The councillors who began this campaign proudly proclaiming achievements in the form of  bricks and mortar spending, missed the fact that voters had already formed their own opinions about what the ballot box issue was going to be. That is runaway spending and its equally evil twin, mounting debt. A secondary issue was a perception that Rothesay wasn’t keeping the public fully informed about how and why money was being spent. In other words, there was a lack of accountability.

Conventional political wisdom has it that successful campaigns focus voters’ attention toward the issues that best reflect the strengths of their candidate and away from issues that might reflect poorly on them. That is perhaps why we are hearing little from current councillors about their involvement in the unpopular Hampton Road project.

From their social media campaigns and campaign literature, however, it’s clear that the returning hopefuls were largely tone deaf to rising anger over wasteful spending and closed doors at town hall.

Rothesay’s debt during the four years of the current council has increased more than 250% (2011 -2015) and the councillors, who are running for re-election, have to take responsibility for that record.

On a go forward basis, voters want to know where the returning councillors would stand stand if they again took charge of the town’s cookie jar for four more years. (We’ll cover the new candidates on this next week)

The litmus test for most voters, has become the proposed $15,000,000.00 arena.  All four, Wells, Alexander, Mcguire, and Lewis continue to support this project, the spending that goes with it, and by extension, the estimated 8 -10% tax increase that would be needed to pay for it.

If voters are seeing the new Arena as a another money mineshaft, I believe we are going to see a few dead canaries after May 9th.

Many believe the vote on May 9th is both a plebiscite on the Arena and on the spending record of these four Councillors. There will be some casualties  among those who want their old jobs back if that is true.

The mayoral race does give voters a more clearly defined choice especially on the Arena issue…

Mayoral Candidate Nancy Grant wants a new Arena for $15 million and Pat Gallagher Jette wants to follow the more modest option that was adopted with the Rothesay Recreation Master Plan but seemingly ignored by this Council. That is, do the refurbishment recommended by the consulting engineering firm who authored the 2009 plan.

As for other town spending, only Pat Gallagher Jette voted against the 2016 Town budget which includes spending that required a tax rate increase this year. That gives her the high ground on fiscal responsibility.

In looking back through Council minutes, we could find little evidence that there was much if any pushback among the other councillors on the spending that appears to have voters so upset.

All councillors, except Pat Gallagher Jette and Blair MacDonald (Who is not running again), voted to go ahead in 2015 with the Common’s project knowing that their decision implied a tax rate increase.

In that February 2015 Council meeting, Deputy Mayor Nancy Grant, Councillors Matt Alexander, Peter Lewis, Bill Maguire, and Miriam Wells voted to approve discretionary spending of $2,203,500.00 on the Rothesay Common with the full knowledge that they were effectively voting for higher taxes for the next 10 to 15 years. The town treasurer’s advice is worth reading as it it his potential tax rate impact that I refer to. For the record it can be found near the bottom of page 7 of the council minutes of that 2015 Council meeting (here).

Voters are not just upset about the volume of spending, they are angry  about what the money was spent on. That is, if they’ve been able to get any information at all…

Spending, like the $ 1.5 million spent on Hampton Road flagpoles and flower beds has got residents particularly angry. The Common’s project, however, generates a slightly different response. Some believe it’s a great project at any price. More become a little less supportive when the cost details emerge. (See the captioned picture below)

Just what the Town spent it’s $2.2 million on may never be known to the public as Council won’t release the detailed costing. That information was redacted from documents supplied when the town finally responded to a Right To Information request last year.

Interestingly, in the minutes from the March 2016 Council meeting indicate that the town asked the Municipal Capital Borrowing Board for approval for a long list of amenities for the Common, including $150,000 for washrooms!  (The detail is here in the March 2016 minutes. Bottom of page 10.)

There are two washrooms (one is pictured at the top of this page) and a small changing room in the new building. In total they represent less space than in the old building that was built with donated money at little or no cost to taxpayers.

In 2015 Rothesay Council was willing to borrow $150,000, or 40 times the cost of the original 1967 skate house, for these washrooms! It’s this attitude toward spending that voters are reacting to in 2016.

As to the question of  Why councillors spent so liberally for four years, that’s something you might ask them when you have a chance.

On May 9th, I for one am voting for more fiscal responsibility, something that I believe we haven’t seen much of from the councillors asking for our vote again this time around.

oneRothesay.com will  look at the new candidates who favour more careful spending in upcoming posts. Thank you for reading!