What Is The Inside View of Sam Katz Poor Ratings?

We all know that he is the best Mayor that Winnipeg has at the moment!

Who is complaining?

rosencrentz wrote:Who is complaining?

The people who voted for Judy...both of them.

I voted for Sammy and still think he's a dork...a piss poor mayor and a liar.

I like him because he's upfront about it.

JTF wrote:I voted for Sammy and still think he's a dork...a piss poor mayor and a liar.

I like him because he's upfront about it.

And your alternative was......?

exactly.

Generally he's lost the support of many due to not being the conservative he was expected to be. City Hall and bureaucracy is growing - not shrinking. That means one of two things - Katz is a spineless liar - or - it's just not possible to reduce the size and power that unions have. Something tells me we'll need a serious financial crash before anything meaningful happens in this area. Even then. Katz has also lost profile due to the myriad of small increases while claiming to hold the line on taxes - and let's not forget his ignoring of the facts of the photo-enforcement scam. If anybody other than Judy (of some stature) had run against him - they would have had a great chance. Next election he will lose.

Totally agreed. It was an election between the devil we were familiar with and evil incarnate. Of the two we got the devil we were familiar with. And he, like McFadyen, continue to confound in the way they do things...

Jondo wrote:Next election he will lose.

Nope. He's said that he's not running in the next election.

Steeves?

Pagthkhan

Murray.

alphabet

Steeves - and he will win by a wide margin against Judy. She's been emboldened by the recent NDP sweep so I'm sure she's already planning to run in three years.

DeanK and I will find some of my retirement funds to make 100,000 sofas to give out with his name on them!

Deank wrote:Pagthkhan

Ewwwwwwww. Stinky!

I'm not voting at all if Pat Nat Khan is running....

Just like if I were in another country and

The (Inter)Net & Yahoo! were running for PM or Pres...Politics is a rigged GAME.

Ian Rabb may run I figure.

I think Ian Rabb is running now...

Once again, Broadbeck is right on the money. Disagree?

Katz a disappointment

"We had high hopes for Winnipeg Mayor Sam Katz when he was first elected to office in a 2004 byelection.

“We” meaning the business community and fiscally conservative-minded people.

We thought finally, a real member of the business community who has successfully operated for-profit businesses is finally in the mayor’s office.

All told, he’s been in office seven years.

And what does he have to show for it?

Not much.

Sadly, Katz failed to live up to the expectations we had of him.

For example, Katz pledged to phase out the business tax. It never happened. He made some progress on the business tax for downtown companies, but that’s it.

He used to rightly complain that the business tax is unfair and damaging because businesses — who already pay property taxes — get nothing in return for the tax. And it discourages private investment."

I agree.

I also agree with his assessment of our former mayors.

No more wash-outs like former mayor Glen Murray whose only credentials was that he held political office and worked as a low-level social activist.

We had former mayor Susan Thompson who was supposed to represent the business community. But she couldn’t even keep Birt Saddlery on Main Street — her family business — open.

Not to mention how she allowed former city coun. Terry Duguid to negotiate one of the worst contracts ever with the city’s main union, CUPE Local 500. That’s when “job security” was invented at 510 Main Street. And it’s still killing taxpayers today.

Prior to that we had the perennially liberal Bill Norrie who represented everything that is bad about politics.

We need somebody like Rob Ford (Toronto Mayor). Slash and burn the establishment - damn the unions and the ones vested in the bureaucracy. There's more of us (the populus) than they.

Now I understand why the City is in such poor condition!

The question is, why don't "slash and burn"-type candidates run for office?

Can you think of anyone out there who fits that description?

Rosencrentz, don't say "Shindle-Man!"

If somebody did, indeed, come out with such a policy, the unions would mount a counter-campaign to make sure the person wouldn't get in.

That's a lot of money to match.

While I support Katz, I'm not one of his cheerleaders, but in his defence, and the defence of anyone else in the position mayor, it has to be a frustrating job.



While we all know that the unions have a pretty good stranglehold on a lot of things going on, gutting their power isn't as easy as we would like. The media is constantly asking the union opinion on policy decisions. Every time theres a cop issue, we hear form Mike Sutherland and Davidson has now weighed in on the proposals regarding the sh1t state of city owned/run arenas and golf courses.



JTF hit the nail on the head, anyone running for office who states that they're going to take on the unions, will probably never get elected.



Bill Norrie is a good guy and everyone loves him, but thats because he offended no one. Look where that left us. Susan Thompson did a good job of making the transition from that cluster frick called the Board of Commissioners to a City Manager model. That was a good start. Glen Murray was there for Glen Murray.



It must be an incredibly frustrating job. If I had hair, I'd probably pull it out before too long.

AND.... its not like Winnipeg City Council and Toronto City Council are set up the same

In Winnipeg the mayor has virtually zero power, hell the city has zero power and needs to ask the province for permission for damn near everything

There has never been 1 Mayor, Councillor, MP (federal or provincila), or local elected official that has ever passed the forum acceptance test!

That is why the whole country is in such dire straights- All we elect is stupid people to represent us.

I dont know what the solution is?

Any suggestions?

More criticism?

Less criticism?