With two candidates for Mayor and ten for Council, Rothesay has a fully contested campaign leading to May 9th.
The race for the Mayor’s job is between a long serving, effective member of Rothesay Council, Pat Gallagher Jette, and a newcomer to Rothesay Council, Dr. Nancy Grant who has served as Deputy Mayor for the last four years and by all reports embraced her role with enthusiasm.
Candidates for mayor are excluded from also running as councillors. As a result, one of these two candidates will be out of the council chamber after May 9th.
Pat Gallagher Jette, with her reputation as a determined and hardworking member of Rothesay Council, is running on a platform of greater transparency at Council and more responsible spending, including holding the line on or reducing the tax rate.
Pat Gallagher Jette, with her reputation as a determined and hardworking member of Rothesay Council, is running on a platform of greater transparency at Council and more responsible spending, including holding the line or reducing the tax rate.
Transparency is not just a cause Pat has taken up on the eve of an election, but one she has consistently championed throughout her political carreer. Her focus, no doubt, draws from her legal practice as well as lessons learned on Council, especially her frustration at not getting adequate information from Town staff on which to make informed decisions. Anyone who has tried to follow the business of this council can understand that frustration.
Pat has also shown her resolve to get answers despite opposition from a block of Councillors who for the last four years have opposed her efforts to shine more light on Council decision-making.
Councillor Jette has been seen by observers as a source of sober second thought on Council and a brake on some of the more “exuberant” of her council colleagues. She will be a big loss to Rothesay council if her Mayoral bid is unsuccessful. Pat Gallagher Jette’s website can be reached by clicking here.
The second Candidate for Mayor, Dr. Nancy Grant, was elected in 2012 on a wave of discontent with the spending of the previous Rothesay Council.
While Dr. Nancy Grant was elected in 2012 on a wave of discontent with the spending of the previous Rothesay Council, it’s not clear that in her role as Deputy Mayor, she has influenced any improvement in the way Rothesay makes spending decisions.
The previous Council was seen as wasting money on projects like the failed Twin Rinks. The Town was forced to abandon this project when it failed to acquire the land it needed for the second ice surface despite spending more than $750,000 on consultants, a result that got little media coverage or mention in open meeting of Council. In fairness, Dr. Grant bears no responsibility for that fiasco, but should have been empowered by the lessons learned from it.
Dr. Grant’s facebook page chronicles, with a hint of old fashioned chequebook politics, the projects she has supported over the last four years, including; “…[Rothesay] Common renewal, Oakville Acres detention pond, new recreation facilities for Wells, curbside recycling, and development of an emergency reception/warming centre.”
Dr. Grant’s campaign flyer outlines a further list of her priorities that includes the big ticket promise of a new Arena, but is silent on the issue of a major water and sewer system upgrade that is mandated by new environmental legislation. The water and sewer project will be hard for taxpayers to swallow if at the same time Council decides, as a priority, to spend on an Arena.
Nancy Grant came out early in 2014 in support of the $13 million Arena. This was after Council’s failure to launch a Rothesay Field House project. The cost for that had soared to $28.8 million and no funding partners could be coaxed to come anywhere near a project that would have been unaffordable for a town five times our size.
In an article from 2014, the Telegraph Journal covered her reasons for supporting the new arena project (an alternative to the scrapped Field House project). Dr. Gant raised eyebrows when she objected to the suggestion of working with Quispamsis on a joint Arena because that would entail a 20 minute drive to the Qplex, five minutes beyond the Rothesay Arena. TJ subscribers can read the June 2014 article by following this link.
Dr. Grant’s campaign for Mayor also picked up some headwind when, at March’s Council meeting, she withdrew her support for a planned independent, outside look at Rothesay’s financial and procurement practises. It was a surprising move for a politician in 2016. ( A previous version of this post referred to February’s meeting. I apologise for any misunderstanding arising from this error. Dr. Grant had previously voted for the study at an earlier Finance Committee. Then at the March Council meeting, Dr. Grant proposed a motion to table the study until the next Council was in place. Her motion was lost due to the lack of a seconder. The March minutes may be found here. Reference is at bottom of page 6.)
Today, improved transparency and open government is not just aspirational it is the standard western governments are being measured by. Public opinion is firmly behind the value of more open government. This is something Dr. Grant will have to work on if she is going to win over voters.
Choosing between these two candidates may well boil down to who is more aligned to the public mood on Transparency and open government and who is to be trusted with controlling Rothesay’s increasing appetite for tax payers hard earned cash.
Choosing between these two candidates may well boil down to who is more aligned to the public mood on Transparency and open government and who is to be trusted with controlling Rothesay’s increasing appetite for tax payers’ hard-earned cash.
oneRothesay.com will link to Dr. Grant’s platform when she has one with a link she’d like to share.
Starting Monday, oneRothesay.com will look at the other Council race. If you have any comments we can be reached by email editor@onerothesay.com