Ashborough Village decision a reason to elect a new mayor
Even before Diane Therrien announced her mayoral candidacy, I had decided - based on her Council record - that if she ran, I would not only vote for her, but support her campaign to the best of my ability.
Monday night’s council meeting reinforced my “why?” Mayor Daryl Bennett again led city council to ignore constituents, ignore professionals, let another urban sprawl development application proceed to the point of no return, despite a lack of supporting evidence.
I streamed the meeting and watched four hours’ worth, all centered around the Ashborough Village development. Between incomplete city ataff reports, unavailable costings, vehement opposition of its two ward councillors, habitat concerns, residents’ objections and traffic woes, council voted to support this urban sprawl development, with more than 700 homes predicted to cost in the $500,000 to $700,000 range.
Traffic studies are incomplete, environmental studies are incomplete, how this fits into our Official Plan is incomplete, haphazard assurances about the LiftLock view not being compromised are incomplete, all while our roads crumble and jobs, affordable housing and rental stock are scarce. Mayor Bennett even reminded council of the spectre of an LPED (the old OMB) tribunal involvement if this was not approved.
But we’ve got a casino. Many new urban sprawl developments. Arenas on wetlands by co-opting Trent University. A new transit garage. And more cookie-cutter housing builds than we can count. Your taxes will go up.
We don’t need environmental assessments – we know better than the professionals - Mayor Bennett will just cozy up to the provincial government to get a bye! Who needs traffic studies? Car headaches are a fact of life! Referendum results on PDI? Phhhht! Our most vulnerable residents? We rely on social service agencies and volunteers to care.
And I’ve only been here 2 1/2 years – even I can see it.
After much research, we chose Peterborough, having to move from Quebec to help with an ailing family member. Everything we read showed that our mindsets were similar – value of greenspace, a vibrant art and music scene, a hardworking downtown core, a generous and tolerant community supporting all sorts of causes, a growing young community, active and innovative social activist groups, a cycling culture, a thriving entrepreneurial economy, an acknowledged Indigenous community, affordable housing, water flowing through our city and more.
Once settled, I attended two council meetings and streamed more online over the last year, excited to get a sense of who our civic leaders were. Time and time again, I have been astounded to find that Mayor Bennett’s vision does not match with what we researched nor with what I see as the desires and goals of the people and community groups we’ve met.
This was evidenced again on Monday night, where, despite serious and numerous objections of impacted residents and their councillors, despite a lack of hard costs and studies, with the mayor and council members choosing to not attend community meetings discussing this development, the Mayor and a majority of councillors under his leadership voted to proceed to the next phase of Ashborough Village.
The behaviour of this mayor is now a chronic, predictably dysfunctional pattern impacting this council’s ability to represent their constituents. Sheila Strickland Town Ward