Direct Election of the Regional Chair

Democracy as defined by Webster’s is; government by the people; a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections.  The position of the Regional Chair is an incredibly powerful and important position, he or she is in charge of a $1billion dollar budget, delivery of regional services (ex Police Services), and representing our needs to higher orders of government.  The Regional Chair sits on every committee and has an equal vote, he or she is the tie breaking vote at Council and they receive a salary and benefits that far exceed those of their elected counter parts paid for solely by taxpayers.  For example the Regional Chair makes nearly $200,000/year in salary and approximately $300,000 in severance and has an office budget of $600,000/year.  In addition the Chair has powers delegated to him or her by Council, which for example made it possible for our current Chair, Roger Anderson to unilaterally sign off on the EA allowing the Odour Control Facility for York Region’s sewage pipe to be in its current location without going to Regional Council and completely ignoring the residents and Council of the City of Pickering.  This is certainly not a ‘symbolic’ position.

There is no doubt in my mind that if we were to move to a direct election of a Regional Chair strict rules would be key because I would want to see spending limits put in place (just as every municipal candidate has) to ensure the Chair’s position does not become one of who can raise the most money.  However the directly elected Regional Chair of Halton spent less money than the Mayor of Pickering during the 2006 elections.

Without being able to directly elect the Regional Chair, we as a community will not have a Regional government where power is vested in the people, rather a mere 15 votes from Regional Councillors will choose who is appointed to such a powerful position while we are left paying the social, political and economic price tag.

Stop the Stink!

As we witness more and more the effects of global warming we have all been asked by various governments to take steps to limit the impacts on our environment and to lead more sustainable lives.  This is something that is very important to the City of Pickering, yet York region is asking us to handle their raw sewage.  We are all expected to be responsible for our own waste yet why does York Region feel they do not have to, that they can sweep their mess under the carpet, while we endure the consequences.  This sense of entitlement by York is a failure to their own sustainable-minded residents and an insult to the promises that York has made in the area of sustainability!

York’s current pipe that runs through Pickering already leaks and takes clean ground water and pumps it through to be processed, while our streams and creaks slowly dry up destroying any natural habitats.  If this leaky pipe were fixed it would increase the capacity and perhaps reveal that a second pipe is not needed.  We all know York region is spending hundreds of millions of dollars on building a new pipe to send their waste to Pickering.  For this money York could develop and build a technology to deal with their own waste and in fact turn it into clean water for other uses.  This technology exists; York does not have to reinvent the wheel.  But this option may take too long and lets face it they do not care about you, they do not care about us, they do not care about the environment, they care about the future development being built in York Region and that is their bottom line.

During this whole process York and Durham Region have ignored us and have not acted in the best interests of Pickering residents.  They have not consulted with the City of Pickering or our residents and they have not been able to answer any of our questions time and time again.  In my opinion York has breeched a Memorandum of Understanding it has with Pickering and York and Durham have breeched the Environmental Assessment Act by not consulting with the community on all aspects of this process.  Durham Region was the co-proponent on this project and they were supposed to protect the interests of our residents, however with the exception of Councillor McLean, our Regional representatives have failed us by allowing the EA to be signed off and subjecting our residents to an Odour Control Facility in our community.

If Durham Region was not willing to stand up for us then it was time for Pickering to act and take a stand against York.  On September 21, 2009 Councillor McLean and I brought forward a motion to commence legal action against York for various breeches.  Despite Council watering down our motion we were able to ensure that if the Minister of the Environment fails to hear the concerns of Pickering and it’s residents, we will commence a Judicial Review of the entire process.  And we will fight for our future and we will fight for the rights of our residents!

-Jennifer
(For more information on this subject please visit the ‘In the Community’ section of my web site for various video clips and articles written on this subject.)

2009 Budget Survey

We have all witnessed the economic downturn that has been occurring throughout the world. Many of us are either directly impacted or know someone who may be impacted by a present or pending loss of jobs, loss of savings or a roll back of salary.  No one is exempt from the economic situation, as these are very difficult times.  

Over the last few months many residents have expressed a concern with the continual increases in property taxes within Durham Region and the City of Pickering. While I refused to support the 2007 and 2008 recommended expenditures and tax increases, I was only one vote and both budgets were passed.  Along with opposition to the tax increases I expressed a concern with the amount of debt that was being consumed.  Mortgaging our present and future generations is a guarantee that our level of taxation will continue to grow.

As preparations have already commenced on how your tax dollars will be spent in 2009, I think it is more important than ever to hear from you the residents, to allow me to represent YOUR PRIORITIES FOR THE 2009 BUDGET.

Please take the time to fill out the following survey and send it to me by April 30, 2009.

Thank you in advance for your assistance.

Sincerely,

-Jennifer

Stop the Stink!

On Wednesday March 11, 2009 Regional Council unanimously supported the Pickering Community and voted to tell York Region and the Minister of the Environment that the proposed Odour Control Facility (OCF) should be located in York Region and NOT the City of Pickering.

I along with approximately 20 other delegations were there to speak on behalf of the community to ask that our Regional government abandon their previous support of the OCF location within the Cherrywood community and request that it be moved out of Pickering!  Surprisingly, Regional Council unanimously supported our position prior to hearing the delegations; therefore many of us thanked the Councillors for their support and withdrew from speaking.

The fight however is not over as the EA was signed and submitted to the Minister by both York and Durham Region in November 2008.  In the EA document Durham Regional Council signed off on the OCF location to be located within Pickering.  Although I am so pleased with the recent Regional Council position supporting Pickering residents and not allowing the OCF within Pickering, I can’t help but wonder why our concerns were ignored in November 2008?  The Minister now has two Durham Region positions before him and we must continue to fight to ensure that the Minister supports Pickering and moves the OCF location into York Region.  Had Regional Council supported this community in the first place the EA would not have been signed and submitted until the location of the OCF was moved.  I suppose Regional Council’s change of heart is better late than never, but I hope their initial support of this location does not cause the Minister to support the OCF within Pickering!

With all of this said, I must personally thank all of the residents who have been involved with fighting this facility.  There has been a lot of time and energy spent organizing and writing letters/emails from our residents and I don’t think we would have been able to change Durham Council’s minds without your hard work and determination.  Thank you, on behalf of all concerned residents!

-Jennifer

Welcome to JenniferOConnell.ca!

Welcome to my new website! This site was designed not as a way to simply showcase another politician, however it was designed as an interactive tool for the residents of Pickering. Something important to me in the creation of this site was that I wanted it to be user friendly and it needed to be user friendly for the very diverse community within Pickering.

I am extremely excited about JenniferOConnell.ca, I love how easy it is to navigate through the different pages. Each page is designed to provide information to the user, whether it’s through the Issues and Legislation page, the Links page or even the Calendar page that lets you know where I am in the community.

The overall feeling that I wanted to express with this website is that I am not your typical politician. I believe I am a new generation of political thinking and my degree in Political Science from the University of Toronto is the tool that allows me to implement this new era of political representation.

My favourite part of my website is this Blog section. My blogs are my informal thoughts and opinions, almost like diary entries. I invite all of you to visit my site regularly and read my blogs. If you have any comments to add to the blog section please feel free to email me and I will be happy to post them for all to read and comment on.

I want this site to be an interactive tool that is thought provoking and gets residents talking about important issues. Enjoy!

- Jennifer

8.79% Tax increase in the City of Pickering

Taxes are something that is always a contentious issue, however the 2007 City of Pickering budget that gave rise to an 8.79% tax increase has the whole GTA talking.

This increase in my opinion was due to a heavy reliance on development and poor long term planning. Because of this I was the only Councillor who did not support this budget and tax increase. I did support a number of the projects within the budget, however I felt that we could have done better at reducing our operating costs. With 0.8% growth the City of Pickering does not have too much going on right now so I found it hard to justify why we are spending the same as past years.

I agree with my fellow Councillors that this tax increase not only has to do with the City’s financial responsibilities but we have had to deal with provincial downloading of services to the municipalities. A good example to highlight provincial downloading is with the recent closure of the Adelaide House, a women’s shelter in the Durham Region. Social services such as this shelter are under the jurisdiction of the Province, yet residents and this local government constantly have to give money in order for their doors to remain open, however in this case unless the Provincial Government commits to long-term funding this shelter will not be able to reopen for longer than one year.

I agree that a portion of our financial problems come from provincial downloading, however this is not the only reason. As I mentioned above the City of Pickering relies so heavily on new growth, this is bad business because eventually every municipality will run out of land.

This along with Pickering's aging infrastructure and the fact that previous Councils for a number of years did not increase taxes even to the point of inflation because it was good for their political careers, and now we are playing catch up. Therefore I can understand everyone’s frustration with regards to Pickering's 8.79% tax increase, I too am frustrated.

Despite the fact that Pickering's increase was so high this year, you should know that Pickering residents still pay less in taxes than most Durham municipalities including Ajax. This is something that is often left out of the media and most residents have no idea how much residents in other municipalities are actually paying. This does not mean that I support the 8.79% increase.

Over the next four years during my time on Council I will be working hard to change the way Pickering does business and ensure that this City becomes more financially sustainable, and that we no longer rely so heavily on the residential tax base. I want to help ensure that hard working families can afford to remain in Pickering and that we leave future generations a legacy we can be proud of.

- Jennifer