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Category Archives: Local Politics

An Open Letter to Mayor Fontana

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Tonight’s city council meeting voted on the issue of continuing to fluoridate the city’s water supply or not. By all appearances it is a very contentious issue with many city Councillors firmly on one side of the debate or the other. In my opinion the biggest atrocities in this entire issue is an anti-fluoridation poster that was created and/or distributed by Councillor Orser. I will not display the poster here or provide a link to it. If you want to see it, I’m sure you can easily find it. The poster effectively compares communities that fluoridate with the Nazi regime by stating that they used fluoride to keep those in the concentration camps under control. Never mind the fact that a very basic search will reveal this to be commonly believed to be an urban legend; the fact that a city Councillor had the audacity to distribute this literature is reprehensible. I have sent Mayor Fontana an email that will most likely have no effect but he must be told that London citizens are accepting of antics like this. Below is the email that I sent:

Good Evening Mayor Fontana,

I’m taking a few minutes of your time to express how appalled and dismayed I am to learn that Council Member Orser was the person responsible for creating and/or distributing the flyer that was shown in the Council meeting this evening. His use of such….iconic…imagery paints the entire city in a poor light at ANY level it is looked upon by. In a year where London has had more than its share of national/international gaffes this latest incident simply should not be tolerated. I implore you to take whatever steps are in your power to seek the removal of Councillor Orser from his position as Ward 4 Councillor. I don’t believe for a minute that you approve or support his willful decision to compare those in favour of fluoridation to being in favour of the Holocaust.

Thank you for your time and consideration on this serious matter.

Will it actually be read the mayor? Maybe. Will it spur the mayor to action? I doubt it. But I’ve said my piece and, for know, this is the only avenue I have to express it.

2010 London Election – My Observations So Far

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It’s election time and on October 25th we hit the polls to decide the fate of our fair city for the next four years. Thanks to fellow tweeters including, but not limited to, @late2game, @fowgre, and @kvl, I’m more interested and involved in this election than I have been in any previous election.

The race for mayor, despite having quite a few candidates, really seems to have only two realistic contenders – Anne Marie DeCicco-Best and Joe Fontana. The gap between them and the remaining candidates seems impossible to bridge. In fact there was some debate online today whether or not The London Free Press has hindered bridging that gap by not giving equal press to all mayoral candidates. It was an interesting exchange with both sides making some good points and I was thankful to be able to be an observer. I haven’t yet decided who is getting my vote but I do know some candidates that are definitely out of the running.

Of more interest to me is the race for my ward. To this end, I sent the following email to all five candidates this past Sunday afternoon (Sept. 12):

As a resident in Ward 1, I’d like to know what you see as being the most vital issues to the city and, more specifically, to our ward? What ideas, concepts, and/or plans do you have to address to these issues? Are you, or do you plan on, taking any additional steps to reach out the younger voters that are more “connected” in an effort to get them out to vote come election day?

I hope this is the beginning of a constructive dialog that will allow me to decide who to vote for on October 25th.

As you can read, I’m not asking for the world here. In fact I would think that my questions would be perfect questions for canned pre-prepared responses with very little tweaking required.

As of tonight (Wed. Sept. 15), only one candidate has responded. Gilles Longtin responded yesterday morning. I won’t reprint the email here as I didn’t receive permission to do so however if you read the Q&A with London Votes it pretty much mirrors the reply I received. Unfortunately the response didn’t really address any of my questions. There were no specific issues addressed (other than being tired of the way Ward 1 was viewed by the rest of the city) and there were no specific (or vague) plans, ideas, or concepts offered as to how to resolve the issues that weren’t addressed. The Q&A link above at least addressed connecting with the online voters whereas the response I received did not mention any online component of the candidate’s campaign.

Of the five candidates Raymond Day is the only one with a website. Unfortunately the website webpage is very rudimentary and seems purposely designed to make people not want to read it. I forced my way through and unfortunately Mr. Day, an apology for poor grammer [sic], does not earn you a pass for such a poorly designed offering. The design and content of the page, combined with the choice of election photo, makes me question the seriousness of the candidate.

The candidate that has disappointed me the most is Bud Polhill. As a veteran local politician that also has other family members running for various positions in local government, I was expecting more from him. I expected that he would be the first to respond to my email and provide some good responses to my questions. Sadly, I have heard nothing.

I find it interesting that the election that I finally decide to pay attention to is the election where it seems that no one wants my vote. If I hear from any of the other candidates I’ll be sure to follow up here and on twitter.

Local School Closings – A Simple Solution

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Whee! Time for another rant. Apparently there are rumblings in the news-o-sphere that London may be looking to close some more under-utilized schools. Needless to say, all the people who have kids that currently go to these schools are up in arms about the prospect of losing their school. If my kid’s school was to be closing it would suck but if the TVDSB made a good argument for it then so be it. If the school is only half full, or can’t even really make 1 graduating class, then maybe it’s time to look at selling off the surplus. So my kid has to go to the school down the road. It’s not like they’re going to bus him an hour across the city. Assuming the Board is intelligent about it they would move him to one of the schools within a mile on either side of his current school. Hell, the one school is close enough that he could EASILY walk there as there as well. The other school is a bit further – it would be about a 25 minute walk I think.

So here’s my solution. When they announce a school is going to be closed (based on a set criteria – usually lack of enrollment) the parents that don’t want the school to close should be given an option to keep it open. The cost of maintaining the school above and beyond the regular costs would be split amongst the parents who wish to keep their little precious at that school. I’m not talking about teacher salaries (although if there isn’t a full class that may have to be addressed). I’m talking about physical upkeep costs, maintenance staff, etc. So if a school that is built to hold 1300 students only has 600 enrolled then the axe should be sharpened. If 250 of those 600 want to keep little Bill and Sally right where they are then those 250 would submit papers agreeing to pay 1/250th of the upkeep costs. I would be willing to go out on a limb and say that once The 250 found out the cost they’d be more than happy to send Billy an extra mile or two down the road.

Rant time!

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Okay, it’s been a while. I was watching the news tonight and they were talking about the “recycling” program here in London. Prior to today I would not have included the quotes around the word recycling. However, in light of the changes I feel I have no choice. Yeah, okay, I suppose, technically, it’s still recycling some products. The changes drastically alter the type of plastics that can be recycled. It used to be types 1, 2, 4 & 5. Now, it’s pretty much just pop bottles and water bottles. So you know all those plastic food containers that are the above type? Yeah, they’re now uber non grata. So while I used to be able to divert about 50% of my waste to recycling that will probably drop to around 20-30% now. I know, I know – it’s my fault for buying recyclable materials. I’m sorry.

With this latest farce from the City of London, I’m actually glad they didn’t launch a green bin program for food waste. After all, they’d probably screw it up by only allowing non-cooked foods. Or maybe only allow wheats grown in the Canadian Plains.

This latest move clearly establishes that the City of London has absolutely NO desire to reduce waste/divert it from landfills.

A little bit of this, a little bit of that…

Posted on by Posted in Alex, Entertainment, Local Politics, Rantings & Ravings, Ryan

Long time no talk peeps! I never realized being unemployed could be SO busy! I’ve ALWAYS respected stay-at-home parents and knew they did a LOT of work. Now I know first hand and yep, it’s just as hard as I thought it was!  So this is sort of a catch-up post of various things. Read on.

Pictures: One of the main reasons y’all stop by. They’re missing. I have to rebuild those pages still. Gimme some time. There will be new pictures soon too!

On Birthdays: Alex turned 4 yesterday. 4-fucking-years-old! I can’t believe it. It does NOT seem like I’ve been moulding him in my image (poor little bastard) for 4 years now. On the plus side – I’ve managed to keep him alive for 4 years! W00t!

Elections: I swear to fucking god that if that liberal fuck forces ANOTHER election this quickly I will NEVER vote for them EVER again. If you could form a political party from all the heinous and murderous leaders from history with Hitler at the helm I would vote for that party over the liberal party. Yes, I would choose a genocidal psychopath over the liberal party. I won’t even dignify their importance by capitalizing the word liberal. Fuck them. As for the provincial branch of that party – sucks to be them. They’re getting painted with the same brush.

Gross misuse of resources: Sending eight (8!!!) OPP officers with one (1!!!) bylaw officer to inspect some guys farm because he has a lot of cars in various states of disrepair (although ALL driveable) on it. Oh yeah, and he uses these cars to make a living. He makes youtube videos that pay him over $11K a month.

Okay, enough ranting about miscellaneous shit. On to the good stuff: VACATION!!!

Nikki’s parents were awesome enough to send the four of us to Niagara Falls for a few days earlier this week. From Sunday to Tuesday we were guests of the Embassy Suites Fallsview for a relaxing (???) time at our Wonder of the World. Sunday we arrived and did the obligatory cruise down by the falls. We saw that parking was $20 there and figured that we’d maybe find a cheaper place to park. We ended up parking up at the Fallsview Casino for only $10. We walked back down the STEEP hill and went on Maid of the Mist. It was a little cool but quite nice. Alex checked out the falls a bit but, for the most part, hung back toward the middle of the ship. It may have been a little overwhelming for him or something. Hell, it’s still a little overwhelming for me and I’ve been on the boat before. After the boat ride we grabbed a ridiculously overpriced bite to eat. Our timing was absolutely perfect as it POURED rain while we were inside eating and cleared up right away. We walked back along the gorge and headed back UP that steep hill to go check into the hotel. That sucked. The climb that is. Checking into the hotel was smooth. We were on the 11th floor with an AWESOME view overlooking both the Horseshoe Falls and the American Falls. The rest of the day was spent chilling at the hotel – down in the pool then back to the room. We ate supper at the TGIFriday’s in the hotel. Okay…maybe lunch wasn’t so expensive… After supper it was just an uneventful evening in the hotel room. There were fireworks over the falls at ten o’clock so we watched those. Had to call it a night shortly after that as morning came early and we had plans.

Up and at it early Monday morning. Down to the 9th floor atrium for the buffet breakfast. The hotel has a Keg Restaurant inside as well and this is where they have the breakfast each morning (spilling over into the lounge if necessary AND the TGIFriday’s on the ground floor if it’s REALLY busy). The Keg has a STUNNING panorama of the gorge. The breakfast itself was excellent! It wasn’t a HUGE selection although it covered ALL the breakfast basics and had an awesome cook-to-order omelette bar. Ryan ate like a little pig and Alex, who usually is slow to eat, did a great job as well. After breakfast we struck off to Marineland. Nikki can’t remember ever going and, while I know that I went, I don’t actually remember going. The first thing we did was head to the “kiddie-land” rides. Alex was reluctant to go on any rides but finally made the decision to tackle the Ladybug Coaster. From that point on he was hooked. All he wanted to do was go on rides. We had to leave the area to go to the dolphin/sealion/walrus show and Alex wasn’t really interested at all in that – he just wanted to go back on the rides. He did like feeding the deers though. If you ever go to Marineland, take your own food. It’s WAY overpriced. For a kid’s hot dog combo, regular hot dog combo, and burger combo, along with a juice and two pops it was almost $30! I tried offering them Ryan in exchange but they apparently preferred money. After spending a day at Marineland we headed home for a swim in the pool. The plan was to hit-up Dave & Buster’s, go for supper, then Nikki & Alex were going to check out the magic show that our package included tickets for. That was the plan. During the swim we realized that we didn’t have time to do D&B’s so we decided to shelve that until Tuesday – after we checked out. After we swam, we got dressed and went across the street to Applebee’s for supper. Alex wasn’t the best little boy during supper and it was really up in the air whether he’d be good to sit through a magic show. When we got back to the hotel he ultimately decided for us when he ended up getting sick. Sorry magic dude, maybe next time.

Tuesday was checkout day. Up early, down for breakfast and back to the room to pack and relax until closer to checkout time. We head to Clifton Hill and spend a couple hours in Dave & Buster’s. For those that don’t know, D&B’s is an arcade/eatery. Our package came with a $60 card for the place. All the machines spit out tickets based on how you do and you can cash in the tix for prizes. Alex liked skee-ball. I ROCKED the Deal or No Deal game. After running out of credits there we went down Clifton Hill to Falls Ave and then back up, stopping at Boston Pizza for lunch. It’s kinda funny – Clifton Hill is arguably the MOST tourist driven area of Niagara Falls; possibly even moreso than The Falls themselves. Yet it was here on Clifton Hill where the food seemed to be the most reasonably priced. After lunch, we headed back to the van, got everyone settled in, and headed for home.

People talk about needing a full week to fully enjoy Disney World. I’ve no argument with that at all. However, I also believe that if a family wanted to take part in most of the things that Niagara Falls has to offer, a full week is required there as well. Perhaps even longer if you wanted to do all the tourist traps on Clifton Hill like the 4,293 different haunted houses. There’s LOTS more we would have liked to have done but just simply didn’t have the time, or, frankly, the money.

What we did have was an AMAZING three day vacation that we didn’t think would happen this year. There are hundreds of pictures and some video. I’ll get the pics posted as soon as possible. I’ve got them on the computer but I just need to get them up onto Picasa and the link posted here. Gimme a couple days.

Too funny

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Okay, this isn’t exactly local politics, but it’s funny as hell.
Here is a blog that is being kept up-to-date by the head speech writer for the Prime Minister. He’s doing the blog from his blackberry as he travels across the country with Paul Martin on the campaign trail.

Even if you hate his party, give the blog a read, it’s good for a laugh.

London Rocks!

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We’ve managed to out-class our nation’s capital and a lame-ass Quebec city to be the pick of the Shriner’s for their new Shriner’s Hospital of Canada. I use the words “out-class” specifically. At no point during the 62-month ordeal did London stoop to the name-calling and whining that the other two cities seemed to base their entire presentation on. London didn’t even respond to the other cities’ cries of foul. London’s message was positive right from the beginning – even when speaking of the other cities. Ottawa has tossed out phrases such as “sub-par” as well as stating that if Ottawa didn’t get it they’d rather see Montreal get it than London. London, even when discussing, the other cities, still spoke positively of them – just MORE positively of London. We Rock. The ordeal isn’t over yet. The Shriners still require a 2/3 majority vote by its membership in Baltimore in July. You can bet that before then both Montreal and Ottawa will be slinging more mud that an American political campaign. Maybe once they vote to build the hospital here Montreal will get so pissed off they’ll go whining to whatever person pretends to lead the province now and demand that Quebec secede from Canada again. Then we can build a really really tall wall between Ontario and Quebec – with no gates.