ELECTION SO FAR HAS OFFERED ONLY A GENTLE GNAWING AND INUENDO

There are huge differences in opinions between local candidates, running in the upcoming municipal election. Don’t count on finding out just how deep and wide those divides are, because there isn’t a venue upcoming that will use debate as a measure of leadership competence. “Meet the candidates,” events, one scheduled this week, are interesting, santitized social encounters but establish very little, if you are interested in how the person you vote for, will be able to argue, negotiate, spar, wrestle with an array of developers, their lawyers, the feds, their latest mandates, and new provincial obstructions to bob and weave through. Wall flowers won’t cut it in our municipal challenges over the next four years.

The election action so far has been, at most, “a gentle gnawing of the shins,” and the observer who thinks the “gloves are coming off,” is grossly over-estimating the will to engage. And I believe there are many candidates who are bloody relieved they won’t have to face a hungry-for-blood audience, and rigorous debate from their competitors. Others have missed a great opportunity to advance themselves, in the eyes of electors, because they are highly aggressive debaters, who are used to fighting for what they believe. This is unfortunate because we absolutely require councillors unafraid of a little or a lot of heat at council meetings. Sitting back might be sensible for the warm-up period, to get used to the protocol, and to bone-up on council business, but if it becomes a habit, then the municipality is being under-served by their representative.

As for the gnashing of opinions, this is going to commence with the new council term, and the only way we’re going to find out who’s a worthy debater, and who should not have run for council, is to watch the proceedings. The horse is long gone before you shut the barn door but it’s what you get when good old-fashion election debates become little more than “meet and greets.”

I have selected my candidates of choice, and with the rest of my family, have already sent in our ballots. We sat together, as a family, and discussed openly the strengths and weaknesses of those we could vote for, and feel, by and large, will make no-nonsense, honest, business-like representatives. Even before this week’s “gnawing” spectacle, at the Opera House, we decided to weigh our decisions on personal encounters, our own debates with candidates over the past two months, and on our expectation of how these folks will do when debating flourishes on the council floor......which it will, I guarantee you. In fact, there are some combinations of council hopefuls that could fire-up the chambers to the kind of heat we haven’t seen around here in decades. And as I’m passionate about counter-point, debate, and a wee bit of sensibly proportioned “fury,” it could be a four year term completely opposite to the soft election campaign we’ve witnessed so far.

I don’t want to see blood on the knuckles out of this, or a council that can’t move-on after a little dust-up, but debate is healthy....rigorous debate is one dose better. It guarantees that the press must wake up from its slumber, and take note. That helps inform us. A passive council is a dangerous one for all of us.

In the lead-up to the election, I’m expecting that the councillors, who suspect they have a lead, will attempt to coast on their efforts to date. Folks like me will be disappointed. A few will try some theatrics to bring votes their way, and others will spend money on ads of self promotion, and decide to abandon the main street, person to person contact, they began with but decided the effort was simply too much work to maintain. I have a feeling most will cross their fingers and hope for a positive outcome. Several however, will take advantage of this laziness, and accelerate their mission to succeed. I’ve voted for these people.....the ones who don’t and have not rested the outcome on wishful thinking. Ambition shown now is ambition that will show later. From the majority of candidates, well, I’m less than impressed in 2010, and I can only hope, their performance as elected officials is more dynamic, than the run they’ve taken leading up to election day.

I won’t contaminate this blog site by naming those I have supported in this election. It isn’t fair to have this great pomposity of opinion about democracy and its virtues, and what makes good governance, and then rest all that on my candidates of choice. It’s not fair for them to be forced to carry all the burdens of responsibility I’ve etched here in cyber-space. I don’t want to jinx them from having a good term of office because they feel obliged to the prolific guy with time on his hands. It’s not like that. Like many of us frustrated voters, we just want to help with good governance.....not micro manage. If we had truly believed ourselves superior, then our names would be on that same ballot, just as the brave souls who face our scrutiny today.