Episode 36: Part I discusses Massey Theatre, toilet strategies, public opinion polls, procurement, politician pay hikes and much more!

It was a jam packed workshop and council meeting in New Westminster on July 8th. There is so much to unpack, that's why we've broken this podcast into two parts. Special guest Coun. Minhas is in studio with us and he provides his personal perspective on what transpired and why. A number of interesting topics came up for discussion including raising the level of authority for the city manager for sole source contracts from $150K to $500K. We also discuss the injection of up to $16M to help support the ageing Massey Theatre with a new HVAC system and landscaping. To poll, or not to poll. That was the question that got posed regarding whether to invest some tax dollars with Ipsos to survey up to 10,000 residents regarding what they'd like to see in the 2025 budget. Why did this stir up a debate and a split vote? What would a council workshop be without another discussion about the City's public toilet strategy. City staff came to council to get clarity on exactly what direction they should go when it comes to installing more $650K stand alone public toilets. But yes, work to install more signage around town directing people to existing public toilets is now underway. Should a new position at city hall automatically be filled by increasing taxes or should we be looking at efficiencies first? You can just imagine how that discussion wrapped up. Or can you? You might be in for a pleasant surprise. Council also debated a motion to refer a major report regarding some significant (and costly) capital improvements to the city as a result of a consultant's study on bus reliability in our city. The referral would have been to the September 9th council meeting to allow the public more than a week to provide Council with their feedback. You won't be surprised to learn how that vote turned out. Spoiler alert, you won't be pleasantly surprised. In Part 2 of this podcast, we'll continue to cover off a number of additional items that came up for debate at the 'marathon mid-summer meeting' on July 8th. This podcast is available for download on all major platforms.