This is an important period in Trent Hills. As a community we face a lot of challenges and decisions. How will be finance a new hospital? How much new development do we want? And much more.
The municipal election is a good chance to consider where we are headed and how we want to get there.
As part of my coverage of the municipal election, I have been working with Herman van den Berg, a local resident who is a retired Lakehead University business professor, to develop a survey of readers about issues you are concerned about.
Herman’s past work has included surveying business executives about how they arrive at decisions and what factors they consider, so this is right up his alley.
We’ve decided to ask about housing, the hospital, the bridge, the tax rate and other factors. And to give you a chance to tell us anything we’ve missed.
Once everyone has had a chance to answer and Herman has crunched the numbers, I’ll do a story explaining what you all said and what’s most important to local residents.
The survey is anonymous; we’ll only consider the information in aggregate. We can’t tell which answers come from which email address or computer.
We’ve kept things simple and quick. It should take less than five minutes to respond. Just click on this link to go to the survey.
Dennis I could,t agree more with your post. Hastings used to be a vibrant community, dance hall, the ball park sitting on the road side, the arena for hockey, the lacrosse, later the hotel. I remember BobScriver as reft. The smile on his face said it all, he was having as much fun as us hockey players. Stayed in Hastings with my grandmother when my cousin was having a baby. Growing up I returned to Trent Hills as a policeman in 1970 and assisted Chief Hicks in a few investigations. It is a shame that this council have passed a motion to install a sun shade at the Marina when this money could go to an outdoor arena for hockey and used for summer sports. Two signs in the Marina window washrooms for boaters only. I was on council for both amalgations. Yes this council seems to be supporting the developers, with their decisions. They got stung on Nappen Island for thousands when the developer didn,t come through. How many thousands went in to putting the wooden docks, what the return is to the tax payers.
A similar question was posed elsewhere. Being somewhat lazy; I’ll simply copy and paste my existing, yet relevant, comment. “As selfish as this sounds, I want my councillor, mayor and deputy mayor to respect and address my values and interests. Thus far, they haven’t. The result, in Hastings, is a community offering so many possibilities, that through reactive planning and poor decision making has been handed over to developers more skilled at purchasing land than building homes. So many vacant properties and empty promises. Fortunately, in my ward, there is a new candidate. Whether overly optimistic or not, I’d like to imagine with this new name comes a reckoning, a reassessment and a renewed hope for our village.”