New city councillors set out their priorities
Four new faces joined Saskatoon city council Wednesday night. In Ward 2, Hilary Gough won a tight race over Pat Lorje, the city’s longest serving councillor, while Cynthia Block, Sarina Gersher and former city councillor Bev Dubois picked up seats without
CYNTHIA BLOCK (WARD 6)
Block said she looks forward to representing the views of Ward 6 residents — and what residents want are the basics done right.
“I’d really love to be able to see our city double down and refocus on how we’re going to get ahead of the schedule on closing basic infrastructure gaps,” she said. The 52-year-old former CTV news anchor and federal Liberal Party candidate said she’s ready to sharpen her pencil and take a “very critical” look at the budget in order to find ways to keep property taxes low.
Block ran her own communications business before seeking election; she said that will take a back seat to her council work. She still hopes to continue teaching one day a week at the local broadcasting college.
BEV DUBOIS (WARD 9)
After a four-year hiatus from council, Dubois is back and says she is ready to “hit the ground running.” The former councillor represented Ward 10 for nine years before she was defeated by Coun. Zach Jeffries in 2012.
Dubois, who refuses to give her age because she does not believe it’s relevant in politics, said she wants to focus on seniors and one of her first priorities will be a motion to have lower seniors’ rates at city leisure centres. The former councillor said she knows the importance of council working as a single unit and looks forward to contributing to that dynamic over the next four years.
“People don’t always agree and disagree and that’s healthy, but at the end of the day, we need to come out as a unit, as a team, for the best interest of the citizens.”
Dubois operated her own marketing and communications business before launching her campaign; she said she is transitioning to become a full-time city councillor.
SARINA GERSHER (WARD 8)
Gersher said she looks forward to meeting as many of her constituents as possible as soon as possible through the introduction of monthly councillor coffee chats. The 28-year-old geographic information systems analyst for the Meewasin Valley Authority (MVA) said she looks forward to being an advocate for improved neighbourhood safety, ways to support the local economy and adequate funding for public green spaces.
She’s said she’s still talking with the MVA about what her role there will be now that she’s an elected official. She said if she continues working for the organization, she will abstain on any votes regarding its funding. Regardless of whether she stays on the MVA’s payroll, she plans to treat her council seat as a fulltime job and residents can expect her to be available, she said.
HILARY GOUGH (WARD 2)
Gough said her top priorities are making sure the city’s transit plan is appropriately executed, that Access Transit is improved to reduce the number of denied rides and that affordable housing is adequately planned and funded.
Before launching her campaign, the 28-year-old cycling advocate was the operations manager of Upstream, a non-profit organization that does health policy and education work. She said she is still determining how much work she will do with that group now that she’s on council.
“Ultimately I understand that the decision of voters last night was to have me working for them in a very serious way and I intend to do that. If it works out, too, to do a little bit of work with the organization that I’ve been with, that will be fine,” she said Thursday.