Thursday, September 22, 2011

Kerry Cook gets defensive on Economic Development

After local Realtor Henry Van Soest suggested that both the City of Williams Lake's Economic Development Office/Economic Development Corporation are doing little or nothing on the Economic Development file, Williams Lake Mayor Kerry Cook with the City's Economic Development Manager Alan Madrigga both explain to the Williams Lake Tribune what exactly the City is up to on the Economic Development front - see that article here

Why the City chose a short-term Task Force over its' already established Economic Development Corporation is beyond me and clearly has not been addressed either from City Staff or the Mayor herself and in fact - she may not be in place at the end of the year when the Task Force is slated to report out on their work, relative to the Business Expansion/Attraction Strategy (BEAS)

If there is any one item where this Mayor/Council is weak on and could come home to haunt them as voters' decide the next Williams Lake Council membership - that clearly is on Economic Development.  Out and about today - voters' tell me that this Council has maybe spent too much time on the "Arts" file and not enough on Economic Development and in the meantime - the community, in the short term, will need to decide what to do about the local pool and an Indoor Turf facility, water/sewer needs for Woodland Drive residents, the issue for re-doing the section of South Lakeside Drive between the Highway #20  Intersection to Pioneer Drive (Wal-Mart site turnoff) and maybe further to Kwaleen School and the fact that the City is sitting on close to $20 million dollars in long-term debt and how to balance all of these different yet competing needs out

SBF

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The city is sitting on that debt because of the TDC and the fire hall.Only 3.5 million of that 20 million dollars was put in place by this council. They don't have a lot of room to rebuild pools and build turf facilities and pave.