Speak up Winnipeg

Yes that worked for me will have to get involved and take it in .

okay I have finally got some free time now

8 oclock start...sorta.. man bus service sucks at 8 in the morning on saturday I had to catch the bus at 7AM to get downtown in time....anyhoo
Mayor opened the event with an explanation of what it was all about sustainable ECONOMIC, SOCIAL and ENVIRONMENTAL plan for the future. (unfortunately even though it was in the emails I would say 90% of the people there were there for ENVIRONMENTAL only )...anyhoo the event was blessed by Mr Buck from the OCN. nice speech, man does that guy ever have a voice made for politics and leadership unfortunately him and Grand Chief Ron Evans were the only visable Natives there.(. I say visable because Natives dont always look Native ) .. which is unfortunate because Natives make up a large chunk of our city, in fact there were not alot of anyone other then white people.. again very unfortunate we need to get more diversity engaged in planning our winnipeg's future.
Each speaker got up to 30 seconds to talk...I was not planning on speaking just listening in ( and any of you that know me, knows that damn near impossible). But being delegate 141 I had lots of comments to listen to.. each one saying transit transit transit!!!. save the environment... man I wish after the first 10 or so they were reminded that its not only the Environment that we care about. for this meeting.. anyway we broke for a little coffee break that was quite frankly impossible to have been made from the 100 mile radius they talk about... ( for those who dont know, oranges and coffee dont grow in manitoba )..

meeting restarted at about person 120 or so.. and I figured damn it.. I cant stay silent if this is the only message passed on to our leadership that is all they will hear...
after many many many real quick drafts ( a couple of which that may have gotten me killed ) I came up with this

A sustainable Winnipeg is one that makes all Winnipegers feel that they belong and matter. We need to realize that while many of us want a better transit system and increased densification,not everyone does. We need to listen to everyone, not just those that scream the loudest on any given day or topic. We can't chase people away by legislating where and how they live afterall Winnipeg wont exist if no one wants to live here.
We are not Vancouver, we are Montreal and we are not Halifax.
A sustainable plan will recognize that and strive towards Winnipeg being Winnipeg.

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so then more people spoke, the 6? 7 ? councillors present were like 5ish people after me. ( oo right and Grand Chief Ron Evans spoke somewhere between us) Gerbasi had an poem about the process if I remember properly it had a shot again IKEA and I cant remember if it was her, someone else or both speakers that suggested IKEA should be placed downtown.. ( marks for the poem being a Haiku.. ) other non memorable speeches by our councillors, then Harvey who was not going to speak, started speaking after some convincing.
So Harvey got up and starting talking, which started out nice, but then just went into what he wants and ending up at how the backlanes in his area need to be fixed. Which I dont really blame him, he gave it a good shot not having anything prepared.. but like a huge number of others the 30 seconds was used to focus on a specific issue that really had very little to do with a plan winnipeg for 25 years from now. Chief of police was there..he spoke on some items...

ooo yeah that reminds me.. a frick load of the senior people from the city were there.. at one point when Sam was opening the event and naming names I was wondering if maybe there were more city employees then people.. especially since about 15% of the seats went empty.. which sucks because since it was a register ahead of time event that meant that 15% of the people registered then just did not bother showing up.. and there was a freakin waiting list of people wanting to come damn it!... anyway.. where was I? Oh yeah, back to the people talking.. we wrapped up the 30 seconds sound bites... then the expert panel got to talk.. and you could tell at least one of them was completely amazed that she was invited since it was obvious of the almost hatred towards the current council's decisions.....

the panel talked for a bit and said how happy there were that something like this was happening.. but again.. even the panel all the heard was the word sustainability and poof the environment was the only thing in their heads... sigh...

anyway we broke for lunch and again they said 100Mile radius and again they served coffee and orange juice for starters, was the food actually 100 mile radius? even that I have doubts that they could prove the chicken, eggs, mustard, tomatoes, cucumbers, hell that the wheat for the bread came from within 100 miles.. after lunch we went and did round table sesssions on a variety of projects... every single time the economics was completely missing from a ton of people, thankfully the social aspect was not dropped. and thankfully it was more then just me trying to keep the economic aspect in people heads.

Some real nice ideas, some that to me seemed bizarre and again not in keeping with the spirit of the discussion.

For instance at the "Innovative financial tools" table I suggested, Self funding transit system, and other retorted with totally free transit and that transit "subsidies" need to be looked at as simply expenses just like the roads.. why should there be a difference/// ( more on that later )..
anyway all in all the round tables generated a lot of ideas and gives some good foundation for anyone who cares to actually have some input from the public and it they have time to review about 50 pages of comments and ideas... ( each person got to hit up 3 tables for 25 minutes a piece and with a max of 10 peeps to a table at a time )

another break (sort of) for the city peeps to slap a summary together..
there were some concurrent events going on.. one speaker giving a speach on 15 ways to a better community.. ( which well pretty much everyone went too) plus they had the city owned green vehicles there and someone answering questions about them .. one car supposedly will generate 125 miles per gallon, but unfortunately they just got that one 2 days before and dont have a lot of time to test it yet,..

we all got back together at 4.. a quick slide show ( available at speakupwinnipeg.com) was slapped together.. sort of showing exactly what I though it was going to show since the majority of everyone was under one sort of common mindset... some more speeches and closing remarks and tada... I finally got to go home ( well not home off to a kids hockey game but hey... thats almost home to me anyway )

so
Over all good event, more need to be held, somehow a greater diversity of races as well as ideas needs to be made to happen. The mayor is actually doing what alot of people have been asking for and that is, let us speak! real nice to see. Hope it keeps up.

Too many people came to this thing with a chip on their shoulder, seems like they just wanted to attack and attack some more instead of thinking. Very unfortunate. Was actually quite amazed that there were not officers in uniform there, but I guess plain clothes were good enough.

More events need to follow. IF they do happen, you people should go.. it was quite a good experience.

What do you think was accomplished?
How many people wasted 30 seconds mentioning the same thing?
My last meeting 30 people out of 40 mentioned the same thing that was mentioned by the person ahead of him/her. I sent a note to my councillor suggesting the City pass a rule that when that happens the person repeating the same thought should be shot!

hmmm.. accomplished. Well... 200 Winnipegers feel engaged and motivated to perhaps be more involved?

sigh.. watching the CBC news they interviewed 3 people who attended.. unfortunately one of them was Sel burrows.

He went spoke at the symposium and then repeated his message for CBC..

his message. ALL inner city kids should be able to play on sports teams and it should be funded.

Well Sel.. if you would pull your head out of your ass for a minute or two and look around. There are in fact TWO options (at a minimum) for these kids one is funding through kids sport and the other is funding already in existance for Community Centre sports through the local community centre.

BUT ... three things have to happen for this.
1) Your community centre MUST send some active representatives to the local area sports association meetings.
2) The Local Community Centre MUST hold at least one registration day, preferably well advertised so that kids actually come out
3) The kids must come out.

WE and by we I mean the citizens of Winnipeg. ARE NOT going to go door to door begging people to come out and play sports. If YOUR community centre is not being run properly then perhaps you need to engage volunteers to get out and actually be involved in the community centre.

In the inner city, community centers have become sources of employment for "volunteers" I'm afraid.

Sel is like Pat Martin. Camera hungry. You know "____ never met a camera he didn't like."

Its just so freakin frustrating .. while Sel spole the mayor just sat there nodding his head in agreement. CHRIST!!!... that cant mean the mayor is not aware of the existing funding does it? Council is the one that must top up the funding program every year because so many kids supposedly cant afford it.

I hope Sammy was agreeing with the idea that every kid should have the opportunity...which is a no-brainer anyway...political rhetoric imo.

But every kid DOES have the opportunity. NOTHING new needs to be done.

JTF wrote:In the inner city, community centers have become sources of employment for "volunteers" I'm afraid.

This is what some people want more cash for. Paid volunteers eh.

nothing wrong with rewarding volunteers with small token of appreciation, say bus passes or bus tickets, or say some hard to get concert tickets or something. Paying them for doing their job no matter how difficult is wrong on so many levels it aint even funny. HOWEVER creating paid positions and staffing those positions properly is just fine.

I don't think it's okay to create bullshit positions and then suck taxpayers money for them. Sorry.

Paid volunteers eh.

If people won't volunteer, close the club.

but some position are not bullshit ones.

If people won't volunteer, close the club.
agreed

The latest from the city to its' employees...

Getting Involved in “Speak Up Winnipeg”

As many of you will be aware, Mayor Sam Katz recently held a Symposium on Sustainability to launch the City’s development of a new 25-year official plan, OurWinnipeg. OurWinnipeg will be a comprehensive policy, land use, and development plan for Winnipeg’s future – the first totally new official plan since Unicity was created.

I am writing today to invite you to get involved in the development of this new official plan. You can do so by taking part in the citywide collaborative process called “Speak Up Winnipeg”, which is creating the plan. Your awareness and involvement in Speak Up Winnipeg is important to the success of this process, and the development of a first-rate plan.

Here are some highlights regarding Speak Up Winnipeg, and what you can do to help make it a success:

 What is Speak Up Winnipeg? Speak Up Winnipeg is a 12-month collaborative process for consulting with Winnipeggers from all walks of life – seeking out their ideas, suggestions, concerns, and hopes for the future – and developing the City’s new official plan.

 What is unique about Speak Up Winnipeg? It is the most comprehensive and participative long-range planning process ever undertaken by the City; if it is successful, it will be a best-practice model for Canadian cities.

• How do people participate in Speak Up Winnipeg? The process is anchored by an interactive website, www.speakupwinnipeg.com. This site allows users to:
• comment on a blog;
0 answer open-ended video questions;
1 submit their own video blog, and more.

Citizens will also be able to provide online feedback regarding draft strategies and reports, and participate in roundtables and open houses.
 What will happen with the information obtained in Speak Up Winnipeg?
The comments and input received through this process will be the foundation for OurWinnipeg, the new official plan. In addition to guiding the city’s development, OurWinnipeg will be a sustainability plan, promoting social, cultural, environmental, and economic sustainability.
 What can City of Winnipeg employees do to take part in Speak Up Winnipeg? Visit www.speakupwinnipeg.com , familiarize yourself with the website and the initiative, and by all means, register as a site user and post your comments – we do ask that you please be sensitive to your role as an employee of the Public Service, particularly with respect to sensitive or confidential information.

 City-Building Workshop June 23-26: You’re invited! The next big step in the Speak Up Winnipeg process is a three-day city-building workshop, also known as a “charrette”, taking place from June 23 to 26, 2009. This workshop will sort through the ideas collected in the Speak Up Winnipeg process so far, and focus on the development of strategies to integrate the best approaches. For more information on this intensive workshop, and to download a schedule of charrette sessions, visit www.speakupwinnipeg.com.

We welcome City of Winnipeg employee participation in this upcoming workshop, subject to our continued ability to meet operational requirements. If you see a seminar in working hours that you are interested in attending, please contact your supervisor, who will determine if your request can be accommodated.

Speak Up Winnipeg is reaching out to Winnipeggers of all professions, backgrounds, and parts of the community. Given the combined knowledge and experience that its members possess, the City’s Public Service has an important contribution to make to the success of this initiative. Check out the website, see what others have to say, and join in the discussion – let family and friends know, as well: they are equally welcome to participate.
Thank you for taking the time to read this e-mail, and I look forward to your contributions to the development of Winnipeg’s new official plan.

Alex Robinson, Deputy CAO

On behalf of Glen Laubenstein, Chief Administrative Officer

Have been involved from the beginning .

I thought that City of Winnipeg employee's had a union to "Speak Up" for them. Let me guess, their ideas are to hire more people and pay them more so you get better service than the private sector could provide.

How does one turn that sarcasm font on?

Sarcasm? *blinks eyes innocently...*

Anyway, back to changing the subject. JTF and DeanK are both right. The current community centre system is fucked. Volunteers are tied down doing administrative tasks that paid employees should be doing, and there is such a lack of direction and supervision on the CC's that they become a little kingdom for the regime in place. Most cc's provide that you only need 10 or 15 or 20 people to show up and elect a board, that then controls city owned facilities and administeres tens of thousands of public dollars.

As far as the subsidized sports programs, those are the ones that don't work. Kids who are fully subsidized have no commttment to the team or sport and will show up when they want. Great way to build team values. Granted the Inner City kids have issues with lack of parental support (thats a big one) and transportation, but if the inner city cc's would get together and figure it out, they could work with the recognized associations to develop alternative programs. Thats not going to happen casue they're too busy playing bingo.

I recently had an encounter with an inner city cc. I booked a field for a public event we have at work and just went in to inform them as a courtesy. I told them that I had a permit from the City and they started on how "other people" were using the field. The other people were part of the immigrant communtiy and it was a bunch of them playing soccer, just a pick up game here and there. The cc wanted to deny them the right to use the field, but they had no soccer program, nor did they make the effort to book the field.

I'm quite sure that Burrows would not want to hear from me about community centres. And yes, I continue to volunteer at one as well as one of the youth soccer clubs.

Deank wrote:How does one turn that sarcasm font on?

It doesn't work in IE6

damn