Councillor ages: does it mean anything?
The world has changed a LOT in the last few years. Things are speeding up so fast many of us have difficulty keeping up. Stereotypically the ones complaining about this “speeding up of life” are members of older generations. This isn’t ageist – its just that those under the age of 35 have grown up with a high level of change and haven’t been around long enough to remember any form of ”good old days” when the pace of life was different.
As my grandma once told me: each generation that has passed has experienced more change in their lifetime than the one immediately preceding them. Or you could just ask anyone who has had to ask a toddler to program their latest gadget; they’ll tell you. (My best friend’s daughter who is just two is already better than I am with Skype for example.)
While it has been my experience frame of mind, rather than age, is usually a much better indicator of willingness to work with – rather than against – the new challenges the world may give you, there is sadly no denying it can be a factor. So with that in mind, here is the list of the ages of Calgary City Council incumbents as of voting day 2010. Decide for yourself if their is an age pattern to the ones you agree with, and compare your philosophies with the ones about the same age as you.
Although, there are none under 40 so I can’t really compare myself on that basis. And I’m not sure how many of my blog readers will be able to either. (Perhaps that’s a naive assumption on my part however.) Either way, I still find it interesting to know the demographics of those who represent me and I thought you might too. So here they are:
Dave Bronconnier – 48
Dale Hodges – 69
Gord Lowe – 71
Jim Stevenson – 65
Bob Hawkesworth – 59
Ray Jones – 57
Joe Connelly – (Couldn’t find his age.)
Druh Farrell – 51
John Mar – 41
Joe Ceci – 53
Andre Chabot – 51
Brian Pincott – 49
Ric McIver – 51
Diane Colley-Urquhart – 61
Linda Fox-Mellway – (Couldn’t find her age.)
These ages are based off of numbers I pulled from the introductory articles of candidates in one of our two big newspapers during the 2007 election, so I can’t vouch that they are 100% accurate. Please forgive me if there is a mistake.
And yes, there is something to be said for having life experience too.
How open data came to be in Calgary
At this today’s Regular Meeting of Council, Calgary City Council passed their Open Data Motion.
Obviously I’m beyond excited about the City of Calgary transitioning into a period of openness and accountability. Passing an open data motion should be seen as a gigantic step forward in rethinking how a government interacts with citizens and who really runs ‘the show’. The people.
I thought I’d take advantage of this moment to shine the light on how this motion came to be.
On May 27 I saw something come across the CBC Spark Twitter feed that caught my eye. Thanks to the wonders of the internet, in writing this post I am able to go back and see exactly what it said: “Just posted full interview with @andreareimer about open data, open source, and cities that think like the web: http://bit.ly/129Cox “. It was that bit about cities thinking like the web that interested me. What did it mean? So I clicked the link.
After listening to Nora Young’s interview with Vancouver city councilor Andrea Reimer I thought to myself, “Why can’t Calgary have something like that? What’s stopping us?” The next day on May 28 I had a coffee meeting with Calgary Alderman Joe Ceci and the former president of my community association. Following the meeting Joe offered me a ride to work downtown. We got to chatting and I mentioned the project Vancouver is undertaking. He was interested but it was nothing more than a conversation during a car ride. On June 6 I was having a coffee with Ald. Brian Pincott on Olympic Plaza to talk about ward boundaries and how things had gone so wrong. Hoping to introduce something of a little more hopeful tone to the conversation I mentioned the Spark interview and the Vancouver Open Government project. He too was interested.
Somewhere in there I came up with the ludicrous idea that I should get these two aldermen to talk with their Vancouver counterpart. And it just so happened that the Federation of Canadian Municipalities was meeting in Whistler the next week. Knowing both Ald. Ceci and Ald. Pincott were attending I contacted Cllr. Reimer via Twitter. She too was attending. So I sent the three an email saying they should get together while in Whistler. (I also attempted to include Cllr. Don Iverson of Edmonton, but as he just had a baby he told me he would not be attending. We talked more about the project however when I drove up to Edmonton to attend TransitCamp on May 30. Edmonton, as it turned out, followed Vancouver and Calgary’s lead and actually got their open data motion passed months ago.)
After a couple friendly emails over the next couple weeks I found out they did not get a chance to meet up with Cllr. Reimer in Whistler but Ald. Ceci met with another Vancouver councilor. Toward the end of June Ald. Ceci and Pincott had met with the city’s IT department and the text of a motion was being drafted.
On November 17 I heard from Heather Reed-Fenske, the City’s Manager, eGovernment Strategy with some of the direction they were heading with the research for the report. She wanted to chat to update me and gain any insight I might have around the issue. On December 18 we met for coffee; where she joked she had been in her job for all of one week when City Council passed the notice of motion I recommended, she’d been working on almost nothing since, and thus hated me. We talked about several different things that other jurisdictions have done and I’m happy to see much of our conversation was incorporated into the final report.
The Report was being prepared for December 2009, but Heather and her team asked for an extension to the February 10 meeting of the Standing Policy Committee on Finance and Corporate Services where it was to be debated, edited and (hopefully) recommended to move to Council for a full vote. They needed the extra time to do more research. As I told Heather at the time: “It’s okay. It’s not a race, it’s a marathon. Just finishing is what’s important.” As February approached Ald. Pincott and Ceci realized they would both be in Ottawa for a conference that week and so asked for another delay until March 10 because, as the movers of the original motion, all agreed they should be in attendance.
The March 10 meeting was painful for me to watch. I had to be at work that morning and could only get away from my desk for an hour from 10am to 11am. This meant I missed the public input window and arrived in time for the last two thirds of the debate and the vote – which passed with only Ald. Chabot, Connelly, and Hodges against. It was painful because I just wanted to jump up and answer all the aldermen’s questions. Instead I had to rely on the answers of Heather and her boss – both relative newcomers to the issues surrounding open data. I knew I couldn’t answer questions about the City’s implementation of open data nearly as well as they could, but there were many other questions about what other jurisdictions have done and what the purpose of open data was that I could have answered that would have helped. (For example, one major issue brought up by more than one alderman was around the risk of hackers. What they did not understand is that open data eliminates the need for the majority of hacking because open data is giving the information away. Not to mention open data 1.0 does not open a portal to actual databases. All the information pulled for a data catalogue is exported information with no additional danger of a hacker access to the database.) I wished I would have been able to give them a streamlined version of the open data presentation I did at DemoCamp on January 26.
After all that the motion came to council today and following another debate, which I understand was once again fraught with misunderstanding about what open data is and what it does, it passed with a vote of 10 to 4 with Ald Hodges, Connelly, Fox-Mellway & Chabot voting against it. (Mar was absent.)
I know this might sound a little corny, but I’m elated at this moment. After almost one full year of work, today a motion brought forward by a single citizen passed City Council. A motion that could be the beginning of forever changing the way the City of Calgary thinks about the way it interacts with citizens and how democracy can work in Cowtown.
THAT is a big deal.
And I’m happy to have been able to play my small part in the process.
I can’t wait to play a part in the next steps of the process too.
A collection of my previous posts on open data coming to Calgary:
Open Data presentation at DemoCamp
Calgary open data report delayed
Open Government starts to expose what’s in the shadows
Brian Pincott on Open Data at Calgary City Hall
Help ensure Calgary’s “Open City” initiative is framed in the right light
Open Government starts to expose what’s in the shadows
Ald. Ceci and Ald. Pincott’s notice of motion regarding open data becoming the standard at the City of Calgary passed this morning with only a couple amendments. One amendment was regarding cost of making the data available and another was asking for the City’s legal departments input. Both very good amendments in my opinion. The motion asked for a report on the feasibility of opening up the City’s data to the public from Administration to be completed and we should see it in December 2009.
I suggested the open data project to Ceci and Pincott in the first place is because it is one very simple way for the City to open up and become more transparent. This is what Open Government is all about.
In this day and age where we see dropping percentages of people who vote, and fatigue over partisan bickering, it strikes me that it is time to remind citizens who’s in charge and why the City exists in the first place.
Cities were of course created for one reason only: to make the lives of their citizens better.
So a group of engaged citizens in the 19th century stood up and said ‘if you wish, we will set the direction for how our City can make our lives better’. The rest of the population responded by holding an election to determine which citizens best characterize the direction they would like to see their city go, and the result was a group who immediately got to the business of making their city a better place to live.
They did this by hiring people to work projects on behalf of the citizens. They set policy and safety standards and generally did the job they were elected to do. Citizens watched and judged their accomplishments – letting them know when they agreed and when they disagreed. Every few years the population got a chance to change their representative if they felt it was necessary. And the building continued.
However at some point in time the elected individuals as well as the people they hired ended up hidden in the shadow of the behemoth organization they created in the name of making the lives of citizens better. Issues became more and more complex as more and more issues fall to their plates for solutions. More and more people were hired, more and more details were added. The entire undertaking became incredibly hard for the average citizen to follow, to judge and provide input on. This, unfortunately, is the government we have today.
Open Government is about using new technologies to shine the light on what is happening on our behalf. It is meant to turn back the clock and give the average citizen a way to be involved again.
Open Data is one small step in that direction; because, it is important to note, the data in our government’s possession is collected on behalf of us with a goal of making our lives better.
We, the citizens, own that information and we have every right to access it.
This brings me to today’s motion. I was hopeful that all aldermen would see this motion as a positive step toward opening up our government and not allowing individuals to live in the shadows – either on purpose or by accident. I truly thought we would see a unanimous vote of approval for looking into the practicality of open data for the City of Calgary. So I was surprised to see two aldermen vote to keep the citizens they supposedly represent at bay. Two aldermen who wanted to keep the City’s work in the shadows.
I’m extremely disappointed in Ald. Chabot and Ald. Connelly for not even entertaining the possibility of allowing the citizens of our city to better know the work they – and those they’ve hired – are doing on our behalf.
Security, privacy and legality concerns are all real need to be looked and more than likely addressed. This report will do that. So why not just SEE what the possibilities are instead of regressing back into the shadows?
Today’s motion was just the beginning of shining the light on the shadows and it shone directly on Chabot and Connelly. They have been exposed.
And just like my opinion of open data in general: what the citizens might do with this newly exposed information is what really excites me.
My comments to City Council on the future of Calgary
For those that follow my Twitter feed and my blog you know I have have had an entirely split focus for the past couple of days. My blog has dealt exclusively with the Doug Elniski issue while on Twitter I have posted dozens of tweets over the same time regarding the City of Calgary’s PlanIT public consultation process going on at City Hall.
PlanIT is an extremely important document laying out the ‘plan’ for how Calgary will grow over the next 60 years. As a result public input has been sought for quite sometime and ‘for’ and ‘against’ side are now providing their thoughts in person to Council. The ‘pros’ concluded last night after two days of presentations (about 110 people signed up to speak) and the ‘cons’ began immediately following (about 60 people signed up to speak).
Last night – at number 97 – I provided my thoughts. Below are my comments to council:
Thank you for allowing me to the opportunity to speak. My name is DJ Kelly, I am an administrator in the not-for-profit sector and president of the Winston Heights/Mountview CA.
I’m happy to answer questions from the point of view of our CA but today I’m simply talking as an engaged citizen.
I wanted to begin, if I may, by thanking Council and Administration for showing vision in creating this document. I’m confident we can all agree, that no business or organization can possibly be effectively run without a big picture strategic plan.
I’m reminded once again of one columnist’s comment from sometime in the late 90s that Calgary is “the city that planning forgot”. With the approval of PlanIT no longer will we be able to be the butt of these kinds of jokes. PlanIT finally provides Calgary with the strategic growth plan columnists and citizens alike have requested oh so frequently.
I’m hopefully the cries of “those fools down at City Hall have no idea what they’re doing” will be, if not eliminated, at least lessened because of this document.
The benefit of speaking toward the end of the “for” or “pro-PlanIT” list is I don’t need to get into the reasons why you should or should not support PlanIT. Instead I can marvel at some of the fantastic comments made by previous speakers.The main one that comes to mind is Derek the Urban Studies student from UofC. I think he brought forward a perspective that many have not thought of when discussing PlanIT and it bears repeating: our generation will not live the same kind of life our parents and grandparents did. Just as they did not live the same kind of life as those a generation before them. There are no pioneers or gunfighters in our midst any longer.
None of us in this room are psychics. We cannot predict the future and should not purport to. Even the City’s own marketing for the PlanIT response process makes light of this fact. I cannot say what the city will need in 60 years, and despite the protests of others that I’m sure are coming, they cannot either.
Look at what we planned on 60 years ago. Those are the very things we are now struggling with and that people smarter than us have shown to be unsustainable. Even the poor bulging city budget shows that at the very least we need to think differently.
This is why the “spirit” of PlanIT is far more important than anything else. So long as we can agree with the points and goals laid out in the first few pages we are heading in the right direction.
The one thing we can say for sure is that PlanIT will change and grow over time. It will have to be a living document. There will be variations as we move forward. We do not need to approve the perfect plan this week. However I think PlanIT lays an excellent the groundwork for the future and I’m proud to live in a city with this kind of vision.
Another thing I think is important to note is that every speaker who has lamented the non-inclusion of the airport tunnel has self classified themselves as “in favour” of PlanIT. I’m encouraged that despite their disappointment, they still have the foresight to see what PlanIT can do for the city.
I am interested to hear the comments of those not in favour of PlanIT. From what I have heard through the press it sounds like the majority are from one single industry, whereas those who have spoken in favour appear to represent a large swath of industries. Having PlanIT receive such wide-spread support leaves me further encouraged.
Personally I’m more concerned with the City’s track record of follow through on ambitious plans. My thoughts on that can be found in tomorrow’s post for Alberta Venture’s Think Alberta,
I won’t get into them today other than to say I encourage City Council to have the courage of our convictions, approve this big picture plan, and get on with the process of building the better city I know this council wants.
Questions followed from Ald McIver about my statements around implementation. I answered that, yes, indeed I do see this as the major concern facing council moving forward and regardless of what planning document we approve it will continue to be the major issue and Council and Administration has serious work ahead of them. More background on that is in my Alberta Venture Think! Alberta post that will be available at 1pm today. (I’ll cross post here following that.) Part II goes up on Friday.
Ald Chabot congratulated me on my timing for showing up shortly before my presentation time. I thanked the internet and the Council webcast. He followed up with another question but to be honest I don’t remember what it was. I remember it being akward and me not really understanding what he was asking. It felt adveseraly (is that even a word?) and I certainly didn’t mean for it to. Sorry if it came across that way!
From the high ideals of 1993 to the gerrymander of 2009
Below is some interesting information to help frame the discussion around whether Ald. Chabot’s council approved map is a good solution and if a proper process was followed.
Policy Title: Ward Boundary Determination and Review
Policy Number: CC017
Approved by: Council
Effective Date: 1993 May 03The criteria used by the Returning Officer for reporting or in developing proposals
during ward boundary reviews are as follows:
- Total Population/Total Electors – all calculations will be based on the number of electors and total population. The total population is to be relatively equal between the wards. It is desirable to maintain a relative equality between the wards and the number of electors;
- Deviation – the maximum allowed deviation from the mean population per ward is +/- 25%. The preferred deviation that the Returning Officer should attempt to achieve is +/- 10 to 15%. This is consistent with current court decisions.
- Future Growth – the potential for growth in each ward over the next 10 years is a factor to be considered.
- Community Boundaries – wherever possible the Ward Boundaries and The City developed Community District Boundaries should coincide. Community Association boundaries are given consideration to attain limited splits. It should be noted that these are not controlled by The City and are difficult to guarantee.
- Easily Identifiable Boundaries – wherever possible, the Ward Boundaries shall be readily identifiable to the public by utilizing major streets, significant topography, etc.
- Least Number of Changes – to reduce confusion to the electorate and implementation costs, proposals developed by the Returning Officer should involve the fewest changes possible to accomplish the required adjustments.
- Block Shaped Wards – in accordance with the 1960 October 19 plebiscite, wards are to be relatively “block” shaped and not “pie” shaped with the downtown being the centre of the pie.
- Environmental Mix – efforts will be made to equalize, wherever possible, the distribution of commercial, rural, industrial, institutional and green space areas between the wards.
- Philosophy of Approach – the general philosophy to be used in developing proposals for Ward Boundary changes are two fold; (a) to develop changes which should not require major adjustments for a span of three general elections; and (b) to have the higher population in the more stable inner city wards and the lower population in the growth area wards.
You’ll also notice that no where in this policy – that was first written in 1960 – does it give the criteria of 5 aldermen on the east side of Deerfoot. So why is it appropriate to suddenly give this new criteria to the Returning Officer after she submitted her proposals? After all she’s been at work on those proposals since May 2006…
Here is is the text of C2009-12 Attachment 1 which shows where the ball started rolling at that time:
Council asked Administration to begin the ward boundary revisions earlier than scheduled by the Policy. At its meeting of 2006 May 15, Council adopted the following recommendation, as amended, FCS2006-19:“3. Direct Administration to commence a process for a major Ward redistribution in 2008 January, with a view to have the complete recommendations to Council before spring of 2009.”
Following that the Returning Officer sped things up considerably before returning with Report 2008-83 on 2008 November 28 giving two proposed options. Alderman Chabot apparently was a fan because an excerpt of those minutes show:
“REFER, Moved by Alderman Chabot, Seconded by Alderman Connelly, that Report C2008-83 be referred to Administration to report to the 2009 February 09 Combined Meeting of Council with a comparison to the recommendations which were contained in Options A and B in 2006.”
The Returning Officer did just that. She showed up with the same documents as well as the maps she created in 2006 for the 2007 election that were not adopted. On 2009 February 09 C2009-12 was adopted which states:
“That Council;
1. Adopt Scenario A as the ward boundaries for the 2010 general election; and
2. Direct Administration to prepare a bylaw to amend Bylaw 19M91, Ward Boundary Bylaw, to return to Council no later than 2009 March.”
The bylaw was written. 13M2009 could now have first reading.
Then along came 2009 March 16 with C2009-21 when proposals by Ald. Chabot, Ald. Farrell and Ald. Hawkesworth were also tabled. The suggestion was:
“That with respect to Bylaw 13M2009, Being a Bylaw Of The City of Calgary To Amend Bylaw 19M91, To Establish Ward Boundaries, Alderman Chabot, Farrell and Hawkesworth’s proposals be referred to the Returning Officer for a report to the 2009 April 06 Combined Meeting of Council.”
C2009-21 goes on to state:
That Council:
1. Abandon Bylaw 13M2009; and
2. Give Bylaw 25M2009 first reading.
Confused yet?
And here we are with bylaw 25M2009 – Ald. Chabot’s proposed map – having had first reading and everything the Returning Officer has been instructed to do since 1993 being thrown out the window.
Remember that policy given to the Returning Officer in 1993? How much of that do you see in Ald. Chabot’s map? It’s been a long journey from the high ideals of 1993 to the gerrymander of 2009.
Oh, and by the way: from AOCC2009-58 (the infamous meeting where Aldermen asked the Returning Officer to come up with a proposal showing 5 aldermen on the east side of Deerfoot):
The Committee determined it was uncomfortable with recommending a specific Ward boundary Scenario to Council.
But thanks for the map Ald. Chabot!
And after all that boring blah-blah-blah. How about some maps showing the history of proposals from 2006 until now?
I hope that helps you make a little more sense of it. It’s all very confusing. Suffice to say: don’t gerrymander, let the Returning Officer do what you asked them to do. Sometimes the simplest things that prove to be the hardest…
PS – A big thank you the the City Clerk for tracking down all 17 documents associated with C2009-12 and C2009-21.
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