CITY MANAGER’S RANT WORTHY OF GOLD
Fielding said he’s done with ‘willy-nilly’ motions related to possible Olympic bid
I have a new hero at city hall — his name is Jeff Fielding and he is Calgary’s city manager.
I was considering leaving council chambers Monday afternoon to discreetly go bang my head against the adjacent concrete wall to alleviate the agony of witnessing the proceedings leading into the second hour of a debate on an absurd motion put forward by rookie Ward 5 Coun. George Chahal, when Fielding rose to speak and glued me to my seat.
Maybe it was an amendment to the amendment of an amendment? No, that was the previous drone fest.
Anyway, Chahal had a motion on the floor that directed administration to “evaluate the best method to include all Calgarians over the age of 14 to participate in a plebiscite-style process” on whether the city should host the 2026 Winter Olympic Games.
It was during the debate on this issue that Fielding stood to speak. He never raised his voice, but you could tell he was bursting with justified frustration.
“I’ve sat silent for many months on the Olympic file and allowed things to unfold here that obviously council and the community wasn’t happy with,” said Fielding, who was sitting next to Mayor Naheed Nenshi.
“And I take my leadership role within this corporation to heart that I should have stepped in earlier, so I’m stepping in.
“That is where I’m assuming we’re going to get direction from,” he said, referring to the newly established council subcommittee on the Olympics.
“Or are we just taking direction willy-nilly off the floor of council on all the things that we’re talking about that come popping into your head? I gotta tell you, I’m done with that folks. I’m absolutely done with that.
“I’ve listened to our folks get castigated over the last several months for mistakes that have been committed and I’ve made clear that we have made mistakes. There were things that we did wrong. But we’ve never been clear about who we were responding to, who is the leader of all of this process and who is responsible at the end of the day that we were supposed to report to.
“So I’m putting my stake in the ground today. You’re setting up a structure, please stick with the structure. Let that committee think about what’s necessary and how to do this thing that we’re embarking on.”
In short, Fielding is sick and tired of all of the silly make-work projects his staff gets handed “willy-nilly” at the whim of councillors talking off the top of their heads and directing administration to report back to council. He’s so right.
Chahal, for instance, should have removed his motion when he learned from the city solicitor that if the city were to include non-electors (people younger than 18), the plebiscite could not be called a plebiscite by law and the provincial money that’s contingent on a plebiscite being held would not likely remain on the table. But he stuck to his silly motion, which was thankfully voted down.
Chahal’s point is 14-year-olds will be of age and will be paying taxes by 2026. Well, by 2026, so will 10-year-olds. When you look at the ballooning debts and deficits of our provincial and federal governments, it’s obvious future generations will be stuck with an enormous bill thanks to the immoral leadership of our governments. Obviously they can’t vote, but they can at least have an Olympic dream.
Sure, we all want young people engaged, but if he wants that, then spend some time in schools and recommend some mock plebiscites be held on an Olympic bid. But first, could we wait to find out what Calgarians will actually be bidding on?
If it’s the mayor’s vision of sharing the Games with Edmonton and Whistler, then that’s really no vision at all and Calgary would just get stuck with a huge security bill and headache and not all the infrastructure that gets built with any Olympic bid.
After Fielding ’s rant, Chahal and others protested that their silly ideas didn’t just pop into their heads, they’d been thinking about them for days or weeks. Sigh.
Earlier in the day, council had just finally, after a long and arduous process, voted in favour of holding a non-binding plebiscite to seek the input of citizens on whether to host the truly greatest (mostly) outdoor show on Earth.
After lunch, about two dozen Canadian Olympic and Paralympic athletes who competed in the recent Pyeongchang Winter Olympics joined Alberta Lt.- Gov. Lois Mitchell to be saluted by council. Of the 29 medals Canada won at the Olympics, 23 of the athletes had ties to Calgary’s 1988 Winter Olympic legacy.
As is always the case, seeing Canadian athletes wearing their Canadian gear so proudly and bursting with positivity and health, it kind of put everything in perspective. But not for long. It was after the standing ovations for the athletes and the photos with our Olympians that Chahal forwarded his motion and Fielding finally made his rant.
It was a gold-medal performance and deserves an ovation. Here’s hoping Fielding ’s words change things in council.
Is there a medal for holding one’s breath?