On Tuesday, March 27th, Williams Lake Council will meet as a "Committee of the Whole" to discuss a letter that was received from the Office of the Mayor - City of Quesnel inviting Williams Lake Council to a meeting to be held in April (on a Saturday) to have meaningful discussion and dialogue on how to improve the muncipalities relationship with the Cariboo Regional District based on commonalities and differences that each muncipality may have with the CRD (Cariboo Regional District). I'm told that both the District of 100 Mile House and Wells muncipal Councils' will not be in attendance due to scheduling issues, thereby leaving Williams Lake and Quesnel to be in attendance at this meeting. Having only 2 of the 4 Muncipal Councils in attendance at this meeting makes the meeting not worth having. So, if Quesnel truly wants to have a harmonized relationship with the Cariboo Regional District, then they must do the following:
1) Remove all CRD Function Service Reviews from the table (Sub-Regional Recreation and Library)
2) Mayor Bello must quit negotiating the new Quesnel Library location in public. Leave that to the respective Staffs' to do that on behalf of the CRD Board of Directors' and Quesnel City Council. He is the Chief Executive Officer of the City of Quesnel. Even when he suggests a location, it tends to have weight in the eyes of the public.
3) At the beginning of each new term of Council, sit down with the North Cariboo Joint Planning Committee and map out 2-3 common goals for the North Cariboo Region to be completed by the end of the local government 3 year term.
4) Change voting rules at the North Cariboo Joint Planning Committee immediately from Majority Vote to Voting by Consensus. This will address the issue of Wells not feeling like a true partner at the NC Joint Planning Committee Table and will show that each person's opinion at the Joint Committee Table is no more valuable than the other. Also, it will, in time, end of the practice of Us-versus-Them at the NC Joint Planning Committee
5) End the practice of linking financial participation in One CRD Function to an another, otherwise know as bartering of CRD Functions. It doesn't work except to antagonize the relationship between the CRD and the City of Quesnel.
What Quesnel has been doing with its' relationship with the Cariboo Regional District doesn't work because Williams Lake did exactly what, Quesnel is doing now, years ago and only now for the good and hard work of former Mayor Rick Gibson and CRD Area "F" Director Duncan Barnett were they are able to turn the relationship around in Williams Lake and now Williams Lake has been able to work with the CRD to get a number of projects that affect the Central Cariboo Region completed including a newly renovated Cariboo Memorial Complex, completion of a Beef Cluster Strategy among others.
By acting on the above over a matter of time, this will rectify the situation between the City of Quesnel and the CRD and allow everyone to see the benefits of a good, hard-working relationship between members of the CRD Northern Directors', Quesnel City Council, CRD Board of Directors' and their respective Staffs'.
What do you think?
Email me at apsecrty@telus.net
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