45M price tag at the last council meeting, Sept. 22.
Nagel, who was the ‘lone wolf’ to vote against the project moving forward, is hoping to garner as close to 2,000 signatures as possible through his online petition.
“This is such a big project, we should be democratic about it and if the majority of people vote for the project (to move forward) you will never hear from me about this again,” said Nagel, whose primary concern is that the project will use up monies (MSI grants) that could be put toward addressing Cochrane’s rising road congestion issues.
But both Brooker and Toews, who did not receive a heads-up that Nagel intended to launch this informal petition, are concerned that the young councillor is misinforming the public with inaccurate figures of how this project could affect Cochrane taxpayers.
“I’m a little frustrated with Coun. Nagel’s approach,” said Brooker, expressing his concern over where Nagel got numbers such as ‘the project split between 10,495 tax bills is an average (increase) of $4,125.77 each’ and ‘we’ll be at 95 per cent of our debt limit by 2019’ (as listed at rocktheroads.ca).
“The fear he’s throwing out with all this conversation around debt is frustrating…if these numbers had any merit at all, we wouldn’t have made these decisions — we’re taxpayers too,” said Brooker, adding that last year the town rolled back taxes and at this point, they are predicted to rise around three per cent for the coming year.
Toews said he has nothing but respect for anyone who stands behind their convictions, and added “I have zero respect for somebody who goes out there and is twisting information and presenting half-truths.”
The second-term councillor has long been a voice for Cochrane’s need to replace its current failing Big Hill Leisure Pool and to instead build a multi-use facility ‘for the future’.
“Morgan is underestimating the intelligence of the community. Most residents will see through his smoke-and-mirrors act and recognize that he is withholding facts in order to push his own private agenda,” said Toews.
According to Suzanne Gaida, senior manager of community services for the town, who has taken the lead on the town’s end of the fundraising campaign for the capital project (sitting at $1.3M so far), the town is on the brink of two major facility naming rights announcements and the fundraising, considering the bulk would only start to come in now that the project has been given the go-ahead, has been going ‘very well’.
“What we presented to council is that there would be no tax increase (anticipated from the aquatic/curling centre project),” said Gaida.
“The 95 per cent in the next five years includes borrowing for the pool/curling facility, building the bridge (from Riversong) and the new RCMP station.”
Brooker explained that the $19M short-term loan that brings the debt threshold up would begin to decline after two years, returning to where it is today after five years.
He also stressed that projects such as the bridge could not be sped up, as it has to go through the process (developers, land acquisitions, design, etc.) just like all other projects.
As far as roads are concerned, the second public engagement session for the Cochrane Master Transportation Plan will be held Oct. 16 at the RancheHouse from noon-2 p.m. and 6-8 p.m.
The pool/curling facility accounts for 67 per cent of the 2013 council debt limit, according to Gaida.
Because this capital borrowing project does not exceed a term of five years, it does appear that Nagel would not be able to achieve a plebiscite — even if he chose to launch a legal and binding petition and obtained 10 per cent of the signatures from the voting population.
“The petition (Nagel’s rocktheroads.ca) that’s out there is not legally binding because the Municipal Government Act (MGA) petition process exempts short-term borrowing bylaws,” said town communications advisor Laurie Drukier.
“MGA section 232 speaks to petitions for bylaws and part two notes that petitions in respect to Part 8 have no effect (short-term borrowing bylaw is in part 8).”
Nagel, who celebrated his website launch with supporters at the Ranche park during the evening of Oct. 6 reaffirmed that he is ‘not against the pool, only the size of the project and the potential cost to taxpayers’.
Around 30 people showed up to support Nagel, who by then had garnered around 280 signatures; by the morning of Oct. 8, he had reached 478.
“I don’t like the direction council is going and I think they’re in a big hurry to spend money,” said Tim Pearson, a ten-year West Terrace resident who was in attendance at the event.
“It would be wonderful to have a new curling rink and swimming pool — but it would be wonderful to drive on the roads to get there.”
For Nagel, he maintains that should he receive enough signatures, he hopes this would influence council to take another look at the project (slated to begin construction next year) and look at scaling back; he has particularly criticized the build of a $10M curling centre.
To learn more about the project and the funding structure, visit cochrane.ca/aquaticcentre.
